Burtons Grill & Bar — Restaurant in Springfield

Burton's Grill & Bar went beyond my greatest expectations. We just moved to the area and I notice it had excellent reviews the last time I checked it. We came here - our first time - spur of the moment this past Thursday. I was expecting a restaurant similar to Ruby Tuesday or Applebees, yet it was very different. I have worked in the food and customer service industry as a server, prep cook, and hostess in five star restaurants, so I am very wary of restaurants and food places in general - even five star restaurants.

Superlative customer service, good hygiene in food preparation & cooking, and exceptionally delicious food are of the utmost importance to me. It appears Burton's staff & our server, Daniel, exceeded our expectations exponentially - more than any restaurant we have went to in this area. Prices are fair and well priced. We didn't eat the more expensive entrees on the menu, yet we will try them in the future especially when they serve my favorite soup, French onion soup.

Ambience is industrial interior with exposed bricks and pipes. Very well designed. The seating area was clean. We had the whole area in a corner to ourselves and privacy.

The ambience and food appeared too fancy and expensive to my husband. Yet we spent the same amount of money or more in other restaurants in this area. To me it was a more elevated and exceptional restaurant than the others in food quality and service.

The kitchen of the restaurant and the food preparation from the staff were visible for everyone to see that the food was properly cooked. I prefer restaurants to be that way.

The hostess (long hair attractive brunette lady ) and Daniel immediately served us, addressed any allergy or food issues we might have, and were very professional & courteous. They both made excellent recommendations for our lunch. Water in a glass carafe and glasses were presented to us on the table, and it was very refreshing.

Daniel walked us through the menu meticulously and how the food was prepared fresh. His attention & answers to our questions and the food on the menu were well thought and addressed. I could tell he was knowledgeable and familiar with the menu.He even refilled my drink without having to be asked for a refill. It is rare to get such service from a server.

There were many new and exciting appetizers and entrees we wanted to try. The sandwiches were both our preferences that day with a salad and parmesan truffle fries. We upgraded to Parmesan truffle fries, and I exchanged my French fries for a salad with a mustard vinaigrette. It cost 75 cents to upgrade the French fries and $3 extra for a big salad as a side.

The bread appetizer came with the three different elements - butter & dipping sauces- herbed butter, pesto sauce, and a tapenade. It was delicious. Our lunch entrees came out with little wait time. Daniel made sure we had extra condiments and that our food met our satisfaction. We were accidentally served regular fries instead of the parmesan truffle fries. It was efficiently resolved in a timely manner. We loved our meals and made plans to come back in the future and bring family & friends there. Everything we couldn't eat was placed in containers and placed in a nice takeout bag.

Daniel, also, informed us of the Burton's free app and walked me through in getting points & perks for our meals on the app. You get $25 for every $300 you spend in Burton's. He made sure to get us our points that day on the app.

Overall, the finest dining experience we had so far in a restaurant and a place to have future dining experiences. Yes we had some hiccups yet they were resolved efficiently and no delays. It still did not detract the high quality of the ambience, food,...

Occurred around 2pm Sep 28th. The review is about Joseph and the manager. The waiter Joseph likes to make the customers wait on him, a new concept and reverse in role play as a way of him making himself gain some micro power trip over his customers: he uncomfortably stood over our table in silence and resett his watch while holding time and space, as me and my girl friend tried to figure out why he is doing that and holding us in limbo. When he finally got done resetting his watch, entering in a number of codes into his ordering pad and holding a full 2 mins over us, his prime time of what he was up to revealed itself. He was doing that whole over compensation niceness to my Caucasian girl friend, while darting head to toe nasty looks and giving out contemptful vibes over me; mind you, I sincerely say this: I did nothing but just exist has a human who is not Caucasian. I thought it was a one off but no, while telling us about the drinks and specials, he literally only looked at my girl friend and it was nothing but a case of microexpression secondary treatment. This restaurants has a lot of daily specials so this went on for awhile. To save us all time, the restaurant shouldn't have let me come in, if that's how the really feel about non-white people. When I had had it with his overly obvious micro racist vibes, after he begrudgingly had to look at me to take my order, I finally just said I needed to see the manager. After he left our table area, my friend sensed already something was seriously off with Joseph and that I was feeling discomfort so she suggested we leave. After I took a min to get up and get some air from their outside baloney area, I came back and my friend and I started leaving. When the manager approached, we discussed on the walkway on what happened. These actions and ways of being start from the top: the manager did the whole, "oh, no Joseph wouldn't do that, he's not like that" dismissal, not dismissal passive aggression. How would you know manager, you would not experience it when you two are both Caucasian, how could you know the experience of these tacitly nodded behaviors which you allow in your restaurant? The owner has to do some soul searching and ask themselves how whom you hire are representing your establishment. It's 2024, for real, we can take our money and dine elsewhere while warning others of this unacceptable behaviors. We will never...

I took a group of my colleagues out last night specifically for Happy Hour at Burton’s, where we had never been before. After we sat at the bar, we weren’t approached for twenty minutes. We were told that “Wednesdays are really busy” so we understood…but we also couldn’t help but notice we were the only non-white patrons in the establishment (except for the kitchen staff). But back to that later… We had to ask for the Happy Hour menu specifically even though we sat at the bar and in the correct time frame. As our food was being served, the employee knocked the large glasses of water all over our food and us. Everything was soaked, our clothes and our now inedible food. The server apologized and grabbed some paper towels…and then dropped them off for us to do it. While WE were cleaning everything up, the bartender was so kind enough to offer us some rags from the kitchen. The manager Jeff came over to talk to us about 15-20 minutes later AND after we asked to see him (he said, “Oh, they JUST told me that happened now, sorry”) and then offered us a round of drinks...as we were clearly no longer enjoying our visit, we refused the drinks and then Jeff shrugged and walked away. We had to pay for the inedible food. Finally, I decided to order one last glass of wine before Happy Hour ended, and instead of bringing me a new glass of wine, the employee merely topped off my still half-full glass from the previous order. I’ve never seen that before at any restaurant. It’s disheartening, because Alexandria is known for being such a melting pot for all races and nationalities, so we really didn’t expect the strange vibe we were getting for being there. Based on some of the reviews I’ve read, it seems like other non-white patrons have felt the same in the past. Why can’t Burton’s have customer service like all the Great American restaurants down the street, where we’ve been treated amazingly for years? I’ve never had a problem or been treated seemingly differently when we’ve gone there.

And perhaps it’s not a race thing – fine, either way, the service here really blew. Also, the snarky replies to some of the negative reviews are a bad look especially when it’s coming from the owner….Cringey. Gave it a try, won’t...