Nov 03

Olive Garden

Restaurant Name: Olive Garden

Location: 4151 State RD 26 E, Lafayette, IN 47905 (map it)
Phone: (765) 447-0074

Hours: Sun-Thu 11am-10pm, Fro-Sat 11am-11pm

Cuisine: Italian

Review: I generally prefer to stay away from large chain restaurants, because I’m a big fan of local eateries, and mostly, the big places kind of suck. But, as this is a restaurant review website, and I was sort of dragged out to the Olive Garden, I’ll go ahead and do a review.

This is a very large Olive Garden, and I’ve been there a number of times. Clean, spacious with chairs that roll. I like wheely chairs. They’re fun. Clean restrooms and friendly greeters. So far so good.

We didn’t have to wait very long and were seated, and our waitress came over with wine for us to sample. I’m a big fan of wine, and I like free samples of wine. So I had some. Definitely so far, so good. However, our server turned out to be one of those servers who tries so hard they are really obnoxious. And she really wasn’t that good.

Two of us ordered the soup, salad, and bread sticks. They were all tasty. One friend ordered a Caesar salad, which somehow never made it to the table. When her meal came, she asked to cancel the Caesar salad. After she ate her meal, she added a little of our salad to her plate and ate it, and apparently the server saw it and added it to her bill! I’m not above paying for what we eat, but if your server fails to bring your food and you share someone else’s, I don’t think that justifies adding the cost of a whole salad.

We all ordered dessert and coffee which was all very tasty. I do recommend the pumpkin cheesecake. Our bills finally arrived and of course, they were a mess. Many of our items were juxtaposed on our bills, and we eventually had to exchange cash between us to make up the difference between what got billed on our cards and what we actually owed.

This type of huge restaurant has a slew of servers, and I’ve been there and had good service, so I can’t say this one experience is indicative of every type of service there. The food ranges from basics like spaghetti and lasagna to more sophisticated meals including seafood and chicken. They usually have a specials meal with seasonal choices.

It’s a safe, reliable place to eat on a week day for lunch or dinner.

Kid friendly: Yes.

Methods of Payment: Cash or Credit.