QDOBA Mexican Eats — Restaurant in New York

TLDR: This place is beyond gross and the service is poor to put it kindly - but tonight was the final straw and I will just go to Chipotle at the mall from now on.

What happened: This was the first time in my life I’ve ever left a place as they were prepping my food. I was so baffled and I looked at the customers behind me as it happened and they also looked at me in shock which confirmed they also saw what happened so I knew I wasn’t crazy.

The rice was soggy and the consistency of mashed potatoes - when the guy went to prep my bowl, he scoops a quarter of a spoonful - then mashed the rice WITH HIS HAND INTO THE BOWL 😳. Leaving a handprint in my food - as if the minuscule proportion of gross rice wasn’t insulting enough! I was shocked. The pork was a massive solid clump, the chicken was gone, and the steak was burnt to a crisp but looked the less offensive so I went with it. When I then said lettuce, still shocked at the rice, the container was empty - as was the plastic tub of lettuce behind him. He collected maybe 3-4 pieces of lettuce and put it on top. I glanced back at the people behind me that are also grossed out and realized I am about to pay $14+ for a bowl I don’t want to eat and people are recoiling at the sight of.

I’ve been in here a few times and the food always looked burnt/undercooked and poor quality, the cleanliness is never what you’d like to see from a place you’re about to eat from, and the service is always unprofessional/immature but it’s fast food so I try to reserve judgement. But this place is so bad I can’t stoop low enough to come here anymore. After all of that I am done. Management...

It pains me to give this review because I LOVE qdoba and have had it in some many places, and this was by far the worse. First the place is filthy, from the floors, to the tables to the actual grills. Workers were not bad, but the food just looks bad. Still went ahead and ordered. Ordered 2 bowls and wow, I should had known it was not going to be good. Chicken was burnt, and chewy. Ordered double chicken, did not get it (luckily was not charged for it) there was some steak mixed with the chicken (probably had fallen)

Overall I did something I never would’ve though I would do. Throw away most of my bowl because of how inedible it was.

Again, I have reviewed multiple Qdobas, and never had this type of experience.

UPDATE: Was contacted by Qdoba’s guest relations who apologized and escalated the matter to the store in an attempt to improve. They also awarded me free entree for my bad experience. As I already knew, no issues with Qdoba itself. It is still Elite. Hopefully this location Ickes it...

So I grabbed a chicken bowl from this place and the food was not bad. Nothing special to write home about but not bad, pretty good chicken. Made this into a meal and got the chip plus a drink. Those two were completely horrible. The chip was stale, can't even chew it. Tried one and threw the rest away. The drink i got was the Gold Peak ice tea from the large metal container on the counter and it was literally poisonous. I immediately tasted the bleach after one small sip. Did some employees forgot to pour out bleach water when cleaning the tank and started mixing ice tea using bleach water? I immediately felt a stomach aches after drinking one small sip of the bleach ice tea. I cannot believe Quoba mixed the ice tea with bleach water. I left the store already otherwise I would definitely complain to the employee. In fact I think I will let the city health department know about this. Bleach in the Ice Tea tank is NOT...