Red Lobster — Restaurant in San Jose

Arrival time 1:38pm Nobody at the host stand when I entered About 30 seconds later a host arrived to seat me immediately Ample parking but depending on which direction you’re coming from, you may have to perform a uturn or other maneuver to get into the parking lot due to the dividers on such a wide street. Decor is old and dated. Walmart quality salt and pepper shakers. The crowd is older and relaxed. The music is bland and not exciting. There are cool mobile payment and game devices on the table. However, they are filthy and with covid I’d expect they’d be wiped down after each customer. I ordered an old fashioned but the waitress didn’t know what that was or if it were offered. There was no attempt to ask the bartender so I just switched to a crown Royal on ice , no chaser. They gave me a very heavy pour and the perfect amount of ice. ✅ I wasn’t offered a water on the side.

I then ordered clam chowder bowl as my appetizer which came with their classic cheddar bay biscuits. It was about 12 minutes from the time I arrived until the time I had food in front of me. The clam chowder was about 95% runny broth. It had a few potatoes but oddly absent of clam. My disappointment was immense. The biscuits were delicious, thankfully.

They appear short handed so service is abysmal. 1 waitress appears to be working a 15 table area.

Entree arrived at 2:10pm

Deep fried scallops are good. Light and crispy batter. Broccoli is cooked perfectly but it’s bland without any sort of seasoning at all. Salmon appeared well done although I’ve asked for it to be cooked medium. It was about a 4oz portion. Crispy skin and light grill marks on the presentation side. Steak was closer to medium well, so again not done correctly. Eventually when my waitress came around, i informed her but didn’t choose to send it back (I’ve heard stories about sending food back). The steak was juicy on the inside. I tasted salt, corse peppercorn and a pinch of spice.

I was still not offered water the entire meal. I was also not offered desert.

I gave her a $15 cash tip on a $51.13 bill.

Summary P - parking: plenty P - price: fair S - seating: ample including a bar area T - time to be served: average T - time to be acknowledged: immediately V - value: good but declining rapidly V -...

Awful. Absolutely awful. We will never be back. If you get a waiter named Michael, run. We should've walked out within the first 5 minutes. Incredibly unprofessional and provided the worst customer service and etiquette I have ever seen at any restaurant outlet of any level. Don't talk to my family like we're your homies because we're not. Have some class and respect. Also, don't curse at the table or blame your coworkers for your god awful service. Our drinks weren't refilled, we waited over an hour for our food, then he had the audacity to blame the cooks and still serve the food to us cold without a single apology or any accountability of his own. My soup was completely filmed over from it sitting out. Plates weren't even room temperature, let alone hot. My brother's steak was well done when he asked for medium rare. I could've done without the F-word at the table and his excuses for everything after he hadn't checked on us for over an hour. Then after the terrible experience, never thanked us for coming or acknowledged conclusion of the dinner when discussing payment. I used to work for Darden, know the standards, and anyone at that company would be completely embarrassed that such a person was even in their restaurant. Complete trash. I wish I could give it negative stars. Not a manger in sight the entire night either or a single supervisor to ask how everything was going. There are so many other good restaurants in san jose... don't waste...

I've been hesitant about posting this review. Red Lobster has been a favorite of ours for many years. Our go to location was the one on Almaden Expressway, but since has closed. My wife and two middle school aged kids went for dinner on a Friday night. The food was horrible to say the least. My wife had two lobster tails, they were not cooked all the way through, the kids both had the $28 steak and lobster specials. We ordered them cooked medium. The tails were partly raw, the steaks were rare. I tasted the steaks and I can tell you that they had absolutely no flavor to them, none. I had a plate of something that I would not have regularly ordered, but the menu changes eliminated my favorite dish. Now for the "famous" biscuits. Red Lobster must be really trying to save money because the new and improved biscuits are bland and nearly tasteless. What a huge disappointment for us. The server did his best, but I was so disappointed in the food, I couldn't get over it. I'm sure it wasn't his fault. Unfortunately we will not be dining at Red Lobster anymore. I'm thinking that I should go to the grocery store and buy some boxes of the biscuit mix, before the eliminate the product?? We spent $200, which is probably about normal these days, but I won't be spending it at Red...