Aunt Granny's Restaurant — Restaurant in Pigeon Forge

Food was excellent. We were seated immediately. My wife and I were dining with our preschool-aged old son. The service was good initially and then our waitress just dissapeared. We were left sitting there with no beverage refills. Since it's a buffet the lack of service wasn't a huge deal until we were ready to leave and continue enjoying the park. We asked another waitress if we could get our check after 15 minutes of us no longer eating, or being checked on, or even seeing our waitress so we can attempt to get her attention, the other waitress says she'll let our waitress know. We couldn't leave without violating the law. Our child is getting unruly because he's wanting to go ride and enjoy the park. We're all tired of being here at this point. The buffet costs $19 per adult to eat here, more than we normally pay to dine out. My wife and I accepted the costs due to the convenience of not having to leave the park, and the added perk of not having to order or wait for our food to be prepared. Seemed like a quick and efficient dinner idea. Five more minutes go by and finally our waitress appears with our bill. I hand her my credit card, and my wife wants her Dollywood cup refilled. So the waitress, who was actually quite pleasant, walks off with my credit card and our Dollywood cup and dissapears again for 15 minutes. I wish I was exaggerating but we were irritated and checking the time on our phones. Just before she comes back out I ask to speak to a manager, the manager comes out and speaks to us and as were explaining the situation the waitress comes back with the receipts and refill and you have the awkward exchange of having to complain about this person in front of them. My wife and I have been together for over eight years and neither of us can remember me asking to speak to a manager before. But after 35 minutes of simply wanting to leave and not being able to, with an increasingly restless child, we were all very unhappy campers. The manager said, well she had some trouble with a bill and I had to fix so it wasn't all her fault. Fair point, if you disregard the 20 minutes we sat there prior to getting our bill or seeing our waitress. The waitress says, it was their bill we were fixing. So the manager says oh, it was your bill we had a problem with. What was the problem I ask, oh we had put another person's order on your bill. I can't imagine anyone but our waitress entering our ticket, but fault is not the issue, mistakes happen. The waitress walks away and we explain again to the manager that we just lost 35 minutes of park time in an unacceptable situation and her resolution is she says she'll speak with the waitress. My wife and I just looked at each other in shock that this seemed to be of so little concern to the manager. No offer to comp part of the meal or a voucher for the next visit. There were several other waitresses who we saw repeatedly so I don't think it's a restaurant wide issue. It was just a very unfortunate situation we got put into and apparently our time is of no value to Aunt-Granny. Dollywood certainly values it's own time. $70 for a one day ticket, and they literally waist over half an hour of our day, only to all but assure us they were not concerned about it. Her letting us know she was going to talk the waitress provided zero comfort and sealed the deal that we will no longer be dining here. Gave two stars only because the...

Dollywood is amazing and I loved The Dolly Experience so much, however my experience at Aunt Granny’s Restaurant was terrible. I came up to the host around 6:50pm ish to ask for a table for three. She said it would be a 20-30 minute wait, which I expected and gave my name with my number. I waited about thirty minutes before we were seated. When I came to the hostess stand to be seated, I was asked if I had a reservation, because they closed at 8pm and were turing people away. I told her I was on the list and gave my name. We were seated at a wet table(just cleaned..cool no problem but it added to our grievence with this place). We waited for 5 minutes at our table, before we were greeted by our waitress who proceeded to tell us they were out of biscuits and chicken was a 20 minute wait. And she was like…”the hostess didn’t tell you.” Which I said no…and told her the hostess was kinda rude. And she apologized. Okay cool…no problem. She took our drink order and we asked her how it worked and that we were ready to order. She explained that you pick three meats and four sides. She took our order and left. We waited 15 minutes for our food to even come…minus the chicken. Tables sat after us had their drinks and food before us. Then when our food came it was luke warm and okay. The sides and pork roast were good, but the cat fish was rubbery and mushy(honestly tasted old). Then when we finally got our chicken…it was battered in the same batter as the catfish and it smelled fishy. We also, had to ask our waitress if it was all you can eat (we didn’t know. We have never been to Dollywood before) and for another round, because she never asked us if we wanted another round. She just kept asking us if we needed anything like a normal server would, which confuseded us a little bit. Plus, to ruin the entire experience we got apple crisp for dessert and it tasted like uncooked flour. When it came out the crisp part was very blonde in color and one bite left the most awful aftertaste in my mouth. Our waitress was more concerned about leaving than serving us. She was very sweet, but she definitely was overwhelmed. I usually try to see the positive in everything, but y’all this was not what we came to Dollywood for at all. This was not it! I feel so sad that I’m leaving a bad review for a place I was so excited to try. I’m so...

Let me preface by saying that a manager's intervention definitely saved this from being a 1 star review.

To start the food was delicious, zero complaints with flavor. The service was very slow, it took 40 minutes to get food, frequent empty drinks, despite most other tables being served more quickly. The dessert portions were tiny and not all-you-cat-eat.

The bulk of my complaint deals with the abysmal handling of food allergies. A member of my party is unable to digest gluten and was limited to two meat options and 3 sides off the whole menu. This was understandable and acceptable UNTIL, the waitress informed us that food was served family style and ALL members of the party must agree on the selection. The net result would've been the entire party eating a gluten free meal, ignoring other dietary needs or preferences. When southern favorites like fried chicken, mac and cheese, corn fritters and pot roast (gluten in gravy) are on the menu being forced to choose between the party's dietary needs and eating the delicious homestyle cooking (literally the purpose for the visit) goes beyond mere inconvenience.

After some SIGNIFICANT arm twisting, the waitress agreed to allow one meat and one side for our gluten free family member while the rest of the party made their selections. Once again, I understand the menu is the menu. There were multiple GF options, it was only the backwards family style "all must agree" policy which caused the issues.

When dessert came, we were informed that there were no options for our GF family member, despite the park being otherwise quite gluten friendly w/ many pre-packaged dessert options.

The final issue was when the bill came and we were ALL charged more for the additional selections, despite only the GF member wanting or eating it.

Thankfully a manager understood the situation and provided a significant discount and apology, hence the 3 star rating. The manager thanked us for informing him and hoped to be able to improve...