Olive Garden Italian Restaurant — Restaurant in West Melbourne

We went yesterday to this Olive Garden with our whole family so it was a big table. First we received a very unwelcoming vibe from the manager because we had service animals. Our dog was nervous so we tried to comfort her because she feels when we are stressed but the manager was very angry and my dog felt her energy and barked so the manager was watching us the entire time and the whole family felt very threatened by her. But we didn’t care, we were not going to have our dinner get ruined because of a person with a bad energy who hates everything. My mom worked in an Olive Garden for 5 years so she was telling us what was best but she knew right away from the bread that the food was weird. She did not like the bread, the soup, and all the plates were greasy and old. The sausage was burned, pasta undercooked, it was disgusting. When she said the soup was nasty, we saw that the kale was extremely old, we were in shock. Most of my family members had stomach aches, 2 of my cousins just went to McDonalds instead while the rest of us ate. The bread was cold, didn’t have garlic, didn’t have butter. The drinks were watered down. I could talk for hours about what exactly was wrong with the food. But anyways, the manager kept coming back with her horrible attitude to “check on us” and we felt so uncomfortable. I don’t wanna to assume but my mom and family who doesn’t speak English well because we are not from here we’re immigrants we felt like she was specifically mad at us and personally rude to us. We never knew why but we felt extremely sure it was because of our accents and skin tones. We were all so happy talking and laughing that we decide not to ruin the night and be all negative and say how disgusting the food was so we stayed unsatisfied but we were happy we got to spend time together. I would like to point out that our server I think his name was Phillip he did very well, we also felt bad that if we complained he wouldn’t get his tip for his hard work because he did well. Anyway, thinking back I think it would be appropriate if something is done. The experience we had was SAVED by the fact that we were calm because we were with our family. But the food and the energy from the manager was repelling and...

Service - Perhaps the server was new but she needs some refresher on how-to (I used to be a server). She gave us the menu, took our drink order, then straight away asked us if we were ready to order. We laughed and said we hadn't looked at the menu yet (yes, the menus are online and yes, people do look at them but we felt rushed). We did order the appetizer though~! We assured her we were not in a hurry. Had just begun to enjoy that when the salad arrived- felt rushed again. We emptied the salad bowl onto our plates, then the bowl, appetizer plates and dishes - all remained there crowding our table until AFTER we had our dessert. The runner who brought the food looked decidedly unhappy, frazzled and tired, but at least we weren't rushed there, which we appreciated. Our server was attentive and cheerful, bless her heart.

Food - Terrible! Dishes lacked flavor, lacked good-quality shaved Parmesan cheese (they've substituted it with something inferior), lacked garlic. The 4 cheese Al Forno sauce tasted like it came out of a can - disappointing! Pasta for both dishes, overcooked and mushy - husband's Tour of Italy had been plated and then sat (who knows how long?) until the edges of his exposed pasta dried out. His lasagna, fettuccini alfredo and chicken parm were also bland. The salad - soggy, tomatoes not ripe. I didn't eat mine (declined taking it home as well). Once upon a time, the one thing you could count on at Olive Garden was an excellent, fresh salad served with chilled plates. No more~! They had prepped ahead, tossed the oil and vinaigrette dressing into the salad and let it sit for hours (which is why it was soggy). We shared a dessert - the strawberry creme cake and it was good.

Atmosphere - Nice! Quiet, low light with intimate tables - pleasant! They have a nice building.

Over all - We aren't usually picky, we don't like to complain and honestly a place should get it right the first time! We didn't send the food back. We could have! We didn't because yes, they could have made us a fresh salad and re-cooked the pasta but what were they going to do about those bland sauces? We didn't want to be there all evening Will we go back? Never again - Olive Garden - you USED...

Olive garden has always been one of our favorite places to eat. We love their seasonal specials, especially the never-ending pasta where you can mix and match your sauces and your pasta and have as much as you want. They have the best and most reasonable lunch of any other place. They have the all-you-can-eat soup and salad special with four different kinds of soup that you can have as many bowls as you can eat, and all four of them are super delicious, as well as lunch specials like eggplant parmesan, spaghetti, lasagna or ziti. Another great thing is they offer $6 take-home meals, which is a very good deal. They have several other delicious meals like the chicken gnocchi carbonara, and really all of their meals are just extremely delicious. Their salad is one of the best at any of the restaurants. Big bowls of crispy lettuce with lots of tomatoes, olives, onions and croutons, and their dressing is the best. They also have very good drink specials and the one really good one is the Italian margarita served in an upright big bowl-type glass with either sugar or salt on the rim and a shot of amaretto on the side, it's really yummy. And of course, all of their desserts are to die for the tiramisu the chocolate Thai mousse cake, the chocolate brownie with ice cream. There's just all kinds of yummy things, Cannolis. It's just a wonderful restaurant and everything in there is super good. Service is always good and everybody's friendly and very...