More bad food - Seriously

It seems I have a knack for choosing crappy places to eat. A few months ago I wrote about a dining experience gone way way wrong.. A little update to that: My sister and I went back with our husbands and parents a few months ago. AMAZING food and amazing service. We were more than pleased.

But....There is a restaurant in my city called Tripoli, its a Greek place with amazing food. The food has NEVER been bad but the service, OMG, the service is horrible. Every single time we go we complain about the service. If you are drinking beer you need to order 3 at a time just to ensure you'll have enough to get you through the meal.

Last time I was there was October 2010. We went for a friend's birthday. We started our dinner at 7pm and ended at 11pm. It wasn't because we were drinking and enjoying ourselves, it was because the service was soooooooo slow. I said I wouldn't go back because I just don't enjoy myself. I don't enjoy waiting 45 minutes for our EMPTY plates to be taken away in order to bring us our next course. I don't enjoy waiting 45 minutes for you to bring me a glass of water. It just isn't enjoyable and no matter how good the food is, its not worth it to me. I swore I wouldn't go back. I did pretty good, nearly a year.

Today I get home from work and this is the conversation we had:

DH: Hey did George call or text you?
Me: No, why? What's up?
DH: Where is your phone?
Me: In my back pocket. Why George, what is up? Is something wrong.
DH: Can you look at your phone?
(I pull my phone out of my pocket and see that I do NOT have a missed call or text)
DH: Well he's going to call or text you soon to see if you want to go out for dinner tonight...............to Tripoli.
Me: Man really? Okay fine since its George.

A few minutes later the house phone rings and we confirm that we are going to meet there at 7pm. I change D's clothes and get dressed pack the diaper bag and walk to the car.

We get to Tripoli where we are greeted by the owners wife. She asks if we are only 2 plus the baby. I said no, 6 plus the baby. We get seated and we are now waiting for the rest of our party to arrive.

3 minutes later the owners wife comes up to just George, myself, and the baby and says, "Would you like to place your order now or are you waiting on the rest of your party?" Uhhhh what the freak do you think? If we wanted to order ourselves, without the rest of our table we might as well stayed home.

So now our entire table is seated, we are waiting....and waiting....and waiting.....for someone to come see us to ask if we'd like to order our food or maybe even a drink. We place the entire order TOGETHER. We ordered drinks, apps, and main meal at the same time to save the waitress the trouble of coming back to our table to keep taking orders. George orders 2 beers in one shot. Do you know how long we sat at a table with no food, no drinks, and no explanation as to why we had none? FORTY-FIVE minutes. Yes 45 minutes with an empty table.

Our appetizers get to the table before our drinks do. As the waitress is handing out the appetizers she says, "Your drinks are on their way." FROM WHERE? Freaking Mexico? Shouldn't they have arrived FIRST? A few more minutes pass and she comes by our table again and says," Your drinks will be right out." FINALLY our drinks come, George orders another beer just for good measure and my husband points out to the waitress that she forgot to bring one of plates from the kitchen. She rushes back and brings it to us.

Now we finish our apps, we are waiting and waiting and waiting and waiting for the meal courses to be brought out. Heck, we are waiting for them to even come and pick up our app dishes. Nope, no luck. Another 45 minutes passes and the waitress tells us at this point, "Everything will be smooth sailing from this point on." The table behinds us gets up before their food arrives, complains to someone and walks out. I felt like doing the same thing but somehow George knows the guy and it would be rude. Really? It's rude making people wait that long for food and water...and did you notice notice the 17 month old with us who was getting very tired and VERY impatient?

Nothing was smooth sailing, we waited another 10 minutes for our food. While we are waiting for our food the restaurant begins to fill with smoke. Something was burning and of course they couldn't admit that by opening a door or window right? Oh and at this point we are debating just asking them to cancel our main meals. As we flag the waitress over she is bringing our salad/main course. The fries that our plates came with were so over cooked that they were actually chips...expect they weren't thin enough to be chips. Look, if I wanted chips I would have opened a bag of Lays and called it a night. This is insane. Everyone just shuts their mouths and eats the edible portions of their food.

We ask for the bill which does NOT get brought to us. My husband had to get up and go find the waitress in order to pay the bill. One of the waiters actually commented "I've worked in worse places" and "Yeah its really bad eh" and started laughing when I asked him if he wanted me to crush my fries and make confetti out of it.

When your staff starts to laugh at where he works its time for a change. It's time to either hire more wait staff or more kitchen staff. It's not like it was an off night. This has happened every single time we go there regardless of the day of the week.

Tomorrow I will call Tripoli and let the owner know what I think of their establishment and their service as well as leaving negative reviews on any and all food forums I can find. This is ridiculous. 

Mark my words, Tripoli will never get a dollar off of me. If you see me in there I give you the right to spit on me.