Craven Wings Choto — Restaurant in Tennessee

There haven't been too many times in my life where my family and I have thrown away lunch/dinner due to terrible food but unfortunately this was one of those times.

We ordered mild wings, teriyaki wings, french fries, celery, and a side of garlic parmesan sauce to try.

The bad: The chicken itself had a very pungent, gross taste to it. Like it was extra "gamy" or something. I don't know if these were going bad or something else was up, but in any case, these tasted gross. Chicken should have a very neutral taste and these did not taste at all like normal chicken.

Their mild sauce was actually just garlic butter. I guess we were expecting like mild buffalo sauce since most restaurants that list mild, medium, hot so we were already disappointed but the garlic butter taste was not good at all. We typically make garlic butter when we are having a crab/shrimp pot so all of us couldn't help but think of seafood as we were trying these. Gross. On top of that, since the sauce didn't have much flavor, we could taste the gross chicken. We didn't like the garlic parmesan sauce either. It was more like a thick, creamy garlic butter with parmesan sprinkled on it. The fries came in a paper bag that was falling apart due to having so much oil soaked into it. That plus their being no salt on the fries made us disappointed as well. These looked to be fresh cut so we were excited at first but ultimately let down.

The good: I live 1 min from the place so it was super convenient. It was easy to order online and it was ready in 15 mins like they said. The wings were extra crispy, which I especially like. They gave us 3 extra wings for some reason. The teriyaki sauce was OK, just not my thing. My daughter really liked that sauce, but couldn't eat anymore once she got to the center of the wings and got the gross chicken taste.

Conclusion: we ate the mediocre fries and the celery and each ate about 3 wings before we threw the rest away. Nobody wanted any more than the 3-4 they had initially grabbed to try out. Our first time here and we hated lunch and threw 50% of it away. We all agreed that we'll never go here again. Too bad Wild Wing Cafe recently...

Had a very unique experience tonight at this restaurant. When I got there I could tell there was something wrong by the way everyone was acting. It was like everyone was waiting around and had no food. After a while I realized this was a real crash and burn moment for this restaurant who seemed overwhelmed. Later I talked to the manager who explained what was happening and why and apologized after camping our entire meal. It took so long to get our food that he felt like he needed to do that which was really smart because I'm willing to go back and give them another chance because of this. The wonderful thing that happened was when we got our food even though it took an hour and a half plus the food was fantastic. I loved the sauces for the wings and I felt like the sweet potato fries were some of the best I've ever had. It takes some restaurants a little while to pull it together and I think once this place does and figures out how to serve so many people with however few fryers they must have they'll be doing great. When you go there you might want to try doing it in an off-hour time and give them a chance to figure out how to take care of everybody with the situation they have. Also I think they were smart to hire a bunch of young people but maybe it'll take a little time for them to find their way and get their footing. I gave them four stars because I wouldn't want to bury a restaurant just for some growing pains. Plus the servers were wonderful Jaden who helped us was super nice and treated us with so much respect that I gave her a good tip. She was making sure we had everything we needed in my kids were really happy even though we waited so long. It's hard to pull off keeping people patient in those situations but my server was great at it... Kudos to the manager who is battling tonight and all of the staff at this place and a little bit of chin up positivity wouldn't hurt in this situation. The food is good and they can figure out their methods Farragut and choto have a real gym on their hands. Hang in there guys I promise it will be...

All good things come to an end. Craven is no longer our Cheers Bar.

My husband and I were excited when we found out that Craven would have new owners. That excitement quickly faded into a huge disappointment.

Regardless of the challenges over the last several months Craven always had great food and great servers. Lisa and Macy are fantastic.

After the new ownership there are three huge disappointments that will prevent us from continuing our twice a week visit to Craven. 1) Salads. Their salads were fantastic. The tomatoes were cubed therefore a little seemed like a lot. Now the lettuce mixture has changed, they have removed olives and the tomatoes are six halves of the small tommy toes. The cheese was cut down at least 50% if not more. I could literally count the strands of cheese. Their salad is now lettuce. 2)I am not a big traditional BBQ person but I do love mustard BBQ sauce and white BBQ. Their Tennessee White sauce was some of the best I had ever had and they removed it from the menu. You no longer have the option of a white BBQ sauce and they don't carry a mustard BBQ sauce. Their selection is now like everyone other wing place. Nothing stands out. There is nothing special that makes me want to drive there, much less spend money.

My husband and son went tonight since I would not be at home and my husband came back to tell me that his opinion is now the same as mine. The number 3 reason we will not be back was because he said the fries changed and they were horrible, he would rather have McDonalds and we don't eat McDonalds.

The prior owners had the bar but they treated their restaurant like a restaurant. You could enjoy one without the other. In my opinion the new owners are focusing in on the bar and the restaurant just happens to be there if you want food. They are structuring it like any other chicken place. There is no quality or thought when it comes to the food.

All good things must come to and end and as we are closing the chapter on this location we will begin our search for the...