The Barn Door Restaurant & Meat Market — Restaurant in San Antonio

We arrived about an hour after they opened. The place is very large with several rooms. All told, we were a party of 16.

We were placed in a separate room. The host was more than happy to accommodate a last-minute change to the number of seats. Once all of our party arrived and our orders were taken, it was more than one hour before we received any type of food. Bread rolls were finally brought after an hour. We were told about 30 minutes into our visit that they were just turning on the oven to put the rolls in so they would be a while. However, the restaurant had already been open for at least 45 minutes before we arrived. The rolls were good. Nothing spectacular. Other appetizers arrived shortly thereafter. I tried a jalapeno popper. It was good.

I initially ordered the ribeye, medium rare, but I ended up changing my mind and ordering the chicken fried ribeye. I am a chicken fried steak aficionado and had recently been ordering them whenever I went out to eat. I'd actually eaten two at two different restaurants within the last 2 weeks: One at the Aspen Creek Grill in San Antonio and another at the Brewster Street Ice House in Corpus Christi. This CFS was the worst of the three. I was extremely disappointed. It was a classic meh chicken fried steak: very thin unflavored breading that separated from the beef once you cut into it. The beef was also flavorless. I ordered two types of gravy: a brown gravy and a cream gravy. The brown gravy was much better, but that is not saying much. I think they're depending too much on the gravy to provide flavor to the chicken fried steak. Both other CFS's from the other two restaurants were head and shoulders above this one with the Brewster Street CFS one of the best I've ever had.

One other note about this CFS. Because it was a ribeye, it had more fat than the standard CFS. It's not really the best thing when you're eating that part with the breading.

The salad I received was good but not great. The only thing holding it back was the dressing which was homemade. I ordered thousand Island. I was told all of the dressings were homemade. I think it needed a little more zing. It was also a little flavorless.

The loaded baked potato was very good. My kids enjoyed their chicken strip meal and grilled cheese meal respectively. My wife also enjoyed her steak, but said it was nothing out of the ordinary.

Very disappointed. I probably won't go back again considering this experience and the price of the ribeye that I should have ordered. I'll just go out and buy one and...

Will not be going back here ever. My family ate here last night for my mom’s birthday dinner, we had a 7:45pm reservation and had to wait for a table but it was a short wait so it was fine. The server we had was terrible. Super quiet and shy girl completely done up in goth gear/make up to the extreme. That’s fine and all but she literally did not want to talk, and just stared at all of us when she came to the table, basically whispered the whole time, would walk up to our table and stare at us without asking her question first, made it super weird and uncomfortable. Usually paying so much money for food, presentation MATTERS (especially when the flavor is not there)! This is the shrimp cocktail the waitress brought out to our table. My mom was very dissatisfied and asked the waitress if this is the normal way the cocktail is served considering it was 8pm on a friday night. The waitress, being as shy as she was had no idea what to say and finally ended up saying that she wasn’t able to make the cocktail the way it’s usually made because their were not enough dishes as all of the ‘original dishes they’re supposed to be served in’ were dirty. On top of that my mom told her it’s supposed to come with limes, cocktail sauces and onions etc. the waitress said that those things need to be specifically asked for, it doesn’t come that way, who knows if that’s true but if it is there’s another red flag. What a freaking JOKE! On top of that she didn’t want to give us STRAWS. I honestly feel like this girl was going through something and should not have been at work. It was very disappointing because the other waitresses working that area were so on it and nice, they even came to our table to collect our dirty plates that had just been sitting there.

Everyone else was nice, the vibes were good but the food wasn’t. I’m sure everyone already knows the chicken fried chicken has no flavor, I survived this dinner on Mac and cheese and my Caesar side salad (it was delicious)

For the price, quality of food and service I will never go back here. BUT the vibes are nice and the tables are spaced apart very nicely for privacy...

Let me preface this review by stating that our server was attentive and friendly. This review in no way reflects his service since he was great

Summary: A steakhouse that doesn't know how to cook steaks, but charges you the prices of a steakhouse that should know how to cook steaks.

This review reflects the quality, or lack thereof, of the steaks of this establishment and the way it was handled by the manager on duty.

We were a small group of people on what seemed to be a very slow day at The Barn Door. Me and one other ordered the New York Strip cooked Medium Rare.

The steaks arrived about 40-45 minutes after being ordered. No big deal, sometimes some places take a while and I was in good company. Now most people can tell the difference between a Medium Rare and Medium Well steak strictly by the feeling when you first cut by the feeling of tenderness.

This steaks (both of them) were obviously Medium Well, both in color, temperature, and tenderness. Given the price of the steak and the time waited, we brought it to our servers attention. Our server, kindly and quickly, took them back and brought us new steaks.

The second set of steaks brought out were cooked Rare (which I'm a fan of) but cold in the center. Not lukewarm, but cold. So as to not want my server to think I was looking for a free meal (which I did not want and did not request, nor get) I cut a piece and had him touch the center (a non-bitten piece, obviously). My server's words "Wow, that's freezing. I'll go get my manager."

When the manager came, she actually said that the first set of steaks were "perfectly fine, and were cooked to their standard" and "the steaks (the second set) seemed to be rushed by the cook so he could get them to us quickly", and even going so far as to partially blame the lighting in the establishment for the color of the overcooked, obviously not medium rare, steaks. Didn't realize the lighting only affected 3 of the 5 plates served on the table, nor did I realize lighting affected the tenderness of steaks. I'll have to keep that in mind next...