Eat'n Park — Restaurant in Monroeville

Eat'n Park: A Review

After attending the Steel City Comic Con, we decided to grab a real meal at a well-loved franchise. My wife enjoys Eat'n Park's buffet, while I enjoy their amazing breakfast options, as well as Eat'n Park's excellent herb-crusted chicken. Going to this restaurant seemed like a no-brainer.

Unfortunately, this establishment was not up to Eat'n  Park standards. We were seated quickly, but even that had issues. The hostess initially brought us to a four-top table in the center of an empty room. After spending all weekend at a convention, we really needed the comforts that only a booth could provide. My wife politely asked for a booth, and while our hostess complied, it was painfully obvious she was dismayed by our insolent request. Instead of seating us at one of the nearby booths, she squeezed us into a booth between other groups of diners. There were groups on either side of us - clearly this was our punishment for such an unforgivable indignity.

As we sat down, at least two groups stopped the hostess to ask where their waitress was. One booth wondered where their food was, another booth, with half-finished drinks sweating on their table, simply wanted to place their order. A third group wondered if they should even pay their bill since they had been waiting a long time, and still hadn't gotten one.

Our waitress arrived within 30 seconds, took our drink order, and left. We figured there may have been a shift change, or some other justifiable reason why the other groups hadn't been serviced. Our waitress neither stopped, nor even acknowledged these other booths who had asked for assistance moments earlier.

We never saw our waitress again. Well, not at our booth. After 15 frustrating minutes of non-service, we decided to leave. We passed by our attentive waitress as she was walking out of the kitchen staring at the phone in her hand. She didn't even have our drinks, and I doubt she even recognized us.

While we waited for our drinks to arrive, the booth behind me got noticeably irate; the three adults in the booth in front of me grew more frantic - their heads were in constant motion trying to locate their waitress, or any waitress for that matter.

We were lost and alone on an island of neglect in the back of Monroeville's Eat'n Park. It was rather surreal, but after a long convention, I wouldn't recommend the experience.

When we decided to leave, the jaws of the swivel-headed booth dropped collectively, and their eyes somehow grew even wider. They asked me if we were simply going to leave. If it were proper etiquette to do such a thing? It seemed as if they'd been contemplating such a move themselves, but we're far too meek to take such bold action.

I sometimes wonder if that timid group expired from a lack of refills and neglect would Eat'n Park even notice? Probably not. It's a bear in the woods kind of analogy, but replace the Grizzly with three mousy retirees. Those poor, poor bastards.

Bad service is bad service. We left. We will not return.

We're currently eating the three wonderful meals we selected at the Masochistic Eat'n Park at another Eat'n Park. This Eat'n Park has attentive staff who cheerfully refilled my coke not once, but twice within a very short time. I hadn't realized how close I had come to an unpleasant ending myself at the other Eat'n Park... you know, the Eat'n Park from hell.

Perhaps I should contact the authorities about the malnourished retirees? Ahhh, it's probably too late for them. I'm sure I'll read about their unfortunate plight one day, after the authorities recover the bodies.

The food in front of us is even more delicious  than expected. Did I mention the attentive wait staff? And real drinks with real refills?

To the dastardly bastion of hell parading as an Eat'n Park: Your loss. You might consider checking on those old people. Perhaps their driver's licenses can help you locate their...

Our service was, unfortunately, abysmal. From the time we were seated until we (at long last) received our check things just declined. We were greeted rather unprofessionally (after waiting a little longer than is typical but still not an uncomfortably long margin of time) - "What're we drinking?" I requested water with no ice and hot tea (I get cold very easily), my son ordered hot chocolate, and my husband ordered root beer. Our drinks arrived after a few minutes and my water had ice in it, but I chose not to complain as I could tell the waitress was already having a rough night (the table beside us sent back some food that was taken off of their bill and left pretty upset shortly after we were seated). My husband asked the waitress to bring us a saucer for our son's hot chocolate, which she then left to retrieve. Several moments later she had not reappeared. I got my son a saucer and spoon from the salad bar. At about this time, my husband noted we had no silverware. The waitress came back some time later and took our orders. I specifically asked for my entree (baked ziti) "wrapped up to go at the end of the meal." I ordered the salad bar for my side, my son ordered stuffed crust pizza and applesauce, and my husband ordered the buffalo chicken wrap with the salad bar and gravy fries as his sides. My husband got his first salad, but we still had no silverware. We waited several minutes before resorting to asking the host for silverware. The food tasted very good, but the salad bar was running low or missing a few items (the marshmallow fluff stuff was gone and I polished off the beets). When the waitress brought our food, she brought my meal on plates and said she'd bring me a box. At this time, she asked my husband if he'd like a refill of his drink, which he accepted. She did recall he was drinking root beer, though, which was nice. Unfortunately she forgot to bring it until right before we were ready to get the check. About this time someone came out to stock the salad bar - by this time we'd been seated for about an hour, and this was the first sign of someone restocking the salad bar in that time. After several uncomfortable minutes of waiting for the check, our waitress finally brought it, and a cookie for our son. When paying the check, the cashier asked "how was your dinner?" to which my husband responded "slow." She apologized that the kitchen is short-staffed and gets backed up. Our service has been consistently slow at this location, but I've never had what I would deem as poor service otherwise. However, after tonight's very disappointing service my husband and I have decided we won't be returning. Very dissatisfied,...

Came in on a Sunday afternoon for a late breakfast. After waiting a bit for the server to arrive, he finally came to the table. Probably just saw me as a younger looking guy who looked like I wasn't going to tip well...which is far from the case - I have always at least given 30% on a check, even if the service is just moderately good - and I say this because I used to serve myself, and I get how hard of a job it is but I also know how some server's choose to preemptively judge customers and won't be as attentive to them if they think they won't be rewarded with an honest tip (e.g. Betty and Diane at Hoss's in Murrysville - two waitresses I worked next to and got to know...they actually told me this, showing me a glimpse of the judgemental mindset some servers actually have) and that seemed to be the case here.

Anyways, the only other time I saw him again was when he brought out my food. For one thing, the 3 pancakes I ordered looked like the cheapest frozen pancakes you could buy from a local food market, small, extremely thin and thawed out. Far from the pancakes I remember EVER being served at this Eat n Park establishment.

And the SCRAMBLED eggs I ordered was basically an egg omelet on a plate. It really was just an egg patty, not scrambled at all. I tried to give the eggs a chance and I took one bite (after I cut a small portion off of the egg patty) and almost gagged...they were honestly that bad.

I'm not the type of person who usually complains about service and/or food at restaurants because again, I know the food industry is a tough job, but the experience I just had was...