Cracker Barrel Old Country Store — Restaurant in Spanish Fort

Where to start. We've always liked CB over the years, but food quality has gone down, portion size downsized, but prices raised. Seems to be the common trend, leaving little choice no matter where you go. We had a bad experience prior with poor service/food at the Spanish Fort location but decided to give it a go again. It was worse this time. The young boy sitting us failed to supply silverware. After the waitress took our drinks order and the wife ordered coffee. Was brought out with sugar and creamer, but we loop back to the silverware issue, nothing to stir it with. Requested a spoon. Said she would get us one. She got sidetracked with another table, and 5 minutes passed. She came back to check on us and reminded her of the spoon. She went and got us one, by then coffee was cold. So she had to go get another pot. Brought back a near empty one and new mug. Poured it, but only had a half cup in it, that was also cold. We had to request biscuits. They were not offered. Brought them to us, loop back to silverware. Can't spread butter without a knife. I pointed this out again. Got that and then noticed that two other tables were also running into mirror images of our issues.. no silverware. At this point, I got up, walked to the cash register, and requested a manager. Mind you, we had been there for nearly 20 minutes. I talked to the manager outside of ear shot of the main dining area (next to the cash register) and discovered it was her first night at that location. I asked who was supposed to handle silverware. She said the one who seated us unless they were out. I brought to her attention that two other groups didn't have any. Informed her of the cold coffee and that we had to keep requesting stuff. She apologized and said that she would have a talk with the staff after work. The facility wasn't full, and I asked her if she was short staffed. She said not at this location. So that leaves it to poor time management on staff and not doing their job. The one who seated us went to the kitchen area several times to chat with the waiters. He could have been dealing with the silverware issue or making sure who was supposed to be doing it knew of the shortage. The manager did comp our full meal. The meal itself was sub-par. Wife ordered roast beef, and that came out with cold congealed gravy, and the meat was poor quality, fatty, and stringy. I ordered the hamburger steak, which lacked seasoning. The mashed potatoes had congealed gravy as well that you couldn't mix in. My broccoli appeared to have been steaming since the time they opened for the day. You touched it and turned to mush (great if feeding a newborn or a senior with swallowing difficulties). We had also ordered the tator tots and fried cheese bites.. the cheese on the tater tots had already hardened upon arrival to the table. So it didn't stick to them at all. It was just a lump of greasy cheese. The cheese bites were ok... problem was we ordered those as sort of a starter types. They arrived 2 minutes before our main meal..... I asked our waitress how long she had been there and she said about a month. She seemed to be struggling, focus wise. I'm not sure if she was having an off day or if this was normal. I noticed other staff leaving, and she said she now had to pick up their duties. I asked who was cleaning tables, and she said she was now, since it was one of the ones who was leaving. The table in question was next to ours and had not been cleaned off the entire time we were there.

I can say that without a doubt, we will not be back to the Spanish Fort one. Saraland burned their bridge about two years ago with us due to service/food quality, and in January, the one near Greenville AL had good staff, but again, a letdown in food.

Cracker Barrel used to be a place to go to get a good meal at a decent price vs. Fast food and their prices. I can say that I now question this given multiple locations failing on quality and service over a period of time.

I think they still do well on the breakfast side of things. When you get into...

Our family usually meets here on special occasions about 4 times a year. It's usually a party of 10 -14. On 6/19/2023 we met there for breakfast @9 a.m. However my husband and I arrived early @8:30 a.m. to get checked in because I've been told numerous times you can't make reservations for a big party( that needs to change) I checked in at 8:30 a text was sent to my phone saying it would be a 35 minute wait. We waited (3 of the party were infants 1 under 2months) outside it was hot humid and rainy. At 9:15 I checked on our table was told they told me 45 minutes but we were next! I showed the young man the text and he kinda shrugged it off. In the mean time people were arriving and being seated. At 9:48 I went back to the front and I didn't even ask the young man I'm sure he could see my facial expression anyway. He immediately walked off and got someone and I explained to them how long we had been waiting and that I've watched other parties getting seated and had even watched people come in eat and go. The lady I talked to said we are getting it ready now so I went back out to tell my family however at this point I was trying to get them to go else where. Then we were called. We were seated and orders placed . We all didn't even get to eat together because we didn't get our food at the same time. It was almost 10 to 15 minutes difference in getting what we ordered. The kids were cranky and sleepy and the whole morning was shot, not to mention by the time we did get our breakfast it was almost lunch time. When my husband and I ordered we didn't even get our biscuits till we were finished with our meal. I wanna add some of our party has a 45 minute drive there. We try to meet there because it's convenient for most, but after this experience I'm not sure we will meet here again. I get places are short staffed and this day was fathers day and it was busy that's why I did wait so long before I asked to see someone besides the young boy seating people. I mean on several occasions they called parties of 5 and sat them and they ate and left. This day is unacceptable. First come first serve I feel like we were shoved at the bottom of the list. Also would like to add we had to get up and go look for our silverware. We actually got food and had nothing to eat...

Stopped here on 8/1/25 during our family vacation as we headed towards Pensacola. Cracker Barrel (CB) has always been a family favorite so we unanimously decided to stop here. It’s conveniently located close to the hotel we stayed at. My experience here was overall the worst experience I’ve ever had at Cracker Barrel. There was no wait, we were sat down pretty fast. A party of 5, that included a 2 and 7 year old, and 3 adults. The waitress brought my husband the incorrect order, he asked for Chicken fried chicken (CFC), and she brought him Homestyle Chicken, when we brought it to her attention she tried to tell us we ordered incorrectly when we are more than 100% sure he specifically said his go to meal, the CFC. My meal was scrambled eggs, potato casserole and bacon. The eggs came out and were not fully cooked all the way and slimy. The potato casserole was uncooked, the potatoes were still raw and if you’ve ever had uncooked potatoes you know the texture and taste, awful. All 3 adults had the casserole and we all looked at each other with disbelief. My 7 year old daughter’s 1/2 order of French toast came out soggy, as in with raw egg still on the bread, she didn’t eat it either. My husband’s chicken was blan, and just not the CB tasty food we’re expecting and it upset his stomach. Although the potato casserole seemed undercooked he ate 1/2 of it and was sick the entire day. The only decent thing was the bacon and biscuits. Needless to say it was a huge disappointment. When we let the waitress know, she looked at me with a doubtful look, as if I was lying and respond with “sorry about that”. Honestly, the potato casserole and biscuits are the reason I come to eat at CB. When checking out, they also asked how the food was and I let them know. TBH I wasn’t looking for a discount or a free meal, just expressing my concerns over the under cooked food that needs to be addressed with the cooks or kitchen staff. I’m glad I don’t live in this area because my local CB is amazing, I would never return to eat at this location given the option or even for a free meal, no thanks. If you’re looking for a good meal, find another CB this one has lots of room for...