Perkins American Food Co. — Restaurant in Norfolk

Ate at Perkins on 1/9/19, arriving a few minutes before noon. There were several people waiting in the foyer and the hostess looked to the heavens and asked, "Where are all these people coming from?" Perhaps we should have left then to relieve the burden. No one on staff had a smile of their face nor did any have eye contact. I dislike having to pay for a carafe of coffee when I only want one cup. In the past, several waitresses would give me a cup, ignoring that rule. Our waitress just shrugged it off - "I don't write the rules." She never really looked us in the eye, was always over our heads. Never a smile. It seemed like the wait for food was longer than usual. The waitress did not deliver our meal, another lady did, and I got my salad at the same time I got the meal. The bill was delivered at the same time as the meal. The salad was warm and contained many large chunks of hard, dry, dark pieces of lettuce. Half of it was edible. A dollop of Ranch dressing was plopped in the center, not enough to enhance the whole salad. When I opened the baked potato, one half was spoiled. I couldn't get the attention of either the waitress or the hostess, but did show it to the person who delivered the meal. She was polite but no apology. Comment was, "We are having a hard time with getting good potatoes this time of year." No one on staff came back to the table to ask how our meal was, nor to ask if we would like anything else. (We had been talking about having a piece of pie.) The hostess took our money and did not ask how our meal was. When we left, there were at least six (perhaps more) tables waiting to be bussed. Since it opened, usually when we are in Norfolk, we eat at Perkins. This is the first time I've ever had a complaint about the service...

Dinner Saturday nite 10/28/23 - 7:30 to 8:30. Very slow time for restaurant...stood at door waiting to be seated for 5 minutes before hostess appeared. Waitress was excellent - very attentive and quick. Our brkfst order arrived within just a few minutes. Luke warm - probably someone else's order that was cancelled. Eggs and sausage barely edible when cold. Powered through the meal however, since sending it back would probably have taken longer than I wanted to wait. At the end of our meal, noticed a male waiter taking an order from another table. As the patrons deliberated the waiter stood with one hand tucked in the back of his pants - hand between his underwear and bare butt! Couldn't get out of there fast enough, but again the hostess had disappeared and we had to stand at the register for over 5 minutes before finally our own waitress showed up to ring up our check. There was solid ice on the sidewalk just outside the door, impossible to avoid.. The restaurant had not applied any sand or salt . Incredibly dangerous situation. I cannot overstate how miserable the place was. The best I can say was that it appeared clean. But that waiter has to go. And the cooks need some refresher courses in ...cooking I guess. Hot foods hot,...

We went in on a Friday night at about 9 pm. From the start the table next to us got a discount due to the lengthy time it took for them to get their meal, and we almost left then but wanted to give it a shot. Took about five minutes to be greeted and by then we already just wanted to put in our order so maybe it wouldn’t take as long. Ordered fried pickles as an appetizer and those took almost 50 minutes to come out. 50 for food you just throw in the fryer. My boyfriend even started a timer for how long it took him to get a refill and it was over 15 minutes before she even noticed. Ours drinks were empty majority of the time we were there. We got our food and his was cold and mine was extremely greasy and not good. I’m not one to complain because I work in food but this was unacceptable. The only reason I gave it two stars is because they gave us a slight discount for the wait (as they should have), which ended up being almost two hours. There was only a few other tables in there and the whole time it looked like our server only had one other table. She never checked on us and dropped the check off when she dropped our food off without saying anything which is kinda...