GARAGE Kitchen + Bar — Restaurant in San Diego

Never order food from “Garage Kitchen and Bar.” I am not the type to leave many negative reviews but I just have to share my experience with this restaurant. My partner and I traveled from out of town to San Diego for our vacation looking for a place to eat in the Gaslamp Quarter and to also enjoy ourselves on our last stay in San Diego, We decided to stop by at “Garage Kitchen and Bar.” As we stepped inside with my partner’s service animal, we were then stopped and approached by a staff member who saw we had a dog. He said no dogs allowed. I told him that she’s a diabetic alert service dog. Then he said it was okay. We found our seats and a tall male server with a beard and a mustache came by and asked us if we were ready to order after bringing us water. We replied politely, “no, we need a little more time please.” He left the table and we browsed the menu. We waited 5 more mins and then my partner went to the bathroom. While she was in the bathroom, I waited for our server to come back to order our food and drinks, however; our original server (tall guy with brown hair with a beard and mustache) still never came back to take our order. A woman named Vanessa came over and approached me asking several questions so suddenly which caught me off guard. At that point, I just simply just wanted to put our order in. But she asked what I was waiting for and I had told her I was waiting for our server to come back to the table so I could order. She left our table. Then my partner arrived back from the bathroom and asked if I had put the order in, I said no because our server still never came back to take out order. The same woman approached our table again and asked if she could take our order, we politely gave our order and waited patiently for our food. Our original server which was male never communicated or returned back to our table for the rest of our service. When we received our food, which was the chicken tenders and fries. the fries were overly salty and only good when dipped in ranch or ketchup. Chicken was dry. My “californication” drink was overly sour and had so much tajin I could barely taste any tequila for a $13 drink. We spoke to the manager by the name of “Shane.” Shane was very, very unprofessional and unkind to us when we kindly and politely shared our feelings and unwelcoming experience to him. He was very aggressive, defensive, rude and argumentative towards us, not once showing any type of care or understanding as NEW customers to this establishment that he manages. You would think that as new customers this establishment would care about providing high quality service and exceptional food with a positive experience, clearly that was not the case. I hope this establishment provides better training courses and has a better manager who is KIND and understanding to their customers instead of treating their customers like their feelings aren’t valid and their voice makes no difference in the quality of customer service they receive. We will never return here. All we wanted was to eat good food and enjoy ourselves with one last meal before driving home several hours. So Very disappointing. All I can say to anyone thinking of eating here ..is there are so many better places to eat in the quarter...

This is one of those rare situations where the customer service is so unacceptable that nearly every other redeeming quality of the venue is squandered mercilessly. That being said; that doesn't make this any less of a teachable moment for this venue.

The Good:

The drinks work. Truth be told, your margaritas taste like they are made with premium liquor, but on happy hour, they are very much house. I appreciate the dark (if not as novel as the outside) atmosphere.

The Bad:

Your bar-dude (about 6'2, mid 20s to mid 30s at the most, with long hair in a pony tail) lost my business and directly caused this review. Not only am I an officer in one of the start-ups that was meeting there today (5/7 on a Monday), but an avid community Yelper with a computer and wifi module in tow at all times (helpful in the unlikely event that you need to review a local dive with a chip on it's shoulder). In addition to being rude, dismissive and snarky, he messed up the order to boot. Firstly, he didn't know what was on the menu, and had to recheck it to see if the item that I told him not to include (but which came on the dish) was even on the menu. Now I've had a long standing animus of servers who refuse to write down their orders, and this helps reinforce that stereotype. Without even checking the menu, he identified the mistaken item as mayonnaise (a word that doesn't appear on the menu as being associated with that item), and then asked in a snarky voice if I "wanted another one" (again, giving up on actually reading the menu or correcting himself). After initially saying yes, I changed my mind and just cut my losses. Fascinatingly enough; the vegan burger was the only reason I tried your venue. As much as I wanted them to make another one, I couldn't abide your bar-dude's customer service (not a helpful handicap when you're selling a product that people could literally buy at Albertson's in it's original form). He even managed to avoid apologizing for wasting my time or any experience that I may have had.

The Business:

Let me start (before I forget) by saying that the area of the bar facing the dining room is a mistake. You never feel like a customer when you're sitting in a spot like that in a restaurant, and I'm sure that your female dining room patrons don't appreciate folks staring down their bras. Now, onto the bar wonder - please either fire him, or train him on how to handle customers (assuming he even likes them). I rose through the ranks of customer service to get where I am today; I'm speaking from experience: you don't want someone messing around with your best asset (the customer) simply because they don't have a dog in that fight. People WILL come to your venue to try the Beyond Burger: please try and remember that can indeed make it at home as well.

And if the person dealing with me today WAS the manager...congratulations on actually reading your Yelp reviews. These reviews cost businesses thousands of dollars a quarter, so way to be on the beam. That being said, work less mid-day shifts: nearly all professionals day drink here, and our customer service standards are high. It's best to expect them before it...

Definitely didn't expect this place to be so good !

Came here for bottomless mimosas for the My brother, dad and husband but even the food had us surprised. Mimosas were delicious! Perfect balance of champagne and orange juice that didn't taste too strong of either. Definitely one of the best momosas I have tasted. Only downside here was that the service was quite slow in terms of the mimosa refills. We had to call them multiple times to refill us. (We came to the restaurant with 1 hour left of the brunch service So we're hoping to get quicker refills but they took quite a long time)

COBB SALAD (Romaine Lettuce | Chicken Breast | Hard Boiled Egg | Bacon Blue | Cheese Crumbles |Pickled Onions | Grape Tomatoes) - So ginormous and so delicious! Quite a large amount of bacon and blue cheese so I took some of it out but it was so good on its own that I didn't even need the dressing!

THE BEST BREAKFAST SANDWICH EVER ( Wild Boar Sausage |Over Hard Egg | Cheddar | Bacon Jam | Cheddar Chive Biscuit | Rosemary Potatoes) - Husband got this one. He really enjoyed the flavor of everything. Everyone on the table tried and liked it as well. The cheddar chive biscuit was quite a surprise. I absolutely love those Rosemary potatoes on the side! So perfectly crispy and didn't seem to greasy either. Right amount of Rosemary flavor on there and just a beautiful side dish overall.

NASHVILLE CHICKEN SANDWICH (Fried Chicken House Slaw | Pickles | Spicy Aioli | Brioche Bun) - This was one big sandwich! Really giant chunk of chicken in there and good amount of coleslaw and aioli as well. Flavor was on point too. Good amount of spiciness in the fried chicken and went well with the slaw and ayoli and pickles. Everyone loved the sandwich.

BUTCHER'S BURGER (Blend of Bison Wild Boar & Beef Bacon Jam | Cheddar | Lettuce | Tomato | Crispy Shallots | Garage Sauce | Brioche Bun) - my brother got this And definitely enjoyed. He's a big fan of burgers and loved the portion size on this one. It was one of those burgers that is just very loaded with fillings and that made it so much better. Came with fries on the side. Generous portion size of the fries as well, and no complaints because those...