Jumpin' Catfish Restaurant — Restaurant in Olathe

How did I live in Olathe for nearly two decades after moving FROM the swampy south - where swimming with gators was normal and frog legs were a commodity - and I JUST experienced this slice of heaven last week? Upon questioning my mother about my apparent sheltered upbringing, she explained, "well, I came here often with friends, you must've been at soccer practice." After her cute little chuckle, I cried, "this is blasphemous, Mother, and I am appalled by your actions!" She asked, "so do you want your birthday lunch there then?" "Yes, please. Thanks, mom," I replied grinning ear to ear.

There is a reason this place is rated 5 stars, and if you're nearby or just passing through, this is a meal you will not regret nor forget; (and you'll probably be planning the family's next night there while boxing up any leftovers).

The service is impeccable. These ladies and gents have mastered their crafts of hosting, serving, or bussing/sanitization; and the hospitality is what stood out to me as the best table service I have EVER had - this is no exaggeration. Be careful as you enjoy the free beans, slaw, and hush puppies because, in my humble opinion, I could fill up on those three alone and be happy. This is impertinent info if you plan on ordering an all-you-can-eat platter of choice. I got two crab leg clusters with mashed potatoes ($26.99 before tax), and it'll be hard to persuade me to order anything different until I'm burnt out on it. Please note: all-you-can-eat crab legs are $69.99. For my birthday, our lovely waitress sweetened my taste buds with warmed apple cobbler (on the house) adorned with a single birthday candle, and I paid a few bucks for it to be accompanied with two scoops of vanilla ice cream. Leaving anything less than 20% gratuity would have been disrespectful as she definitely deserved it. We paid at the hostess stand on the way out; and it was a definite "unbutton the jeans when getting in the car" type of meal.

10/10 would recommend to a friend and 10/10 we'll be back again! See y'all...

We have been coming to this place for many years and have always been very satisfied. Unfortunately our recent experience was less than average. The service was awful! Apparently our server was new and normally I would excuse a certain level of service considering being new. But we had to ask for everything. Food was brought to the table before an order was even placed and sat there getting cold while we waited for drinks and plates. Apparently when you order an all you can eat salad bar you have to pay extra if you want to enjoy the beans, cole slaw and hush puppies that were delivered before you even placed your order. The person that ordered the salad bar had no interest in the extras, but my questions is if we had all ordered salad bars would they have then removed the beans, slaw and hush puppies that were delivered already? Seems a little backwards. The cooks could be heard using profanity from the salad bar and the waitress handled our drinks in a very unsanitary way. We ordered a children's meal that was supposed to come with potato wedges that never arrived. The food was average this visit. When I explained all the issues to the manager and trust me there were more, all we got was an "I'm Sorry". I am all for supporting local family business and I have been in the service industry for years. I get that there are times when things are not perfect. But the way it was handled was disappointing and honestly I will not be returning here ever again. There are other places I would much rather patron first, where the service is priority to continuing...

The service was great. But the food was just not good. Maybe the kitchen was having an off night, maybe covid/supply chain issues hit the quality hard.

The hushpuppys and beans were fine as starters, the coleslaw was much too soupy though.

Our entrees were mostly bad. I was served piece of catfish the size of a McDonald's chicken nugget and a quail which tasted fine but had no meat on it. Like I know quail is supposed to be small and not have a ton of meat on it, but this was a particularly sad quail. I think the waitress recognized just how skimpy my meal was because she brought me a plate of crab legs completely unprompted, which was appreciated except they were overcooked, and I didn't want to finish it even though it was free... I'm reasonably confident my side of mashed potatoes was powered instant mash.

My friends meals consisted of more extremely small, sad catfish portions and a lemon pepper chicken that they completely forgot to season (like literally cooked it in a pan with oil and sent it out, no salt, no pepper, no lemon, no nothing). Also one trip to the soup/salad bar which included off-tasting gumbo and standard not great salad fixings.

The wait staff tried so hard, they even took the unseasonably chicken off our tab, but the place was a ghost town during normal weekend dinner hours, it still took a while to get our food. I have to assume nobody was dining in because the food is consistently like this.

I went in hoping for some good southern cooking to remind me of family and home. I...