Romano's Macaroni Grill — Restaurant in Round Rock

Avoid at all costs! You ever see that show Kitchen Nightmares? You can experience it in person at Macaroni Grill Round Rock. What has happened to this place? It used to be one of the prime "date night" locations. My party of 8 walked in on Saturday night, Sept 9 around 7:00pm. The restaurant was fairly empty so we were seated immediately. Our server, Asia, asked us for our drink order. All of us ordered water, but I asked for iced tea. My buddy asked for their "special bread" that usually comes out before the meal, along with the olive oil dip. We received our water, but she forgot my tea. The bread was MIA. A few minutes later, my buddy asked for her to come back over and requested the bread again. She immediately brought it over, but the oil was missing. It was about this time that I looked at the stone wall behind us and it's covered, top to bottom, with crayon graffiti. This isn't just a few markings, it's across every inch of wall that I can see around me. They are allowing people to draw on the walls! What has happened to my fancy Macaroni Grill? Asia took our order, and I asked for a special past dish (Pasta Primavera - penne pasta with a mixed vegetable medley). I confirmed with her what was in the medley and was confident she understood what I wanted. When my order came, the pasta was horrible - undercooked and the ONLY vegetable in it was diced squash that was burnt. Where were the other vegetables? Additionally, every dish we received was cold. Every dish. I needed to send this dish back, but we couldn't find Asia. In fact, as we all looked around through the restaurant, other staff saw us needing help and just ignored us. Like they didn't know what to do. Finally, we saw Asia and hollered for her. She came over and I explained about my dish. She never apologized. She just asked if I'd like to fill out one of the "Build Your Own" pasta forms. Yes! Why wasn't this offered originally? My dish came back very quickly, but the pasta was still undercooked. I only ate a small portion of it. Never once did a manager come over to say anything to us. When we received the check, the wine my friend received was billed at $11, when it was listed as $7 in the menu. We pointed this out and Asia said she would look into this. As my wife and our friend walked to the bathroom, they FINALLY saw the manager. The Manager was standing with Asia. My wife overheard Asia say that we wanted the charge adjusted and the manager rolled her eyes and through her hands in the air. REALLY? Are you kidding me? You can't come over to initially see if everything was okay. You can't come over after we sent back a dish. But your going to roll your eyes and make a comment when you overcharge for a glass of wine? In my opinion, at the very least, my meal should have been taken care of - I hardly ate any of it. We completed our transaction and got out of this place as quickly as possible, never EVER to return. The issue here is there is no leadership. People are working here that should not be in the service industry, but apathy has taken over and they are going through the motions. Please do yourself a favor and...

On Saturday, 3 December 2022, I placed an order at the Macaroni Grille in Round Rock, Texas. I ordered: Truffle Macaroni, Truffle Fries , Pasta Milano, Pick 2 Apps which were bruschetta and fried mozzarella, Kids meal Alfredo and Ravioli, 3 Loaves of rustic bread, which was to be picked up at 8:30 p.m. I arrived at 8:28 p.m. and called to let them know that I had arrived, and that I was in slot 3. I was told that, "they were bagging my order right now," and that it should be out in less than a minute. At 8:47 p.m., I went inside and asked about my order. I was directed to the bar where they told me that my order would be out, "in just a few minutes," and that thy were frying up the fries. I went back outside, and waited patiently for my food. At 8:55 p.m., I called and asked to speak to a manager, I was placed on hold and then a manager came on and told me that, " a lot of orders came in," and that my order would be out in a minute. (No apology, no asking for understanding, just basically telling me that I was going to get my food whenever they decided to give it to me.) The manager finally came out at 8:59 asked if I was my name, put the food in my window and left, almost causing me to drop the food. All of this was frustrating and unacceptable, but the condition of the food was what really caused issue. I was missing the Fried Mozzarella from my order, The kids pasta had no sauce on it, the macaroni had the incorrect noodles and was dry and unappetizing, the bruschetta was warm and mushy instead of cold and refreshing ( A clear indicator of how long the order had been sitting at room temperature), the drinks were wrong, all of the food was stone cold unappetizing and inedible, but none of that was the worst part. I received spoiled Olive oil and Moldy cheese! A kitchen that is that careless can not be trusted, and frankly is probably in violation of many health codes. Ironically after all of this, the receipt was suspiciously absent from my bag. Luckily it was an online order, so I had the confirmation number via email. Not only was the food of poor and unacceptable quality, it was unsafe and unsanitary to eat. We had to go and spend another $73 on food after this. This was a horrific experience all of the way around. I paid $69 for food that I couldn't even eat. I tried to call back and request a refund but I was put on hold and they never answered again. I called again on Sunday, 4 December 2022, and I got the same response. The service was bad enough, the food was horrible, but the mold really was just far too much. I was on Vacation and unfamiliar with the area, so I tried to pick something familiar to eat and I ended up regretting it. If you want delicious food, amazing service, and a good experience, then do...

We made reservations a few days ago for mother's Day dinner. We arrived about 10 minutes ahead, checked in with the hostess and I was told they were running behind and it would be about 30 minutes before we could be seated. I understand, it's a holiday things are busy no worries.

Almost exactly on 30 minutes we were seated, the server came to the table before asking for a drink order let us know the soonest he could get food out would be an hour. Seemed strange they the hostess didn't mention this, so we assumed the time was inflated a bit to accommodate the busy restaurant.

We order drinks ( tea sand soda) and then order calamari, bruschetta, and 5 entrees ( my son wanted the chicken caprese salad along with his meal. The server brought us bread and olive oil and about an hour in the calamari showed up. 15 minutes later the caprese salad.

Hour and half into service I asked the server if he had an idea of when we might expect the rest of then entrees and the bruschetta....

This is where the meal gets weird, he launched into a speech about how the GM knew this was coming and they should have shut down togo orders and how they should have hire more people....he was loud enough that the tables next to ours were now looking and watching this crazy display. He then offered to drag the GM out of the kitchen and give us the corporate number so we could call and complain. He also let us know that he would be calling corporate to complain as well....

Whew...so we declined his offer and instead asked for the check for everything we had eaten so we could go find something else to eat on the way home. He brought the check with the bruschetta listed (bruschetta that never made the table). We let him know he went to the back and out came through hostess with plates of food for our table and she asked,"you don't want it?"

I need to clarify we asked minutes earlier when the food would come out. No one knew and the suddenly it showed up at the table. How sketchy the food was ready and no one knew? Where did this food come from? Was this our order or someone else's?

We declined and just asked to pay the bill, the server came back and nearly shouted,"good news your bill was comped, you can still tip me if you want to."

I need to note I never asked to speak with the manager, a discount or free food.

I did leave a tip for his trouble but it will be a mother's day meal we will never forget, as I said earlier such a...