Ron's Original Bar & Grille — Restaurant in Uwchlan Township

Ron's is terrific! I have eaten there many times, I have dietary restrictions (gluten free), and I worked there for a couple years, so I feel I'm pretty well informed to review.

First of all, the food. The food is virtually all incredibly delicious--anyone who lives nearby will tell you the same. Seriously, some of the best food I've had. I particularly recommend the No Holds oval dipped in their ranch (the best ranch that exists), No Holds cheesesteak, Appalachian Melt, Victoria Fries, and sweet potato fries with their honey ricotta dip.

But is it healthy? That depends on what you order, and what you mean by "healthy." In one sense it's highly dependent on what you order. Is a salad healthy? Absolutely. Is a cheesesteak healthy? That's gonna be a hard argument to make. But they have tons of options and allow you to customize/sub anything so I always feel I can eat well and healthy if I want to.

In the other sense, and I think this is what they usually mean, it is all very healthy--in the sense that it's fresh, whole foods. Having worked in the kitchen, I've seen all the foods, base ingredients, storage techniques, employee sanitation, and cleanliness, and I have zero worries about eating there. Virtually the only thing I have an issue with is the hot marinara sauce being stored in a plastic bottle--but Danny the GM is awesome and really cares, and when I complained about this to him he understood and recognized it wasn't the best option. It may still be in that bottle (I don't know), but from this you can see how much he cares--not many in the restaurant industry would even think once about microplastics. And this is just one example. He and Ron are genuinely always looking for ways to improve the healthfulness of the food, even recently exploring VERY new and cutting-edge options for frying oil that would actually be positively healthy. I feel great about eating there every time.

And about the options--like I said, their menu is HUGE and you can sub pretty much anything in a meal, so there is something (many things, honestly) for everyone. There's even a meal that is specifically a DIY-type meal. They have plenty of good vegetarian options, from salads to eggplant parmesan, and they have a dedicated gluten free frier, gluten free breads, buns, and rolls, and full labeling on the menu for gluten free foods. Everyone there is very knowledgeable of gluten allergies.

What else is there to share? I guess the pick-up, delivery, and staff. Pick up is almost always 20 minutes and has friendly staff, so many people love it. Sometimes there is a line but Ron's is a cult favorite so that's unavoidable.

The delivery team tries VERY hard to keep delivery times down as low as possible, but again, it's hugely popular, so they aren't always low. They also take great care in making sure hot food stays hot and cold food stays cold, and I am told the quality is always good.

And the staff are amazing! Like I said management is great and everyone loves them (seriously). Almost everyone loves working there. And the waiters/waitresses are very nice and pleasant.

Oh, and I guess price is worth mentioning! Prices are good and competitive, and vary appropriately--you can get many cheap items for $10-15 but can also get a nice salmon steak or clams. I would expect Ron's to be expensive given how good and classy it is, but you can easily eat a big meal for $11, as long as you can eat gluten. For gluten free people, there's an upcharge on everything with gf bread specifically. And this is appropriate, since gluten free buns and such are bought elsewhere. To be honest I am not thrilled with the price of the upcharges, BUT I am not complaining in the slightest, because they are obviously optional and I am exceedingly thrilled that they are available. I haven't found anywhere else that has such extensive options for gluten free people and I am happy to pay extra.

Everything is hand-cooked fresh by many staff using the ingredients that were hand-prepped that morning. I highly recommend. Especially being gluten free, this place...

We've been living in Downingtown for 15 years and since Ron's has been around for more than 15, we've been going there for a while now. It has morphed from a basic mom-and-pop style restaurant to an elegant mom-and-pop restaurant. It's larger now and they've redone the facade (stone) and they've added space for live music (and dancing if you should so desire).

