Olive Garden Italian Restaurant — Restaurant in Olathe

Our experience was not good, again. Our previous visit I ordered some sausage with my meal and it came out dry and crusty. I asked for more sauce and it can in what was a laughaful thimble of a container. The manager took off the meal and we left. Not great due to my health conditions and not being able to eat anything but salad.

Then Today. Went with the family again. This time a lot has changed. Your greeter was wiping her nose and then escorting guests to tables without washing her hands. This continued as she sat people around us. No one wants some snot covered napkin that holds the silverware.

We were seated and immediately asked if we wanted appetizers and drinks without looking at the menu at all. The waitress was very polite, no issues with her. When the salad arrived it has 3 tomatoes, a sliver of onion, 2 peppers, a lot of croutons, and no real visible other items. It did not have enough dressing at all. I ordered your spaghetti and meatballs with meat sauce. It was incredibly small. The meatballs were boiled and had absolutely no seer from any pan or grill on them. They were tasteless. My noodles were overcooked and tasted like they had sat in water. There was very little sauce on them at all. I tried a sample but I could not eat them at all. When the Manager came over to see about the meal the first thing she said was that the noodles looked overcooked. It was that Obvious. She did take them off of the ticket for us. Does no one look at what they bring out? How many others got the same batch of nasty noodles? This time, like before, I got to watch my family eat and I didn’t.

Sadly these are not our occasional experiences. Several years ago we went to the Location at the Legends in Kansas City, Kansas. All our Alfredo was soupy. I asked for it to be corrected and the manager said he corrected it himself. What he did was adding mashed potatoes to the sauce and mixed the noodles back in. Previous to that, at the same location, we bought food and had some to go. We found the end of a zip tie in the pasta. Previous to that we were seated near the rear of the building and left for 45 minutes without anything. When I addressed it with staff they simply told me that we had been forgotten. Yes, forgotten about. People walking by us and never any service. We will not go to the KCK location at all.

We will not go to the location on Metcalf in Overland Park. I accidently left my sunglass attachment to my glasses on the table when we left. I walked to the car and turned around to get them off of the table but it had been cleared already. A manager told me he had found them in an employee’s locker and not brought to anyone’s attention. Wow…

Where's the Italian seasoning? Where is any seasoning? There is no doubt that Olive Garden has gotten so cheap, so lackadaisical on their standards, that people will go somewhere else when this is the place we used to go to celebrate family. It’s not the staff today or last visit today that made the biggest impact but the food. Do better Olive...

Visits over the last couple of years have been hit or miss. This visit was a miss.

The server was friendly and attentive, although I wonder if she is the reason for some of the issues below. 4 stars for her for benefit of doubt.

We ordered the toasted ravioli for an appetizer. They arrived relatively quickly. I assume they microwave them, because the pasta was chewy and the edges were hard (not crispy) like leather. The filling was okay, but had too much black pepper.

A few minutes later the salad arrived. We had barely started putting salad on our plates when our entrees arrived. We had to rearrange the table to have room for the new plates as the appetizer plates had not been picked up yet.

Our pasta sat and waited on the table while we rushed through our salad. And we had less than we would have otherwise because taking salad home doesn't keep very well.

My wife had the build your own pasta, with spaghetti, meat sauce, and sausage. She said hers tasted fine.

I had ordered the build your own pasta, with spaghetti, meat sauce, sausage, and meatballs. I added the extra meat because I planned on having enough leftovers for two more light lunches (economy and all). The menu indicates that the build your own meats were three meatballs and two sausages, with each meat selection adding $3.49.

However, when I finally got to my main course, I noticed there were three meatballs and only one sausage. I had expected two sausages as listed on the menu, so brought it up to our waitress when she came back.

Now, maybe she misunderstood me or I misunderstood her, but her explanation was that when you get one meat selection, adding another meat was $3.49. She said I could get a second sausage, but it would be an additional $1.50. I declined, believing that I would wind up being charged $5.00 for two sausages.

When we got to paying the bill, I saw that the sausage was added at $1.79, and not the $3.49 I understood her to say. So, maybe she thought I only wanted an additional sausage when I had ordered. But, I believe she should have clarified since I was pointing at the menu item when I ordered it.

Confusion aside, the taste of the meal was good. I think there was a little less spaghetti than usual, but maybe I was just in a bad mood by then.

Overall, the visit was less than spectacular. From the chewy ravioli, to the rushed salad, and topped with confusion about what was ordered, I've had much better...

6/2024- A few minutes,after ordering our lunches, they showed up along with the soup and breadsticks. I mentioned this to our server, but she just laughed. We saw our server again, after I finished my soup and meal. She asked me if I wanted more soup. The next time we saw her, was when we were at the door to leave. She had the mints for us. I had gone to order pick up, to get our mints, before we saw our server at the door. We gave our server a big fat tip. Nothing. Update 2/2023- Service was nonexistent. I wrote a comment on the company website asking for a callback. Hasn't happened yet. And after checking the nutrition chart, this chain has an overload of sodium in their food. Just like many other restaurants do. My cardiologist was right. Stay away from most if not all restaurants, due to the high sodium. Update: 10/25/2023-Service, again, was horrible. Food was good. Everything else about our experience, was mostly. nonexistent. Management wasn't seen or heard from, during our visit. Their are many other restaurant's to chose from, with much better service. 11/1/2023- I wanted just the soup at lunch. I used to get endless soup, lunch and dinner for around $6. I asked our server to inform me if the price was higher, before she brought my soup out. She brought my soup out with my wife's lunch. I checked the price on the Ziosk at our table and one bowl of soup at lunch, is $8. A manager came back and verified the price was correct. At that point, I gave them my bowl of soup and the soup was taken off our bill. I ate lunch at home. The server never notified me of the higher price, liked I asked her to do. So, enough is enough. Olive Garden has lost 2 more customers. I can eat at many other restaurants, instead. Just watch the carbs, fat and sodium. Their is a positive to this. I ate the wonderful breadsticks. Not sure if our server will bring the mints, but that doesn't matter. She never did. By, Olive Garden, it's been nice, while it lasted.

From 2 regular customers. Thanks for all the memories....