Hazelwood Food & Drink - Woodbury — Restaurant in Woodbury

As I am reading other reviews it seems as if rude customer service is not an isolated incident. Made reservations for 8 of us for last Saturday at 11am. I'm currently in the late stages of Metastatic Terminal Breast Cancer. Currently, we have family, and other loved ones, driving long distances & flying from other states to see me, knowing it might be the last time. What should have been a wonderful afternoon with such loved ones, turned into a humiliating walk of shame. Only two of us were repeat customers. We ordered entrees, some desserts to go & my husband ordered his with a cup of coffee, to enjoy while we visited. Before he could take his first bite, the check was brought at 12:25pm. From beginning to end, we were there for 3 hours, which for a group of 7 people, none of us thought it was unreasonable. A bit before 1:30pm, one left. I, together with 2 of my children were getting ready to go as well. Suddenly a female staff member stood at the far end of the table & loudly announced to us "folks" that there were people waiting for the table. Coincidentally, not long before a male staff member wearing a blue or black blazer, approached our table and asked us how we were doing, never said anything about any reservation close in the horizon, nothing to prompt us to think that 1/2 hour later, we would be kicked out. We were not so upset over that we needed to leave, 3 hours, 7 people, including ordering, waiting for food, eating, ordering desserts and drinking some coffee was not excessive in our opinion. We understood the table might be needed. What really angered us was how it was handled. The female staff member, not only loudly announced it to us "folks" her tone was that of an annoyed mother with neighborhood kids at her house that needed to go home. She had the kind of look given when you're no longer welcome to return. The people sitting in one of booths, on the other side where she was clearly heard, mentioned to the other guest that we were getting kicked out. As a bonus, the staff at the host stand, were smirking & giving us dirty looks as we walked out. Again, it's not so much that they needed the tables or that perhaps for this establishment we overstayed our visit and needed to leave. It was the way it was handled. If there was a reservation, why didn't anybody say anything to us earlier? I can't imagine that anyone in the business of customer service thought this was the way to handle it. She could have leaned over to my husband, who paid the bill before and quietly told him the same information. He is a military, retired veteran more than capable of disseminating the information to the rest of the table, 3 of us were in the process of getting ready to leave anyway. Her attitude inferred we should have known or were told before and were purposely not leaving. Even clearing the rest of the dishes would have been a more sensible way of indicating we needed to go, than the choice that was made. I have never encountered such treatment. We understand that in the end, we are just a speck to you. We don't really matter. For me, the moments when I can gather with loved ones, in particular, knowing it might be the last time, are not a speck. They're important. For us to praise this restaurant, and for the afternoon to end like that, was crushing. Again.I want to emphasize it wasn't so much the alleged need for our table or that perhaps we overstayed. It was the way it was handled. There was no need to announce it to the entire room. There was no need to treat us as if we were misbehaving children. When approaching an unpleasant task common sense needs to be a priority, in particular when dealing with customer service. We were polite and friendly to our server, my husband tipped generously, to that point, we had not given any reason to indicate lacking manners or the need to be directed like naughty children Loudly announcing it to an entire room, mstanding around us as if we were going to run away, in addition to the smirks and dirty looks from the stand was...

