Cousino's Steakhouse — Restaurant in Oregon

This is a very sad update to a review I left previously which was glowing. I do not enjoy leaving these types of reviews.

Last night was the second time in a row we have had a very negative experience here and it will sadly be our last.

The last Friday night in May we went here for dinner with a party of 7 to kick off graduation weekend. The service was terrible, waitress kept giving everyone the wrong drinks, salads, entrees and so on. Noticed portion sizes getting smaller and this is not a cheap dining option - but we never minded that bc the food, service and atmosphere was great. That same night two in our party had to wait over ten minutes more than the rest of us for their entree. When the last one was brought out by the owner he simply set it down with no apology at all - and as many recent reviews here have stated their should be no reason for this given they are no where near as busy as they used to be when we first started going here years ago. The person in our party who waited for his entree the longest was offered another glass of wine while he waited and he said yes. We were charged for it which in any situation like that I’ve ever been in - it’s comped.

We went there last night for our one of our daughter’s 18th birthday dinner - her first choice despite our last trip. We all understand prices are going up - but if your going to charge what they are charging for fairly standard meals (chicken parm for $30 - more on that later) you’d better be giving people a fantastic evening. Especially around here! My wife ordered and sent right back a glass of what was supposed to sparkling Moscato. It was flat and tasteless. Twice we had to ask it to be removed from the bill. When you are charging what they are charging for entrees - $5 up charge for “premium” sides like Mac and cheese and onion rings is simply unacceptable. My chicken parm was terrible. The sauce was way too sweet and tasted eerily similar to the marinara sauce served with the mozzarella sticks. The chicken was very small and the sauce was watery. For $30 that is totally unacceptable and when a guy my size eats maybe a 1/3 of his entree you’d think the waitress would ask if you liked it or there was something wrong. The servers here have become robots - the ones that used to work here that were so great, personable and fun to be served by I haven’t seen in quite a while. The chicken tender meal that has always been a huge hit with all three of our girls looks like the serving size has been cut down significantly. If you couldn’t tell after having to ask twice to remove the drink, the uneaten chicken parm, or the fact that we all looked very unhappy when you brought us a check for over $230, includes a generous tip that I didn’t think was warranted by my wife used to serve (three appetizers, five entrees, that works out to be $40 plus a person which is just insane) that’s just unacceptable. And we will not be coming back.

A few things - the owner is the son of the husband and wife that ran it for a long time. I’ve talked to his mom on the phone and she is a wonderful woman who you can tell really cares about this place. She did mention to me that it’s been a struggle since Covid - well she might want to have a talk with her son bc he comes across as extremely detached and like he doesn’t care. And if that’s not true he needs to work on his demeanor and role as the owner. Aside from seating people he never asks how things are, stops by when a table is spending a very decent amount of money to thank them personally for coming in - just a shout from across the bar last night saying “good night” as we left.

We are so disappointed that this is now what we have been seeing here and obviously from the recent reviews and lack of the place being busy - we are not the only ones. Running a family restaurant like this is hard work - and that is not currently being done. It’s a real shame how quickly this place is...

My family planned a get together at Cousino's for roughly 35-40 people, called at least a day in advance to give them a heads up. They began arriving at 5pm. I was one that didn't get off work until 6pm, I called my family at 6:15 and to get things moving I gave my mom my order over the phone because they said the waitress was waiting til everyone arrived to take orders. I arrived at 6:45 and orders had not been taken. No one take our orders for food until after 7:15. From that point it took almost 2hrs for our party to get our dinners. I blame the evening solely on the management staff's ability to prepare for the evening. It was prom night and they knew in advance they had large parties coming in. We had over 30 family members and 1 server and that server had other tables at the same time. When I worked as a server in a nice restaurant if a party had more than 10 guest it was always 2 servers because customer service was a priority. In this case, 1 server with over 30 people at 2 tables and still working other tables in her section, management set her up for failure! If they were short staffed or were extremely busy then a manager should have been helping from the start, but they weren't around either. Keep in mind our party consisted of families with multiple children all under the age of 10 and at least 6 kids under 4yrs old. Image how happy hungry kids are and then image how happy their parents were when trying to deal with unhappy hungry tired children. When the food did come steaks were over cooked, my burger ordered Medium was dry as can be, and most of the family asked for to go boxes because they were so fed up with the situation and wanted to leave immediately or because the children needed to go. Even when the people that did stay and eat started our meals, the server was so frustrated she avoided the table and never came thru to ask how our food was because frankly my burger would have went back as well as a few steaks because of being over cooked. We had planned on getting a large family photo of everyone because we had a few family members in from California that we only see once every few years, that family photo did not take place because people left because of poor service and inconsideration on the part of Cousinos. FAIL! When our family representative talked with the owner, he received nothing but excuses and when I say NOTHING I mean absolutely nothing but excuses and a generic apology that seemed more like a slap in the face. I feel horrible for our server because she was set up for failure to start. Not to mention there was a party of 10 that sat down around 6pm and were served, ate, and checked out by 8pm... Complete and utter FAIL...

We had a family gathering with a large party of 15+ (originally 18) people. Our family gathers every year in August celebrating our deceased fathers birthday. Cousino's was always one of his favorite restaurants. Initially we called 4 days in advance to make reservations but were disappointed. We were told that they could not take reservations for parties over 10. They DID allow us to make two separate reservations for two parties of 8 people which I feel was accomodating. At that time we were told we could not be out of our seats once seated. On the date of our reservation(s), I arrived an hour early of the scheduled time to make sure our tables were ready prior to everyone's arrival. I waited about 30 minutes for them to figure out the seating arrangement, as there was some confusion. Apparently they aren't supposed to reserve two separate reservations for large groups?? Once the tables were ready; pleasingly, there wasn't a wait for the rest of our group. Although, everyone got seated at different tables. We were again told we could not be out of our seats. As for seating, if they wanted us out of their way, They did have a nice area in the front with windows that had seperate tables that would have been a more private setting. They could have reserved those tables in that area. One of our family members arrived a little bit late. As they were greeting us and finding a seat, our server came out and reprimanded them. She told them they had to sit down and could not be out of their seat. On a positive note; the food was served hot, fresh, & great. The the waitress was attentive. However, the only other issue was that she collected everyone's check (except mine). She cashed them out & they left, as I sat in an empty area for nearly 30 + minutes waiting for her to come back to cash me out. One of our family members eventually came back inside because they were waiting for us in the parking lot. They had to find our server and tell her we were still waiting. I have mixed feelings about this experience, the atmosphere was pleasingly quiet and again the food was served fresh, hot and tasted great. Although, other members of our party were pleased, because everything was taken care of prior to their arrival. I feel that it was not a great experience for me because I had to mediate everything and that factored into restrictions on seating, them forgetting me at cashout & that all compared to the price we paid. I feel that a smaller group size might have had a better overall experience. Unfortunately we will not be gathering...