McEwen's — Restaurant in Memphis

Not my best dining experience. I'll start with the good parts: Server was professional, efficient, and friendly. Excellent grits Beer was cold and good. The little biscuits were good.

The rest was a downhill spiral into something akin to a fast-food nightmare.Things did not start off well when I made reservations an hour ahead of time and they seated us in the back of the house, in the server section. I could understand this if the restaurant was full, but it was half empty with plenty of two tops. Okay we'll accept this point, but then the food came. The buttermilk fried oyster appetizer were a sad, overpriced, sweet, greasy glob of fried dough with an oyster somewhere inside.

My friend ordered an entree of cumin dusted chicken thighs with johnny cakes. The plate that came out was a dry, unrecognizable mess of something that tasted nothing like chicken thighs, but more like a meat substance on mostly pancakes mixed with greens. We had to ask the server if this was what we ordered. The server confirmed that it was and my friend spent the rest of the evening pushing the food around on her plate.

I ordered creole spiced braised pork osso buco, collard greens, and grits. As I said before, the grits were excellent. The collard greens were tasty but they left the big fat stem in. The stem was like eating a twig. I somehow managed to chew the first one down and learned my lesson. I have cooked collards all my life and I always tear the leaf from the large center spine. The osso buco was a beautiful piece of pork slathered under a truckload of over sweet barbecue sauce which oozed into every part of the meat rendering it inedible. After choking down a few bites, I concentrated on the grits and finished my beer. About that time my friend spotted a roach crawling on the wall above my head. I suppose that is due to the fact that we were close to the kitchen. This was the very last straw; I stood up and pointed out the roach to rest of the diners.

So, I would advise any potential customers to avoid McKewans. There are plenty of other really fine restaurants in Memphis at a fraction...

My wife and I went to dinner last night to celebrate her birthday. The atmosphere is intimate yet inviting. We were seated by the window, no fault of theirs, bt there is no real view, bt you get to see outside, so that wasn't bad. Mary was our server, and she did good at explaining the menu, the special and highlighting their best dishes. Food came out prompt and hot. We had the fried oysters and the cauliflower. Both were good, I love oysters, so I probably should have gotten 2 orders of those, lol. My wife had the seabass, and I had the osso bucca, which both were very, very good. We did not have room for dessert, so we didn't get any. My only complaint if I had one would be that although we were full and did not want dessert, I would have appreciated them still bringing something out to acknowledge her birthday. When we were leaving I'm not sure if it was the manager ( nice gentleman) he did sat Happy Birthday and Joked that they were going to sing to her lol ( I still would of appreciated the birthday dessert). Overall, it was a nice experience, and I would return to partake in more small plate options. That's why I gave the 4 stars on service. They have valet $12 and on the street parking, we paid $4.50. If you have never been, it's worth a visit. Oh, note to Valet. Although some patrons may not use Valet, I still think he could open the door as a nice gesture to the start of your...

Its a very nice quiet date night type of thing. Service was phenomenal and very friendly. Quality control is lacking, a lot. I looked up food reviews and was very confident making our reservations almost a month in advance. However, it seems as though our portions did not live up to photos seen from reviewers. Everything was HEAVILY UNseasoned and our $145 dinner for 2 looked like kids meals smaller than that of a kids meal at McDonald's. Like what even is that $40+ steak dish?! Would you not be mad if thats what you got for $40+?!?! I was very disappointed to see our portions after what i saw from other reviewers before making our reservations. Simply look at my sea bass and the steak and compare it to the others you see in the review section... QUALITY CONTROL 👏👏👏 I will not visit again and i will not be sending any of our scientists there in the future as i got a couple of bad complaints from my department at work about this establishment. I now know why. Thanks you all for being very kind and welcoming but the food needs a lot of work for the prices youre charging. Its very much a "ill spend whatever they want me to, infront of my friends" type of place. Save your money and go to Flight instead. They pride themselves on their food, as they should! I think McEwen's started off on very good note but their food is not...