The restaurant is a stand alone building next to a strip mall and a stand alone bank on the other side. It has outside seating but being that the seating seemed to put you right into a parking lot (in my old and cranky opinion) I chose to eat inside. As we approached the doors, everyone eating outside was clearly enjoying themselves. This was not a quiet and reservedly eating crowd. The group was loud and happy! It was a joy to hear the laughter. I have an English Mastiff Service Dog. As we entered there stood a few men. I am uncertain of all of their positions. One appeared to be a greeter, one a host/manager/seating specialist? and two others I believe were servers. We do draw attention as most people don't see such a large dog -especially with such a short person (her back comes to my freely hanging hand) which probably makes her look even bigger- coming inside restaurants. So when we said there would be three of us, there was a hesitation. It was natural. Was I including Mr. Ed here? My friend rushed to explain that my spouse was parking the car. Then, there was a quick second before the person responsible for seating us asked me "Where should I put you?" That was perfect! I don't expect everyone to know. Asking is best. When I explained what worked, we got the perfect booth. They have straight booths, curved booths and tables with chairs available. I am uncertain as to how many people could possibly need to know this but there are table legs under the middle of all the tables ... not in the corners. The supports are smaller on the booths. The atmosphere is a nod to industrial with an open ceiling and no center walls, a metal frame between the bar and seating area. The kitchen is open and gleaming steal and white. While the bar is at times wildly noisy, the kitchen is mostly quiet. Clearly everything runs like clockwork. The rotisserie chickens can be seen roasting all day. There is an open fire oven in the corner. The sous chef has everything coming out perfectly, as ordered. This is NOT frozen food reheated at the restaurant like some national chains. The server was wonderful! He was genuine and warm. He came to our table when we needed him but not too often. It did not feel like he was hovering or watching us but he was just there at the right time. The last time I had service with that level of timing and knowledge of how often to show up, I was at a very expensive location with linen and dress codes. I am very impressed by the man who served us on Friday, June 16th at the first table! The food was great, the decor was fun, the atmosphere was very good but it is this service that will have me coming back!! The only part of service that was missing is that the doors coming in and out are very big and heavy. If I had come alone with my Service Dog, I could not have opened the door and would have had to rely on another customer. Yet, once I got inside, 4 men stood there. On my way out, I could not open the door and 2 men stood there. Most restaurants solve this by propping open the outside door and having someone take a moment to assist with the inside door, as necessary. Regarding the food: the Prime Rib dip was exceptionally crafted Prime Rib, not the flat roast beef that most places provide. The chips are fresh housemade and delicious. Oh, and the mostly traditional artichoke dip had this special something to give it a little extra kick! It came with flat bread and was worth every penny. Don't try to have a quiet conversation here. High ceilings, far walls, lots of open space feels great but means that none of the sounds are dampened. On the other hand with all the noise it is less likely that people can hear exactly what you are saying when you plan your next crime while sitting at the bar or outside. At a table or booth, the next one over...

First of all, the service was good. I’ll never leave poor marks on a server because I spent 20 years in food service. They clearly had no love for their job, but I certainly can’t blame them after seeing the food they had to serve to people.

Sat in the bar, had a huge speaker above every booth in the bar blaring crappy pseudo-pop nonsense at a volume that was just loud enough to make conversation difficult. A 1/10 on atmosphere because of the loud music.

Ordered the calamari and for the first time ever was served calamari cut into basically fat French fry shapes, with none of the rings and small tentacles I normally associate with calamari. Visually it was…concerning? They came out in, oh, 30 seconds after the order was placed so I knew these had been sitting in the window under the heat lamp as some other server’s mistake, waiting to be pawned off on the next table to order calamari. Again,I’ve worked for 20 years in food service I know fry times and I know heat-lamp-warmed fried food. I sent it back and got another plate of it that had clearly not spent enough time in the fry oil, or the fry oil wasn’t hot enough. It was soft, no crunch at all and it’s temperature almost made me think they microwaved my initial plate and sent me back the same dish.

My wife ordered a French dip which she didn’t finish and didn’t box up because, and I’m just speculating here, the box itself would be more flavorful than the sandwich.

But the real star of the night was the shrimp and scallop scampi I had for my main course. Holy cow, when I say this dish was uninspired I do so only because I don’t have a thesaurus with me to find a better word to describe this absolute trash pile of a dish. Huge pieces of frozen, reheated broccoli mixed with tiny, nearly undercooked spiral cut shrimp and scallops the size of a quarter cut about 1/8th of an inch thick all in a bed of bland and not quite cooked noodles with a scampi sauce that was somehow brown in the bottom of the bowl. How scampi sauce comes out brown is beyond me, scampi is SO SIMPLE, how do you mess it up? Topping it off, the bowl it was served in had splatter all around the rim and a big smear where someone had either done the laziest attempt at wiping the bowl or their thumb had rubbed across the inside of my dish. It was honestly the worst dish I have ever been offered at a restaurant.

There is literally nothing this place could do to get me to go back. $1,000 in free food and earplugs for the music wouldn’t get me back in that place. I would be shocked if anyone goes...