Cracker Barrel Old Country Store — Restaurant in Virginia

The only reason I'm giving this place two stars is because of Nikki. We came in as a party of seven and were told there was a 30-minute wait. We browsed the store and played checkers, which wasn’t a problem. When our table was ready, our waitress arrived quickly and took our drink orders. However, things went downhill from there.

When it was time to order food, I went first. I ordered the apple cinnamon pancake platter but asked if I could substitute the eggs for something else due to an egg intolerance. The waitress immediately said no and rushed over to my mother without further explanation. My mother has a very restricted diet but can eat fish. She ordered the rainbow trout and asked for it to be cooked without butter. The waitress responded, “So no seasoning then, got it.” When my mom asked if the seasoning contained butter, the waitress didn’t answer and had already moved on.

When our food arrived, my pancakes were served without the apples on top—they were on the side in a bowl—and I didn’t receive my bacon. My mom’s fish was clearly buttered and seasoned, despite her request. I felt insulted by the waitress’s lack of care and asked to speak to the manager. When the manager arrived, she yelled the entire time she spoke. My mom explained that her fish was buttered, to which the manager replied, “It’s not butter; it’s margarine.” A long argument ensued, during which the manager claimed they couldn’t guarantee the margarine spray wouldn’t get on my mom’s fish, even if they scraped the grill. She refused to cook the fish any other way, said they couldn’t make unseasoned rice, and was overall very rude.

The manager did offer to substitute okra for my eggs and said she would bring it out with my bacon. Meanwhile, my mom left the restaurant to get a salad from Chick-fil-A, which, by the way, was far more accommodating than Cracker Barrel. I waited for my okra and bacon, but they never arrived. Eventually, I stopped another waitress named Nikki and explained what had happened. She assured me that substitutions were possible and even shared that she had made similar requests herself. Nikki apologized for the long wait and offered to get me anything as an apology for the inconvenience. She even gave my brother a free drink. Nikki deserves to be the manager—not the other woman.

The conduct of our original waitress and the manager was completely unprofessional and ruined the experience. All I can say is that someone needs to promote Nikki.

The saddest part is it was my great grandmother's 94th birthday and the experience was...

This Cracker Barrel Restaurant is EXTREMELY hard to find. When you turn off Mayland Drive onto the side street. This restaurant location is losing lots of business because the only Entrance into the property is NOT marked at all with any Cracket Barrel Sign. There is NOT ANY Cracker Barrel sign showing where to turn to even FIND this restaurant. I drove up & down the street 3-4 times looking for Cracker Barrel to NO avail. If I did not have persistence and use my gas turning into EVERY street entrances; I would NEVER had found this Cracket Barrel. Your company NEEDS to put an Entrance Cracket Barrel Sign to show motorists to where to FIND the location of this restaurant. This is definitely TOTALLY UNSAT for anyone trying to reach and find this restaurant location in order to have a meal. This is definitely NOT good customer service & this restaurant is losing business!!!!* This restaurant served Biscuits that seemed to be NOT freshly made & baked. With all my prior visits & experienceds to Cracker Barrel the biscuits were fluffy & looked & tasted freshly baked. NOT at this location; the biscuits seemed to be frozen biscuits & no way meet the standards for the fluffy biscuits that I had eaten previously all 20+ years eating at various Cracket Barrels Restaurants. However, my ordered Steak was cooked to my request and was very tender; HOWEVER, the menu stated that my ordered Steak would be cooked with butter & garlic. My steak did not have any garlic or buttery taste to my ordered Steak. If I order something off your menu; I expected that “my ordered food” matches what the menu states. If my food is not cooked like the menu states; it is my opinion that this is FALSE ADVERTISING!!!!

When I trying to check out; there were 3 CB employees standing near the registers; not any of the 3 employees made eye contact & they ALL 3 seemed to be more worried about they putting up stock and not being PRESENT at the cash register to meet & accept my checkout meal payment. While standing there; there was another make customer waiting behind me & I had to speak up for him, for in order for the young black haired lady to come up to the second register & wait on the male customer who was standing there & he was being ignored. This is UNSAT, especially that the restaurant was NOT even busy at all. In my eyes, this is very poor customer service; it could be a different story if the restaurant was packed & very busy. That was NOT the case when I was present checking out around 1630ish on...

Arrived at the location to place a to go order for the family. They promoptly called someone to come take my order. The order taker was pleasant and within a reasonable time I had my food and was on the way home to have dinner with the family. Thats the good.

Got home to find the order incorrect and package sloppy. First I ordered hamburger steak with brown gravy, mashed potates and apples. No mashed potatoes and the apples were slung in the container mixing with the dry hamburger steak. Second order was the Chicken Fried Chicken with sawmill gravy. Missing the mashed potatoes. Mac and cheese slung in the container all over the chicken and this order also had apples in the container that were not supposed to be there mixed in with the mac and cheese. Last order was a sampler missing the mash potatoes and apples.

Took the order back to the restaurant. The same lady came out to hear my concerns that took the order. When I told her my concerns, she replied, " We were out of mash potatoes." I was physically in the restaurant, why did she not come out and tell me we were out of mash potatoes? So instead of me getting a substitution choice I got nothing. I showed the lady how the apples had mixed in with the mac and cheese on one order and the hambuger steak on the other, and she was perfectly fine with it. So there resolve was to give me containers of gravy and they now had mash potatoes so I received two orders. However I did not get the mash potatoes I ordered with my meal because the lady took upon herself not to ring up because there would have been an extra charge.

So I leave there with 3 meals that were ice cold by the time I got back home and food profile that was less than pleasing. We will not be back as it was a waste of $50.

In the meantime, there was a couple behind me that wanted to place a to go order. The lady asked the seater to take her order and she replied I can't, I have to call someone to take the order. The lady kindly ask, would it be faster to order online than to wait to have the order taken. The associate looked at the lady and said it's your choice I cannot tell you what to do.

Please work on training you associates in the art of customer service and how to handle...