Chili's Grill & Bar — Restaurant in South Elgin

Date: 6/29/22, time: 8:40-8:45 Pickup (actual pickup happened around 8:56. You'll know who it is when you look it up. Dark Blue Ford. . .very much balding guy who had to walk in.

I can't believe it. I'm writing a review on CHili's. . .is this what my life has come to?

Ordered Online. Order says pickup at 8:45. Arrive at 8:44. Parking lot is basically empty. Only a few customers in the restaurant. I pull into pickup spot two. Sign says to STAY IN YOUR CAR. I wait a few minutes. Decide to check my phone. Apparently the text wanted me to "check in" when i arrived. So i did. It asks. . .what spot are you in? Spot 2 of course. Online check-in says to STAY IN YOUR CAR. Another 5 minutes pass. I refresh the page. it says "you're checked in". . .stay in your car. . .okay. I wait another couple minutes cause it's 10 past when the order is supposed to be ready. There's nobody else picking up. . .I finally decide to just walk in and the girl who's supposed to be operating the to-go counter is essentially chit chatting with some other girl in the kitchen on a super wet and not clean floor. I wait for a beat, she finally comes over and asks, "what's your name?" Excuse me? It's says on MULTIPLE communications to me to stay in my effing car and YOU'LL come to me. She finds my order, which has for sure been sitting there for 10 minutes. . .then haphazardly moves it in my direction with one hand while simultaneously walking back into the kitchen. . .the bag almost topples over but I'm able to save it with my left hand. Like. . .how effing lazy do you have to be? You can't even make sure to hand the bag over nicely to make sure i have it before letting go? I was a little more than miffed. Especially since I had hustled to get there in time so we wouldn't have cold food. Of course, when I got home, food was 10 minutes colder than it should have been cause they left it in a thin paper bag, enclosed in thin plastic containers. . .

Normally I give folks the benefit of the doubt, and I'm sure it's "hard to find good help" now days. . .but I tipped 18% ahead of time. Plenty of folks nowadays think tipping on a pickup is a bunk concept, but I can agree there's some work to it. If you're doing your job, yeah. . .but if you're just not even paying attention and messing around with your friend in the back, why should I tip you? This to-go order was a strait expo from kitchen to a bag. No extras. Girl needs to learn how to do at least a half-a*sed job. In all honesty, I just want my tip back. I don't mind paying for the food, I ate it cause I was starving. . .but I essentially paid for a girl to not work, and paid for myself to do the work instead.

Feel free to reach out. I'm sure you can find my contact info on my receipts. I was the ONLY person picking up at that...

Food is okay. However the plastic packaging they use, Karat, says right on the box that its microwave safe and dishwasher safe. Its not microwace safe at all. The plastic melted after i heated up my food in the microwave for 1min and 30 seconds. These companies are willing to lie to you about so much. Why even bother spending money to eat out when they give unsafe packaging where the plastic leeches into your food. Im not blaming employees at all. I am blaming the owner of this Chilis as well as Karat, the packaging company and will be lodging a complaint with them as well. As for food, the fried cheese bites are great, like mini mozz sticks,but the sauce is so watery and tasteless and makes me think its being cut. The chicken fajitas I was told were bland and you're better off just ordering from El Faro. Texas fried were a joke, they need soft cheese and not the shredded one that hardens after 5 minutes. There were 4 jalapeno slices....needless to say...bland and not worth it. Chicken and waffles were good. Waffles have sweetness and crisp, chickens not bad either. Street corn....well its pretty bland. it doesn't taste like street corn at all. Just unsalted butter. Overall Id say go somewhere else. If you really want something here, sure, but its prolly not gonna be a great experience and you might get plastic in your food. Just....don't trust any of these chain restaurants. They want your money amd thats all. Go treat yourself to something cheap but good. Go eat somewhere where they dont lie to you. Blue Box Cafe and El Faro, Larsas Kitchen....all great places...

My husband and I have been avoiding this location for about two years. We tried it a few times because it’s close to us, but had such bad experiences (mostly with service) that we would just drive out to the Bartlett location if we really had a chilis craving.

But today chilis sounded really good, and it was already getting late (for us cuz we’re grandparents when it comes to bedtime). We checked the ratings and saw some recent positive ratings and decided to give it a second shot.

I would happily go back to this location based on our experience today. First, shoutout to Lorenzo. Chilis South Elgin, seriously give this guy a raise. He was so sweet, personable, gave great service, and even told us how to order our food to give us the best deal. AND he was waiting like six tables working his tail off and still did a good job.

When we walked in we were seated immediately, and Lorenzo was there within a minute to see if we were ready for drinks.

I observed the area where we were sitting and the staff all appeared to be on top of it. We didn’t order anything from the bar, but the bartender was very attentive from the few side conversations I heard with other customers.

Props, South Elgin. Please keep being this good so I don’t have to drive far to get my chips...