Blue Plate Kitchen — Restaurant in West Hartford

I would like to start this review by mentioning that I have been to Blue plate upwards of 10 times in the last 2 years and always had a great experience. The service, the food and the outdoor seating was always great, honestly a 4/5 star review....until yesterday. If I could leave 0 stars for this experience I would. I arrived with 2 other adults and my 2 daughters, 8 and 10. It was about 11:15/11:30. They were clearly very busy, based on the people waiting outside and the very busy patio section. As expected, there was a wait to be seated and I was told 20 minutes for indoor seating and 30 for outdoor. I requested first available. We were promptly seated indoor at the 20 minute quoted window with only breakfast menus. We were surprised when it took about 15 minutes to be greeted by our server but let it pass as they were obviously busy. We put in our drink order: coffee, waters and 2 sodas, which we then waited another 15 minutes for this to be dropped at our table. Wondering why we only had breakfast menus, we asked if this was all that was available, the server brought us the lunch menus. Now having other options, we mentioned to the server we needed just a minute to look over this menu and we would be ready to order. No children's menus were ever offered. Per our check the entire table's food order was entered at 12:31pm. At this point my daughters were getting antsy and I went to the host stand, since I hadn't seen our server, to get some crayons and the children's menus, that were not offered, also requesting a refill on our coffees. Following placing our order, I used the rest room and noticed that obviously the kitchen was extremely busy, noting the hostess carrying a few bags of red potatoes to the kitchen from Big Y. We then waited, and waited, and waited. Finally, what appeared to be a manager came to our table with the refill on coffee and we asked when our food would be ready as it was now approaching 2pm. She barely apologized, stating the food was coming but "they were waiting on a few more items". This was not reassuring...as you can imagine. I would guess that about 5 -10 more minutes passed and our food was brought to the table. The only mod to the entire order was the cheese on my sandwich, which was wrong, but at this point I didn't care. I was not sending this back for obvious reasons. We finished our meals which I can say was the only positive part of this entire experience. My daughters wanted dessert. The server obviously had no idea what was offered and rambled off the carrot cake, lava cake, cookie with ice cream and tiramisu. We ordered the cookie with ice cream. Server came back to tell us they were all out of the cookies, so we changed this order to the lava cake and a small dish of ice cream specifying they were to be separate. The plate came to the table with the lava cake with four scoops of ice cream and lots of whip cream on the same plate. Summoning all of my patience, I asked if she could please bring a small dish of ice cream with whip cream. She returned to tell us they were out of ice cream. We maintained our composure and my daughters finished the dessert. When I payed the bill, I had the opportunity to speak with the manager to discuss this experience. She again, not very apologetic, explained that our server was "new" and they were obviously busy. I did not need this explanation, but wanted to let her know it was her responsibility to inform her customers that there would be a very very long wait for food, giving us the opportunity to make an informed decision about waiting and not being a surprise. She did how ever take $5 off our $100 as a consolation. She also asked if we would ever return. I don't think given our experience this needed to be asked. In hind sight, we should have just left. And no, to answer the manager's question I have no intention of ever returning to that restaurant. Hands down the most disappointing dining experience of my life. Good experiences you might tell 1 person, bad...

My one star is purely off of service which left a bad impression off of our first and last experience here.

Our server greeted us and proceeded to tell us she was hungover. Maybe that was a sign that this experience would be going downhill from there.

My fiancé ordered the corned beef and three cheese omelette. I ordered the Southern which are basically biscuits and gravy and we shared the strawberry stuffed French toast. Drinks ordered were a coke and bloody Maria.

Bloody Maria was good although the pickle celery that accompanied the cocktail were shriveled and dehydrated. Tip is to keep cut celery stalks in cold water.

Food arrived and everything was correct except my order of the Southern. What arrived was an egg scramble with veggies and sliced avocado. I asked one of the host to grab our server so we could simply just correct the mishap to my correct order of the southern which was biscuits and gravy with an egg your way.

She stopped over and I told her kindly that this was not the Southern and she proceeded to tell Me i ordered the Southwestern which to her was the same thing just minus the biscuits and gravy. So in her correction, she gave me an order of the biscuits and gravy and left the southwestern scramble on our table, which I did not touch.

The food was overall good. Only thing is the gravy was watery which I believe needed to start off with a roux to thicken it. We were not even halfway done with our food and she dropped off the check to us which was rude and made us feel rushed to leave. To our surprise, she charged us for the Southwestern scramble. So we told her I didn’t order this and would gladly pay for everything else just not the item I didn’t order and didn’t touch. She proceeded to tell me that, “well you did say Southwestern”. Ok. Listen. We were fine until she told us that no she’s not wrong but I am because that’s not what I said. Watching my fiancé starting to go from 0 to 100, we just said whatever just charge the card. But fiancé felt it was wrong of her to tell us what we said out of our mouths. As a server and restaurant manager for over 9 years. If I messed up an order, my apologies let me get you the correct item ordered and it will be removed from the check.

I have never experienced a dining experience where the server proceeds to tell the customer they are wrong and you’re still being charged for it. My fiancé spoke to the manager and it was resolved with simply removing the item that was not ordered off of the check. Were we basically forced to pay for something while being blamed. Yes.

Unfortunately this was our first experience here and will be our last. Left a very bad taste in our mouth due to our sever. To me, it could’ve been simply resolved on the servers end. As an alternative with great service while supporting local:...

Unfortunately I went in with decent expectations for this place. I sat at the bar and had a chance to look around before my order was taken and the more I looked the more I was upset with what I saw.

Surfaces behind the bar were all dirty and beer taps were not cleaned with care. A cooler to the left of me was open the entire time I sat through my meal and was still open when I left. There was a railing along the bar and I could see the buildup of whatever was there had never been cleaned. And this was for every bracket along the bar, not just mine. It was only the beginning.

I know places that have been in business probably three times as long and never have seen such a sad milkshake machine. I truly hope it's just a decoration and not actually used to prepare anything for customers.

The espresso machine looked unhappy and the steam wand was sitting in a frothing container looking unclean, and to my distress I saw a staff member pour milk from it that I didn't even know was in there for however long. It was never steam purged after it's use when they poured from it.

In the cooler below the espresso machine I saw paper carton containers that were just left open and not folded closed. I mean... Please. Close things even if in a cooler.

My food was placed next to me and I kind of stared at the plating wondering why it looks like it was just kinda plopped there and sent out that way. Expo shouldn't send out sloppy plates.

I gave them one extra star because I saw "poached eggs and hash with hollandaise" and didn't read any further than that. My corned beef hash was served over a bed of cornbread which was very surprising and I had to double take on the menu. There was more cornbread than protein on the plate. The sweetness of the cornbread overpowered everything that was savory. I understood what they were trying to go for with the sweet and savory aspect but I just couldn't get behind it even though I tried to.

All and all, I was disappointed and unfortunately don't plan on returning unless this place is given a thorough cleaning and their staff all get their serve-safe certifications updated.

Certifications won't do anything if it's not actively enforced by management so I hope that they're able to read this and provide some serious feedback to their staff and understand that people do notice when things are off.

C'mon guys. Open coolers, dirty machines and unchecked dairy can make people...