Olive Garden Italian Restaurant — Restaurant in Mesa

THIS Olive Garden was awesome. I had to double check which restaurant the request was referring to because we actually started out going to a different location in Mesa, closer to our house. The website said there was no wait time for a party of two but when we got there, it was actually 35 minutes. Okay, that was unacceptable, but we could have sucked it up if the snotty, rude, p.o.c., Chick behind the hostess stand had been nice, but she wasn't. At all. I waited while a man came to tell her that his party had decided to sit at the bar and she brushed him off like a pesky mosquito. Then she told me that the website is always wrong and their minimum wait time is 35 minutes. What?! I tell ya what, if my husband hadn't wanted Italian food that night, we might never have gone back to any Olive Garden.

But we decided to drive across town to the Superstition location, and WOW! What a pleasant difference! From the girl standing in the door, who greeted us with a smile, to the two hostess girls, running back and forth seating everyone, to our waiter, who I'll get back to in a minute, to being exit greeted with sincere thank yous, our whole experience was lovely.

Our waiter was Dave. He was picking up dishes from another table when we were seated in his section. Instead of taking his tray off somewhere and coming back at his leisure, he stopped on his way to the kitchen to greet us and ask for our drink order. When he came back to the dining room, he brought our beverages. What an efficient young man! We ordered an appetizer. He brought it right away, along with a beverage refill.

My maps app asked me if the service was fast at this location, which we had just been laughing about. We ordered our entrees. I wanted to see how long that would take before I answered the question, but just a few minutes later, two people brought us our food. I answered the question, Yes!

The Shrimp Frito Misto was scrumptious. Put some onions in there, too, will ya? We kept looking for them, but there were only fried bell peppers and giant succulent shrimp. It was delicious, but the addition of onion slices would have brought it to another level.

The lasagna was as expected and the salad and soups were excellent. The noodles in my Alfredo were not cooked sufficiently so I had to take my dinner home, add a little milk to it, and cook it until the noodles got soft enough to be edible. I'll have to be sure to ask them to cook the noodles all the way in the future. Al dente doesn't mean al mascella.

I do wish they had more booths. I marked ambiance down to three because we had to sit at a table on chairs instead of in a cozy both. Chairs are good for lunch, but when I finally get to go on a date with my husband, I want better atmosphere than that. They had booths available, but apparently not for us. Hm. At least everyone was nice and we had a great time. Hey...we didn't...

This is my and my husband's "go-to" restaurant and location. We'd never had a bad experience until yesterday. The young lady came to bring us to our table, and then there was confusion about where we'd be seated. She brought us to one seat then all of the way back to the front desk then all of the way back where she'd originally brought us. We were seated at what seemed to be the wheelchair-accessible table. My son is autistic and crowds and loud noise are triggers for him, so I went back to the front desk to see if there might be another table in a more quiet area and the host quickly got us to a new table - shecwas lovely. Our waitress eventually came to our table - it was the young lady who brought us back and forth to the tables. She seemed nice enough. That's where it all started. After our salad and drinks came (we had to wait while she found the proper tool to open a bottle of wine because she didn't have it in her apron). That's fine - we're human. Then ... we don't see her. My husband tried to flag her down overland over. She went to the table next to us sooo many times. My husband said it was around 11 times in total. We couldn't get her attention. We just wanted water and another salad. She never even checked on us. Then ... our food comes. We weren't ready. She asked if we were ready and my husband told her that we had been waiting for our waitress to get us a couple things, and her response was "I'm sorry ... I'm just the messenger". Not my favorite response, but she did get the things we needed. After many many times of trying to getvour waitresses attention, we asked for a salad and she brought one - dropped it on our table and walked away. Didn't ask if there was anything else we needed, and didn't make eye contact. That was ot from her until she asked if we were done and brought our bill. My husband had a gift card he'd received and had an issue using it fir payment. She came back to see if we paid and he told her, so she took it and walked away I'd assume to figure it out. She came back and told us the response she hot related to an issue and Saud "you're going to have to call", and walked away. I was so frustrated, and asked my husband if my sin and I could just wait outside. I stopped at the host desk to provide my feedback - we love this place - silly, maybe, but it's where my husband and I had our first date. They apologized and said "it's prom season". I get that, but the table next to us received exceptional service and the very short bit of time and effort we received from her was way less than stellar. Again, they apologized, but I was definitely being pacified. Sadly, we won't be going back to this location. Still love Olive...

I recently placed an online order for pickup at this Olive Garden location, opting for just soup and breadsticks – items that are typically quick to prepare and readily available for dine-in customers. I was shocked and frustrated that from the time I placed my order until I actually received it, a full 50 minutes elapsed. Knowing that restaurants can get busy, I even arrived at the pickup area earlier than the estimated time, hoping to potentially get my order sooner. Despite the restaurant appearing busy, there didn't seem to be an overwhelming crowd or backlog that would justify such an extensive wait for such simple items. Waiting 50 minutes for soup and breadsticks feels frankly egregious and points to significant issues with their online pickup fulfillment process. Improvements are definitely needed to make this a more efficient experience. Adding to the discomfort of the long wait was the presence of homeless individuals near the pickup parking area. They were either begging for food or creating an awkward environment for those trying to park and retrieve their orders. This is something the restaurant management should be aware of and ideally take steps to address, perhaps by connecting these individuals with local services that can provide assistance. When my order was finally brought out, the "sorry for the wait" comment I received felt completely insincere, which only compounded my frustration. I frequently use online pickup services at various restaurants, and this experience at Olive Garden was one of the worst I've had. While the food itself was good, it wasn't very hot by the time I got home, leading me to suspect it had been sitting for a while before being brought out, further highlighting the delay in their process. Based on this experience, I'm very hesitant to use Olive Garden's online...