HIBACHI EXPRESS WINTER HAVEN — Restaurant in Winter Haven

We came to this location because went to Lego Land and we had a good experience from a location in Clermont.

These are some of the ways this establishment dropped the ball:

When we order our food. The store was not busy. There was one family already eating and another family waiting for their food. We ordered at Steak Entree (medium) and a Mexican Roll. The steak entree comes with a starter salad.

We waited for about 15-20min. No salad. No sushi. No food. We saw 3 families come in after us. After they placed their order and sat down, we see the server bringing out the starter salads. We thought that we would be getting one since we placed our order before the other families that came in after us. No. The server brought the salads to the other families and walked right past my wife and I.

The server then brought out meals to the families that came in and ordered after us. I am making an assumption, but several plates looked like the steak entree that we ordered. (Steak, veggies, fried rice, w/ yummy sauce)

(This is where it gets weird.) The server brought out a steak entree to a table that seemed to already have all of their food. She was visibly confused. We raised our hand to call her over. My wife explained that the steak entree plate should be ours because we placed our order about 25min ago and we see other tables getting their food before us. She said “oh… hold on… let me see…” still confused. She then brings the plate to another family who sat down after us. The crazy part is there were about 7 people at that table. The server brought the steak entree to one young lady at the table. The rest of the food for that table was not brought out at the same time. The remaining food was brought to that table about 5-10min later. So instead of giving us our food and then bringing the other family their whole order all at once, the server skipped us (again) to bring one plate to one person at the table with a larger party. Not sure if the young lady ate by herself awkwardly or waited until the rest of her party’s food arrived so they could eat together (meaning her food probably cooled down significantly).

At this point, my wife had to get up and go to the counter to ask about our order. 1st the man said our order was coming up. My wife showed him the time stamp on our receipt, our order number, and pointed to the number of receipts hanging on the cook line.

The man at the register said “A lot of people ordered at the same time. The server is getting confused”. Just then, another man walked up to the counter stating that his family is still missing food from their order too.

The man at the counter who took my wife’s order turned back and grabbed a steak entree and walked it over to our table. My wife asked about the sushi roll. He responded with “oh” and went back to get the sushi. After bringing the sushi, my wife inquired about the starter salad. Once again the man said “oh” and when back to get our salad.

Yay, we finally got our food. The salad and salad dressing was delicious. The Mexican roll was also delicious. The fried rice and veg was ok but didn’t have the same steam heat coming from it as the 1st entree the server skipped over us.

The absolute worst part of this whole thing was the steak. It was HORRIBLE. IT was so tough. It was supposed to be to be medium. I don’t know what comes after well done (burnt?). It wasn’t burnt but it definitely wasn’t medium because it was so tough to chew.

The 2nd most horrible part of this experience was the nonchalantness of the staff as we tried to communicate our frustrations with them. I am a firm believer (and practitioner) of compensating guests when they do not have a stellar experience. I try to do something small to show that I want to keep my guests coming back. A simple “Our sincerest apologies for making you wait so long. Here is a free appetizer, drink, dessert (something…)” would have turned this whole ordeal around for us.

We never got an apology or any acknowledgment of how the staff messed up. That’s the most...

Let me tell you something this place right here is it I have 5 other people with me when we eat 4 are kids and trying something new is difficult with 4 kids but this is the place right in between Lego land and the Legoland Beach resort so perfect location if you have littles but don't want to eat an expensive meal at the park nice seating super clean bathrooms and when I say the food was amazing I mean I have eaten up and down the east cost from fresh main lobster and Boston clam chowder all the way down to the FL keys and this place was it we had 6 people eating at 8pm on a Friday night and had comfortable booth seats the food came out so fast and if you are afraid of ur kids not wanting it they have chicken nuggets and Fry's while we hade steak hibachi 1 had chicken hibachi and I had steak and shrimp hibachi we also had a order of cucumber rolls and avocado rolls and man they were fresh we also got dumplings and 2 orders of the chicken nuggets and Fry's . Now the staff was over the top when I tell you the kindness and family friendly vibe we received with the 2 wonderful women working at the front counter Mini & Samira I have never seen 2 people multitask and get it so perfectly right at the same time I could not believe the kindness of these people and the portion sizes reminded me of being back home in South Carolina were as I'm 6ft 4 and 290lbs and could not finish all my food. If we go out to eat as a family of 6 I don't expect to pay less than a 125$ but with all are food and drinks it was about 90$ I like my food to have flavor and seasonings and this did not disappoint I only wish I had ordered more shrimp because it was amazing absolutely best shrimp I have ever had. Not to the wise they do cook there stake medium well so if you like it done differently make sure you ask at the time of ordering. My only regret is I wish this place was closer to my house great job who ever is running this place because you are crushing it keep doing what ever t is ur doing sorry I don't get picks of the food from the first bit we couldn't put are forks and chopsticks down it was...

On 10/03 around 9:00 p.m., my son called in a pickup order for three meals: one Hibachi steak and shrimp, and two chicken and shrimp. When he got home to Bartow, to my surprise, only one of the three orders was correct. The food looked like leftovers — mostly rice — one container had almost nothing but rice and a few vegetables, and another had what looked like fried shrimp instead of the Hibachi chicken and shrimp combo.

By the time my son arrived, the restaurant was already closed, so I couldn’t call right away. My son’s order was correct, so he ate his, and my daughter tried to eat a little of hers, but mine was completely inedible. It was honestly nasty.

The next day, I called to explain what happened and told the lady I couldn’t eat mine. She said she would speak with the manager, and later told me the manager agreed to replace the meals — but only with lunch portions. I offered to bring the food back since we didn’t eat it, but she said it wasn’t necessary. Because of that, I threw the food away, trusting her word.

When I drove from Bartow to the restaurant today, they only offered to replace one meal with one meat option, saying the others were eaten — which is not true. I explained that the employee who took the order entered it incorrectly, not my son. I also told her that any business should take accountability for their employees’ mistakes.

I even offered to pay the difference if necessary, but they refused. In the end, they only replaced one meal with a single meat option instead of the combo. I almost refused to take it, but I wasn’t going to let them keep my money either.

Overall: Very disappointing experience. Poor service, no accountability, and terrible food quality....