Chili's Grill & Bar — Restaurant in Simsbury

June 2025- Back again for two burgers in the late afternoon: The Big QP Burger & Oldtimer with cheese w/o mustard. Always satisfying food.

May 2025 - With an unexpected change of plans on Mother's Day this year, we were so happy that Chili's in Avon, CT was open until 10PM as many restaurants in the area closed at 8PM. They were doing good business when we arrived just before nine. Apparently, many others were glad, too.

Chili's reminded us why we should eat here more often as long-time customers over the decades. Large menu with a variety of hamburgers, sandwiches, fajitas, quesadillas, steaks, salads and a few diet choices, big dining space and separate bar, casual vibe, great margaritas and friendly service.

Drinks: Two Presidente Patron classic margaritas were well made, the raspberry tea not on the menu was served in a plastic mug & the Heineken in a bottle with a chilled glass worked for someone who is a microbrew guy.

Food:The chicken bacon ranch quesadilla was delicious, as was the welldone mushroom swiss burger with fries. Because I make great ribs myself, mine I have to say are better, but I still liked my half rack of dry rub baby back ribs. It was a little dry and charred, but it may have been because it was close to closing time. Mac and cheese side was rich and creamy. Fries on two of our orders were well cooked.

Chili's has always been a reliable go-to chain restaurant for ribs, fajitas, burgers, and more. Returning to CT after many years in SoCal some time ago, I told people it was the only place you could get a good margarita. There are equally good places now or better for this drink, but Chili's still provides a balanced menu and a comfortable environment for patrons who want to sit at the bar, have a family dinner with young children or a casual date.

The Avon Chili's I used to go to for many consecutive years. This was my first time here in a while. More recently, it was because of the Coronavirus, and we've been eating at small businesses to help keep them open. Prior to this, schedules, destinations, and locations changed our dining places.

Feb. 2022, we were seated in the bar right after opening. Our server, also the bartender, was polite and attentive. They don't have a happy hour, but their Valentine's Day themed $5. margarita for the month was very good. I wanted the Blue Pacific Margarita I used to love, but they've changed this recipe, and it now has pineapple juice like many other drinks on the menu. This change didn't work for me.

Also new was they no longer charge for their chips and salsa as they did before, which was something truly surprising to me after returning from CA, where these are always complimentary. The basket brought to our table was drenched with oil. We heard other customers inquire about this, and everyone was told it was because they were made fresh today. Salsa was simply blended tomato, but as a free starter, diners ate them up.

Their original menu items remain the most consistent. The full order of ribs still falls off the bone tender and flavorful. The fries were lacking.

The six ounce sirloin ordered rare to medium rare was cooked medium, and the loaded mashed potatoes that came with the meal tasted off to me. Lack of seasoning? Pre-made? I ate a few bites and got the rest to go for my partner. Broccoli was fair.

It was hard to choose between three and four stars for this review, but I'm giving it four for the years of good food I had here, the chain as a whole, and perhaps other dishes...

Went in for lunch Have always ordered the same chicken sandwich, in fact ordered it several weeks ago. Today what was brought out to me was substantially inferior and did not look anything like my previous orders. I was told the menu changed yet the wording in the menu did not change at all. What did change was amount of chicken that was on the sandwich, frankly I could go to McDonalds and been served a better meal...thats saying alot!!! I spoke to the manager Michael, I explained that the chicken was on hamburger roll (not on a brioche roll as stated in the menu) I know the difference and apparently so did he. He said "yes the other sandwich was on a different roll and you did get 2 pieces of chicken" I picked up the top of the burger roll. The chicken was one piece, half the size of a chicken breast. And the price was the same!! OK...so you have decided that you needed to cut costs...charge the same with less food...justify it by saying that you changed the menu....NO you did not change the menu...you changed the portion to minute size. The comment the manager gave me was "sorry I cant do anything about it. He looked at the menu...scrambling to justify the change in roll etc etc. but it was an epic fail. The menu is a MISREPRESENTATION of what is being served. And what manager can not do anything about it when a customer is unhappy. His only response being "cant help you" Sorry..not sorry ...wont be paying for a shoddy misrepresented piece of food at this Chilis anymore..or maybe any other. Also, there were several customers in the restaurant also complaining about their orders. Not...

Unfortunately this was not a good experience at all. This is our first and last time coming to this particular Chilis. We were coming back from Granby and figured we’d stop. We usually frequent the chilis in Bristol or southington and typically have good experiences. I had weird vibes from the start and should’ve listened to my gut. A gentleman at the to go counter was visibly irritated, not a manager in site either. Several tables needed bussing and cleaning. Should’ve left then, but we were hungry. Our server was definitely inexperienced, we tried to give the benefit of the doubt. We ordered our usual Arnold palmers (one with blackberry and other with mango flavoring) I don’t know what we received but they were not Arnold palmers and they were very watered down. I’m guessing this server didn’t know what an Arnold Palmer was and tried to take a guess at it.

Our server instead of asking about refills and overall service was chatting with a coworker holding a skateboard. Our table had extra plates and cups we needed taken, it made enjoying our meals difficult because he never removed any of the dirty dishes, or cups. The servers overall demeanor was honestly just off putting. When we asked for refills we had to remind him about what we even had. I had the burger bites, my significant other had a burger and our burgers were burnt and the bread on my sliders was stale. We are good tippers, but I wasn’t tipping even 18% for the service we received.. no way no how. We won’t be back here, ever… and I don’t...