My husband and I had made reservations for 8:30 PM last night, August 10, 2007, to celebrate the successful launch of my new business. We wanted an earlier reservation, but were told our choices were 5-something pm or 8:30 PM. I chose 8:30.
We arrived at 8:20 PM and were told it would be a 15 minute wait beyond our reservation. We said that would be OK. 8:30, 8:45 came, 8:55, 9:00, 9:10, and we were still not seated. We were waiting with the crowd in the lobby and I observed the blatent "slipping of cash" to the greeter and people being seated out of turn.
The names below us on the list continued to be seated ahead of us. My husband was ready to leave, and I should have let him. I asked the greeter when we might be seated, as our reservation had been for 8:30 PM. He told us we were third next in line. The entire lobby emptied. There was one couple left with us, and they were visitors from out of town, and IRATE at the wait. They were told they were fourth in line. (We were still third.) The irate couple was seated, and we remained, alone in the lobby. Again, hubby wanted to leave. By the way, we were dressed nicely and it's not like our hygiene lacked or anything--it was purely the fact that we didn't slip them a wad of bills to seat us.
Anyway, at 9:20pm, they seated us. Now to the food. The service from this point on was good, the food was not. I ordered a blueberry mojito and it was so bad I couldn't drink it. I don't know what they did to it. Our steaks were not cooked as ordered. Hubby ordered "well done." That means, according to their menu, just a little pink in the center. The meat was red throughout. They brought our coffee condiments to the table, including the fabulous chocolate coated candy stirrers. BUT, they only brought one. For the two of us. How utterly cheap!!!! The little dish it was served in should have contained about 6-10 of them, that was the size. They brought ONE. We split it. Hubby's soup (onion) was so-so he said, my salad was good but nothing exceptional. As I said the meat was not prepared as requested. At this point it was about 10:30 pm and hubby was not going to send it back to the kitchen as he was starving.
The bill came, $120+. You know, we have money, just not filthy rich, but I like value. This meal was not worth $120. Outback Steakhouse serves an equal steak, and we'd get out for $50. Anyway, we are locals and have recommended the Met in the past to people. Never again!!!!! Never, never again. And, we'll never return of course. And obviously that will tickle them pink, or should I say red, like the undercooked steaks, as they only want clientelle who will slip them the green. We weren't interested in playing that game. We had a reservation. Which meant nothing to them.
Stay away, unless you are one of the wealthy who feels that tossing around wads of money to the staff to get preferential treatment is the way to go. In the minds of this restaurant, it is.This is not a nice restaurant, if you value being treated in a nice manner, and having quality food prepared to liking. I guess we didn't bribe the cook to cook it as we liked. Oh, well. As I said, WE WILL NEVER RETURN TO THE METROPOLITAN GRILL. It was supposed to be a fun occasion for us, a celebration, and it turned into an enormous irritation. Unpleasant. I think we'll avoid all of the Consoldiated Restaurants in their group as well, just to be safe.
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Metropolitan Grill
3 reviews –
