Applebee's Grill + Bar — Restaurant in Sarasota

Decided to not get Chili's on Beeridge and I75 just to have something different. BIG MISTAKE. Started out good though. Called ordered Kids chicken tenders with an Oreo shake, An Adult chicken Tender basket, ironically I stressed the adult one, a fiesta chopped chicken salad with no dressing, and an appetizer sampler. They informed me that I would have to pick it up at the bar of that was okay and it would be 20 min. I showed up in about 15 went to the bar the bartender was great went grabbed the food rang me up and off I went. That was the best part of the evening. Got home and the first thing I realized was I got two kids meals. Checked my receipt just in case and was charged for the full sized adult basket. I was dissapointed but moved on as a phone call would get me a meal another time. Then I opened my wife's salad. I told her she was not going to be happy. Sitting in this huge Styrofoam container was the smallest 14$ salad I have ever seen. But it got worse. It had Caesar dressing on the lettuce and it was only chicken. No corn salsa. No peppers and onion and the salad was badly wilted. Now I had to call. As I'm looking it up I open the appitizer sampler and the cheese sticks were solid. Went to grab the marinara and it wasn't their. Disgusted I went for the chips and artichoke dip....it was cold and tasted horrible. As the phone is ringing my wife asks me were the Oreo shake is. They missed that too. I was so upset that I turned down the offer for a couple of free entrees and said I wanted to return the food and was on my way.l back which was okay with the manager Amanda. When I got their the bartender created me and gave me a giant Oreo shake and went into the back. I assumed to get the manager but about 5 minutes later she came back with bags of food. I told her that I didn't want any food I just wanted my money back and I didn't trust their cooks enough to accept food from them again. She said okay as it was an backward moment as she had no clue, went grabbed the receipt and I saw her and the manager at a terminal. She came back over and said the manager couldn't void the transaction but would be out in a second. After 5 minutes she came out with a 50$ credit for another meal. I felt bad but told her I was honestly never coming here again and asked of it would work at another location. I was told no. At the end of the night I paid $43 and two trips to this place and walked out with one big Oreo shake and an hour of my life gone. They are supposed to follow up with me tommorow. She was nice but...

This was the worst dining experience of my life. I love Applebee's restaurants. Everytime we come into town we usually dine at one. We came in around 615pm, the host sat us at a dirty table with caked on sticky goo all over the table and no silverware. Our server was new and told us that he never served before and was clearly very nervous. Which is fine, me and my husband have worked in restaurants and hospitality for years and understand when someone is fresh on the floor. Another more experienced server noticed we didn't have any silverware and brought us some. But it was unwrapped and just placed on top the dirty table. We asked our server to get us something to clean the table so we could be more comfortable. So we ended up cleaning our own table.The server forgot one of our drinks but it was fine. My husband ordered the "dollarita" and it tasted like straight syrup over ice, doubt it had any liquor in it. He requested a house margarita afterward hoping that would be better and it was just as gross. I ordered a new entre called the 3 cheese Mac with honey pepper chicken, which looked amazing in the picture. I was so excited to try it. My meal came out and it was so disappointing. The pasta was over cooked and mooshy there was mostly water than sauce and the chicken was just over done kids chicken tenders drizzled with idk what. Also my son ordered the kids burger with the fruit and yogurt, and the yogurt was chunky and curdled like cottage cheese. Obviously spoiled. Most of us just picked at the food and asked for the check. Not enjoyable and I'm hoping we don't get...

It was a good environment. It started out "okay." the waiter acted like he was really busy when the restaurant was really not that busy at all. It took about 5-10 minutes just to get a frozen lemonade. When I looked to see where that guy was, it never seemed like he was doing anything. When he finally came around to give me my drink, we where finally ready to order, but then he tried to leave again and said he'd be back in a "couple" of minutes... usually when people say that they mean like 10 minutes. So we stopped him and just told him to take our order before he took off again. We aren't usually pushy but we where really hungry and the service was just pretty slow. Food came out pretty quick, but they still put lettuce and tomato on my sandwich when I asked them not to, so... they had to take it back. I got another one and it was really good, I loved it. Meat was excellent and so was the bread. Their club house grilled sandwich is my favorite item on the menu. But my mom ordered a salad which was $11, and she didn't get much chicken or that much stuff that she asked for on the salad so she had to ask for more of that. Because $11 is a bit much for a salad so you should get what you paid for... The other waiters/waitresses where really nice I just maybe think this guy needed more training. He never really said your welcome or anything either which was a bit odd. But overall, food was great. Just maybe the staff could use some better training. We still tipped him 15% because at least he tried to...