1/23/2012 Update We were this past Friday evening. Ron's was very crowded and as a result it took us 40 minutes to be seated -- which was very close to what they told us it would take. Our server this time was excellent -- she provided friendly and efficient service with a smile. The food was the best we've ever had since we started coming here. Only one complaint: I ordered probably the most expensive beer on their menu: Chimay. Their beer menu states that Chimay is only available in an 8 oz. pour. At $7.25, eight ounces of Chimay turns out to be $.90/oz. When I got my glass of beer, however there were hardly 6-7 ounces of it in there. Not acceptable. Next time I'm having Chimay at home and ordering water at Ron's.

Their menu and food has been more or less the same apart from the few experiments they keep trying (some fail, some don't). Their ovals are super and italian entrees quite good. Good selection of beers on tap and in bottles. Reasonably good selection of wines (after the morph somehow their wine pours became smaller -- Ron, fix this). We keep coming back to this place over again so we must like it.

However, there is one thing to be aware of: Every time we had an excellent experience here, it had to do with the server. Last time we were here, the experience was superlative but the server had a lot to do with it. The previous time we were here, the experience was very mediocre -- the server was slow, lazy, indifferent (toward the end of the meal -- when it was getting time to supply the bill and have the patron add a tip -- the service became a lot better - ha!). The food is consistent, the service varies with the server.

One final note: their garlic bread can great or lousy depending on whether it comes fresh out of the oven for you or it's just reheated. If the latter, send it back and ask for a fresh order -- day and night difference! 3/6/2020 update We've been going to Ron's for over 20 years now. Yesterday my college-going child came home for Spring Break and of course her favorite local place is Ron's, so we had to order out from Ron's. After ordering, we were discussing how it's hard to maintain the standards of a restaurant for so long and how Ron's has been able to do it.

That jinxed our order I suppose. We had ordered our favorite item -- ovals -- and of course the kitchen had to burn (char) the hot Italian peppers that we all like on our ovals. The kitchen burnt it, but assuming that Ron's has quality control staff to inspect what the customer picks up, they didn't have any issues letting us take our order home.

Congratulations Ron! You won't be seeing us or our dollars...

I had dinner here last night for my very first time. It was our annual friends Christmas dinner. The food is excellent but the customer service leaves a lot of room for improvement . There was four of us ladies and our first waitress was Kendall who was very friendly but when she brought out our sodas she didn't know who ordered what and a few were incorrect. When she served me mine she dropped it on the table and the whole glass of soda went all over, heading straight for me..I moved as quick as I could to avoid being drenched in root beer. Unfortunately the side of my pants got wet and my coat as well. I understand accidents happen but the waitress brought us piles of napkins and towels to clean the mess up, while my one friend was asking for a bus boy to tend to it. We then had to request another table because we were not going to clean this all up.. We were moved to another booth promptly with a new waitress whom did not seem happy at all about taking on another full table. I even had to ask her her name since she seemed too busy to introduce herself and also for menus once again since we were in the process of looking at them when the soda was dropped. I had went back to retrieve our menus but they were gone while the soda was still dripping and laying all over the original booth. I think it was an assistant manager who brought us the menus and he asked if we needed anything else, at this point I needed a towel to put under my leg to absorb the wetness from my pants which I received. While we were starting this process all over again one of my friends showed us that she received one of our original menus, it had soda inside of it and she just used her napkin to clean it off and we didn't mention it. We all finally ordered our meals and each of us agreed the food was delicious. Our waitress had asked if we would need any to go boxes and I said probably but I wasn't done yet so I would let her know. She brought us each a box out anyway when I didn't have anywhere to put it except on top of my coat, so I felt like we were being rushed to finish. We were all full from our dinner so no room for dessert so i would say their portions are nice as well. We received the bill with no discount what so ever and were never even offered a free appetizer for the trouble and no manage ever came back to talk to us and even offer a sincere appolgy. So today I have to take time out of my day to wash my winter coat and all the while I cannot help but think about how the customers satisfaction used to always come first at establishments but it seems that has been lost in this day and age and to just another party of four who will replace our seating at the restaurant.

UPDATE: The restaurant had commented on my review to please get in touch with them via email, which I did "TWICE" with no...