Stoney River Steakhouse and Grill — Restaurant in Roswell

My family (of 4) was anticipating a wonderful evening to celebrate my son’s birthday. I don’t often spend $200+ for dinner on our family, but it was a special night. The first inkling that there maybe problems was that the actual server who would be waiting on us took a long time to drop by to even ask for a drink order. Not a big deal so far. It was a simple order, 3 soft drinks and one dirty martini. ‘Great! We have our drink order in. We should be in business now. But then the waiting for the server began- this would become the theme of the evening. I’m not sure how long it was, but it was long enough that the internal clock inside all our heads began to alarm. “She’s forgotten about us”, someone said, and our food order isn’t even in.

Finally, the soft drinks arrive but not my wife’s dirty Martini. And we still haven’t ordered. We stacked and placed our menus on the isle side of the table to indication that we are ready to order and oh, by the way, we need refills on the soft drinks. The martini arrives but before my wife can say anything, the server is gone. It’s a martini but my wife tells me,”Its not dirty”. I wanted my wife to have what she wanted. I knew our server would not be passing by anytime soon, so I took it to the bar myself to fix it (Olives with a little olive juice).

Just as the martini arrived our server returned with some bread and we ordered. “Great, now I can rejoin our celebration and stop being distracted trying to flag down servers and fix incorrect drinks”.

One of my favorite things to eat is a ribeye. I don’t get the opportunity very often, and I’ve been looking forward to this steak. Don’t judge me here - but I really like steak sauce with my steak. And I don’t want it 10 minutes after the hot steak arrives, I’d like it while the steak is hot. Once the steak leaves the oven you’re on a strict count down. It’s tantamount to McDonald’s fries; amazing hot - stale packing peanuts cold.

Now I’m no restaurant insider, but it seems when food is served in nicer restaurants by support staff, there must communication that the person dropping the food tells the server, “Your table needs this-and-that”. And the main server eventually brings the ‘this-and-that’ later. But in the case of steak and steak sauce it’s long after it’s needed. So I’m trying to find our server, or any server to bring the sauce ‘before’ the steak arrives.

Problem is, now that we have placed our order we are in table desert; server wilderness. I can’t get arrested in this place. As I’m investing more and more time attempting to get some preemptive steak sauce, I realize that I’m so distracted trying I’m missing my time with my family. Please understand, I’m in no hurry. It’s a celebration after all and I want to savor the moment. But with an initiative server, meant every step of the meal was an exercise in needing something with no ability to get it.

In time, our food arrives - no steak sauce because I haven’t been able to get anyone’s attention. So I ask the lady (not our server) dropping the steaks off, “Can I get some steak sauce?” (and I tried to say the next part without sounding like a total tool) “Can I get it while the steak is hot?” She smiles and agrees, but I can see it behind her eyes, she’s thinking, “I’ll tell that to the main server”. Noooooooooo! (High camera angle on me as I raise my fist in the air cursing the air. Oh, and it raining.) This is what plays in my mind as I realize I’m never going to get steak sauce AND a hot steak in the same universe, not in this lifetime.

Then what may have been the ultimate insult to the evening… I look at my sizzling hot ribeye, having come to terms with my fait of no sauce with a hot steak. I reach for the knife to devour this glistening 12 ounces of goodness to only then discover - we have no knives!

Panic! The hot steak window is closing. I look for our server, any server, a janitor, anyone. In desperation I go to the hostess stand. “Can I get some steak knives? Oh, and some sauce would be fantastic.”

Not a...

Went to lunch with family after attending graduation in the area. We frequent the Stoney River in Duluth so it was an easy choice. Unfortunately, we had the absolute worst experience ever. From the host telling us to wait a moment while she “tried to scrape together a server”, in a restaurant with 2 new tables, ours and another family who walked in moments before us. Our server was kind and we placed our orders. About 45 minutes go by and we realize we still have not received our food. I ask my server were they short in the kitchen and she said no the salmon takes the longest to cook. Interesting but ok. She goes and tells her manager, Julie,. Julie stood in the expo window the entire time with, and simply shook her hesd and looked at us .I’m assuming she was standing with the general manager, David, because he refused to give us his name. He comes to the table and mumbles that he was coursing our meals, but we all just order entrees. When I said that, he just walked away and never returned. Food finally started coming out. My cousin specifically asked for her salmon to be med well, it was burnt. Her brother ordered the salmon as well and when he cut into it, it was rare. Not medium as the standard temp is. This is what we were told took so long to cook. Two in our party had steaks and they were satisfied. I ordered the french dip and my bread was hard and the meat was cold. The potatoes were the only thing hot on my plate. Julie comes to the table and when asked was it rare she just looked at it and didn't say a word. When asked what she was going to do she says that she can cook up the raw salmon, to which my aunt asked her to give us a fresh piece of salmon and as long as it won’t take another hour. Julie started aggressively approaching my aunt. We all just told her thank you that would be enough. Another piece was brought out and it was undercooked as well. We just didn’t eat that day. The manager who came on duty, Prince I believe, was extremely helpful at the end but at that point our experience had already been ruined. Truly appreciate his efforts, however.

This was the absolute worst experience ever. And for management not to care to communicate was...

My fiancé and I recently came to enjoy a steak dinner, but, unfortunately, we were very disappointed by our experience. I ordered the coffee-cured filet mignon cooked medium. It arrived to the table completely gray, without even a hint of pink. It was tough, chewy, and overwhelmingly salty.

I never send food back to the kitchen, but, when the manager came to our booth while making his rounds through the dining room to ask how our experience was, I did address the issue honestly. He was very kind and clearly wanted to fix the issue, which I appreciated. He sent the steak back to the kitchen.

Unfortunately, the second steak came out completely rare—a deep maroon red and raw in the center to the point that I didn’t feel safe eating it. At that point, my fiancé was halfway done with his meal, and I wished I’d just kept the overcooked steak.

The server saw me cut into the new steak and immediately acknowledged it was still completely undercooked—they insisted to take it back to the kitchen to be cooked for longer. The third steak was finally cooked correctly, but, by then, my fiancé had already finished his meal.

We didn’t get to enjoy our date night dinner together, which was disappointing. To top it off, when the check arrived, we were shocked to see the filet was still on the bill. After we asked about it, they agreed to remove it—but they did not. Instead, they removed our dessert. Given how poorly the meal was executed, I was disappointed we were even put in the position to have to ask for the filet to be removed, and then they didn’t accommodate the request despite saying they would.

We still ended up paying over $150 for a meal that was mishandled from start to finish. We didn’t even get to enjoy the meal together because of how poorly the meal was executed, and it took them three tries at a steak house to get my steak cooked correctly.

The appetizers and sides were delicious, and the manager's attitude was appreciated, but overall, the experience...