The Root Cellar Cafe — Restaurant in San Marcos

Went with my wife: Seated at a wobbly table I could not even get my legs under because the chairs were too tall. I'm 6'4, it felt like they tried to seat me at a kids' table. Had to go back to the front of the restaurant and ask for a different place to sit, because wait staff was nowhere to be found. Should have been my first warning.

Seated at a new table, we waited 15 minutes for service. No drink service anywhere. When the waitress finally came around, she brought waters, we ordered two ice teas and our dinner: Chicken and waffles for my wife, pecan crusted chicken with side of grilled asparagus and risotto for me, and some chips and house made salsa as a starter.

Five minutes later we finally got our ice tea. Another five minutes for chips and salsa. The tea was decent, it so hard to mess that up. The chips were stale. They tried to spruce it up with a bland chili powder sprinkled on some, but it didn't help. Figuring the salsa might breathe some life into them, tried it. It literally tasted like someone took a can of crushed tomatoes and called it good. No heat at all. No salt, and for being tomato based, it even needed acid. My wife who avoids spicy foods labelled it the worst salsa she ever tried, "a cup of bland tomato pulp".

15 minutes later, with no tea because the waitress was nowhere to be seem, the chips eaten anyway because I hadn't eaten since breakfast, dinner finally arrived, served by a friendly young lady. Needless to say, dinner did not go better than the chips.

Chicken and waffles: Chicken bland with sudden bursts of flavor that are localized to random areas. The siracha honey sauce is literally that, siracha mixed with honey and a bit of water so that it flows. The maple syrup pours like water. The waffle, while delightfully chewy, was somehow the blandest waffle ever created. My wife finished the chicken, and left half the waffle on the plate.

Pecan crusted chicken: I would love to tell you how this somehow oddly round chicken breast tasted, but the bourbon sauce with green onion is so overpoweringly sweet and coated the whole chicken, so it is all you taste. I'm not sure why they even added the onion, it was a few slices piled on the middle of the chicken for looks. The grilled asparagus was cooked fine, except the sauce had managed to run into it, so it was also sweet. The risotto looked and had the consistency of someone tray baking it and then bringing it to a church casserole lunch. Not creamy, somehow chewy, with obvious edges from whatever they cooked it in, and tasted like stuffing.

The waitress finally showed up and refilled our drinks when I finished my meal (wife was still slowly eating her meal). I asked for the check, which arrived 10 minutes later on a tray with a cutesy magnet. Apparently no one ever told them that the strips on credit cards are based off magnetic fields. Then no one ever came to collect the check. We waited 10 minutes after I got it before I finally handed it to a different waitress who was serving wine to another table. Then another five to get it back from our original waitress.

One star because it looks neat inside. One because I didn't get food poisoning. Minus one for horrible service on a night that was not that busy. Minus one for a chef who appears to not taste their food. Minus one for the bland abomination...

We went for breakfast today and am leaving severely disappointed. We were told when we arrived that it was a 20-25 minute wait for a table (after trying to join the virtual waitlist, which wasn’t working), and ended up waiting over an hour for a table. We were told that we could go upstairs to the bar for an appetizer and drink, so we did. We waited about 5 minutes for a person who worked there to walk in and when he did, he just went behind the bar and told us to let him know if we wanted a drink. We ordered 2 mimosas that barely tasted like anything. When we finally got seated at our table we tried to order the spinach and artichoke dip but were told it was out (fine by us), so we ordered the hatch chili queso which was pretty good. My boyfriend ordered the hill country breakfast with extra bacon, and I ordered the pesto pasta with a salad (that it came with). After about 45 minutes his food came out, minus the bacon. The sausage tasted like Jimmy Dean and the eggs were sub par. My food, on the other hand, did not come out. After about 5-10 minutes we asked a waitress to check on it, and a few minutes later our server came out to tell me that they were out of pesto and my meal could not be made. They asked if I wanted anything else, but my boyfriend was almost done with his food and we had already wasted 2 hours there. We reminded him that we were supposed to get a side of bacon (thinking I could at least eat that), and the waiter had forgotten to put the order in. They brought out 2 slices a while later that were very inconsistently cooked. We were never checked on, our waters were never refilled (which was extra disappointing because the AC was not working and it was very hot in there) and struggled to get one person to help us. They comped the queso and gave us 20% off my boyfriend’s food but never actually apologized. If I could leave less than 1 star, I would. Overall I was very disappointed with their service and will not be returning...

We went to eat for a late breakfast, we have been there several times for dinner but never for brunch. We also had our dog with us so we knew we would be sitting outside. When I walked up to ask for an outside table, the hostess walked up and said “what’s up.” As if I wasn’t trying to eat there, so when I asked for a table for two outside and that we have a dog, she said, “okay, yeah let me see what we can do about that.” She then went to the back and came out a few seconds later saying that they had a table and that we could go out there, but then someone else came out and stopped her. They told us that the waitress had already started two other tables and needs a break before another one. We were told to wait a few minutes. Since we had a dog I went to wait outside, but they didn’t take my number down or even ask for my name. We just waited outside. It was a Tuesday at 1:00pm, there was only those two tables outside. We waited 5-10 minutes and the whole time we were watching two waitresses go in and out of the restaurant serving the two tables. My girlfriend went in and asked how long we would have to wait and they told us maybe 5-10 minutes and then turned back to talking to one another, so we waited some more, and then left because they seemed they had no intentions of serving us. Other experiences at Root Cellar have been great, I don’t know why they felt the need to treat us this way. Safe to say we won’t be going...