Fork & Barrel — Restaurant in Winter Springs

Once Upon a Time, This Was Our Favorite Spot…

Sadly, those days seem to be over. We’ve been loyal regulars here for years—weekly to bi-weekly visitors, rain or shine. But lately? The place has taken a sharp nosedive into “meh” territory.

Let’s give credit where it’s due: Emily is an absolute gem. We've had her as our server several times and she’s consistently fantastic. There’s also a gentleman who’s equally excellent, though we didn’t catch his name (if only we could book them by request like concert seats).

Tonight, however, we got Madison, who seemed to be playing a game of “who can ignore their table the longest.” We had to wave her down like we were stranded at sea just to place orders. Meanwhile, she managed to pre-bus every table except ours. Ours looked like a post-apocalyptic buffet—plates and glasses everywhere, a true masterpiece of neglect.

Now onto the food. It’s been on a downward spiral for our last three visits, but tonight really took the crown. For the first time ever, I had to send my dish back. As someone who has managed restaurants, what truly baffled me was the lack of any managerial check-in afterward. Apparently, “sent back to the kitchen” is now met with a shrug and a disappearing act.

Dish 1: The salmon—once my go-to favorite—was so salty it could've preserved itself for winter. Dish 2: A steak ordered medium rare came out so overcooked and dry, I’m pretty sure Gandhi’s flip-flop had more moisture. Dish 3 (tonight): Gave the steak another chance (fool me twice…)—still overcooked. The carrots? Crunchier than my will to stay positive. I couldn’t even stab them with a fork.

No one checked on us. No apologies. No “Hey, sorry your $30 meal was cooked by someone who thinks medium rare means charcoal briquette.” Just… nothing. It feels like the kitchen staff has changed, and unfortunately, the talent didn’t transfer with the apron.

It’s genuinely disappointing to say, but we won’t be coming back anytime soon. This used to be our go-to spot, but now we’re going to have to go-to somewhere else.

One saving grace: the sticky toffee pudding is still excellent. But sadly, dessert alone can’t carry an entire meal—or...

Originally, I was inclined to give a positive review for this place during my first visit here. Seemed to have good food, seemed to have good service. I decided to withhold judgement until my mom and I went to eat together. I was glad that I didn't post that review. Because our experience in my second visit (and her first) was miserable. Despite the fact that we called in for a reservation at 7PM with several hours ahead of time, we ended up waiting an entire hour for our food. An entire hour for two plates. Not even appetizers, and just a single negroni for a drink. The acting manager at the time tried to placate us at the 8PM mark and we later got our food ten minutes later - my sandwich was great, her fish was lukewarm. He also offered us dessert on the house. Which would've been alright and soothed things... But we waited for another forty minutes without receiving it. Our waitress was also extremely inattentive. We didn't hear from her for nearly forty minutes when it came to the food, didn't provide any info as to what was going on, whether it be our plates or the dessert. We had to ask the bar staff and other waiters to find her, and they couldn't help because apparently she was the only one that could give us our receipt. I don't know who is running things, but when your service and kitchen is so messed up that you have your clients waiting for nearly a straight hour without your orders and even more than half an hour for the dessert that was supposed to be compensating for the mess-up in the first two orders, something is horribly, horribly wrong...

My husband called and made reservations for 7:30 pm for the two of us, it was a special night. We left our home in Sanford at 7pm so we would be a little early. Unfortunately, there was a bad accident on the bridge of 417 and when we realized we were actually going to be late, he attempted to call the restaurant to let them know. It went to voicemail and the voicemail was full. We arrived at 7:40 ish and walked in the wrong door and ran into the hostess who just looked at me blankly when I asked her where we check in. We just followed her to the main entrance and there were other people waiting to be checked in. When it was our time to check in I apologized for being late, explained the accident and she replied with if we aren’t here within 15 minutes grace time then they let our table go and now there are other people in front of us and the wait is 30 minutes because the kitchen is really backed up. Now mind you, no one was seated while we were waiting to be checked in and when she looked at the time it was 7:46 so I’m not sure who she let our table go to. She knew we were there within the grace period that she stated they allowed. She saw we had gift bags and could have cared less it was a special night. My husband then asked her if we sat at the bar, if we could be served food there and her response was that the kitchen was really backed up… is that a yes? A no? Again, just gave us a blank stare. Such horrible service!...