Gateway Family Diner — Restaurant in Straban Township

Reviews VS Reality

Im not one to leave bad reviews, I rather speak to management & give them feedback so they can get better (which we did) but this one needs to be re-rated

Seems this place used to be good, but as of right now, thats no longer the case.

We were seated quickly, the guy who seated us seemed welcoming. The waitress came quickly too & was nice, however we noticed she was "efficient" yet very disengaging. Just said hello & quickly moved to ask what we were drinking but in a rush manner (BTW the restaurant was not busy at all). Since its a diner, we have visited many others before, my daughter asked for a sherly temple to what the waitress answered "we are not a bar", she didnt offered her options so we had to jump in & suggested to get her a sprite then. I asked for water with lemon but just got the water. My son asked for a NE clam chowder soup and got a broccoli soup instead. We ordered a french onion soup which we had to returned (it looked nothing like the pictures we saw on previous reviews, it was flavorless & super watery. The waitress quickly took it back and replaced it, this time with the NE clam chowder which was ok. However, once again the waitress was too "efficient", moving so fast, almost running away from the table all the time, so I was having a hard time trying to comunicate with her that I still wanted the lemon for the water. (It had a strong tap water taste so there was drinking it without lemon)

My daughter's burger was good yet fries came out cold. My son ordered a spagetti chicken parm, sauce was straight out the can and overcooked pasta (he only ate 1/3 of it). My husband ordered the Fishermans platter, was not good either. All of it was frozen seafood without seasonin, it was more breading than seafood, the crab cake was just a cracker mash with crab flavor (He just ate the shrimp, left the rest). My beerbattered cod fish basked was the better food from it all, good flavor, done right.

While we were dissapointed with the food, we got even more dissapointed with what happened while paying.

The same guy who sat us in the beginning (I believe his name is Ahmed) Asked us how was everything? So we went ahead to provide constructive feedback and said that the food needs improvement. While explaining about the platter the guy interrumpted and went towards the entrance of the kitchen where the waitress was and started screaming at her & someone in the kitchen in a very disrespectful manner & so loud we could hear him all the way to the entrace where the register is...

That didnt settle well with us at all!!! While the service was not all there, the truth is the waitress was still nice & she was probably just having an off day... However, the food choices /quality that its being bought to serve to the customers is not the waitress or the kitchen staff fault. Besides that and more importantly the behavior this guy had towards the staff was completely innapropiate & uncalled for. Shortly after the yelling part, another lady came out with the guy to the register to assist us. "Are you the same people who send back the onion soup? That's different than the onion rings". Im not sure what they guy told her, but we were not asking to get a refund on the food or a discount, which we quickly made clear to the lady. We explained we were just giving feedback with the intention for them to get better. She was polite and appreciative of it, still gave us a discount and thanked us for the honest feedback. She mentioned this place has been under new management for about 6 months (which to us explains the changes... Reviews VS current reality)

I really hope they get the feedback to heart and look into making the food experience & service better. They have a great location and great potential to turn it around if they are willing to stop cutting corners and get their menu to what a true diner is all about.

More importantly I hope they take care of the situation with this Ahmed guy, and show respect and take good care of their employees.

Best of luck and truly hope they can...

First, the good. My wife had a pancake, an egg over easy and bacon. It all looked, and she said, tasted very good! Now, for the bad. So, the first thing is the handicap parking is not five steps out the front door where there are three or four good parking spots, but the handicap parking is around the side of the building. Decide where I parked had steps and was quite a walk to the entrance door to get into the diner. My sausage, tomato, and Florentine soup were hot and delicious. My salad was quite a bit wilted, and the very large cucumbers in it should have been seeded and the very thick skin peeled. The Fisherman's Platter that I had should be taken off the menu completely. The clam strips were mostly clam flavored breading. The fried butterfly shrimp was so small and smashed so flat that it was nearly non-existent. Whoever called that ball of Goo a crab cake must have never eaten an actual crab cake!! The scallops were not real scallops, but the surimi material that they make imitation crab sticks out of. The fried fish was probably two steps below Mrs Paul's fish fillets. There was fish inside the breading, but the breading was at least as thick as the piece of fish was. I discarded at least three quarters of what they called a crab cake, most of my clam strips, and the thick edges of the Filet-O-Fish. We will go back again, but I will never order the Fisherman's Platter again. As I said previously, it should be taken completely off the menu as should any other dishes that use any of the components from...

We only came here because we wanted breakfast for lunch and The Honey Bee was closed on Mondays. We were expecting a "diner." The atmosphere was very generic. There were wires loosely going to tvs, no decor, and claw toy machines. When we were seated, the waitress barely gave us time to glance at the menu before asking for our drink order. I ordered a vanilla cappuccino, which was a definite mistake. I wasn't expecting it to come from the machine with the button at the gas station down the street with whipped cream. As my husband poured the sugar into his coffee, a waterfall of sugar went onto the table and coffee because the lid was not secured (the salt and pepper lids were not secured either). Our impersonable waitress just stood there wanting to take our order and said she'd bring another coffee. She didn't offer to clean the table. So, we wiped it onto the floor. Then our silverware was dirty, and my OJ cup looked as though it came from a scout camp from 1970 with a jagged plastic rim. The food was average. My egg sandwich was very salty. Lastly, the cashier/possibly owner was incapable of returning pleasantries nor making eye contact. He shouldn't have gone into the restaurant/customer service industry if he didn't want to talk with people. The only positive experience was the efficiency of the waitress. She was fast, but not pleasant. I would not recommend dining here. The Lincoln Diner in downtown Gettysburg or The Honey Bee restaurant are way better options with friendly service...