The rebirth of chain restaurants (Buford, Boston: buying, minimum wage, to live)

[ATLondoner]

Ate once at PF Changs.....never again. Same for California Pizza Kitchen, probably some of the worst pie I've ever eaten.

In terms of good chains I'd like to throw in Fado irish pubs...been to Chicago, DC and the pair here in Atlanta and all IMO are of a high standard when it comes to food.

[bu2]

Originally Posted by ATLondoner

Ate once at PF Changs.....never again. Same for California Pizza Kitchen, probably some of the worst pie I've ever eaten.

In terms of good chains I'd like to throw in Fado irish pubs...been to Chicago, DC and the pair here in Atlanta and all IMO are of a high standard when it comes to food.

Curious as to what you disliked about PF Changs. I've found them consistent and liked the food. I've eaten there in at least 4 different cities.

[ATLondoner]

Originally Posted by bu2

Curious as to what you disliked about PF Changs. I've found them consistent and liked the food. I've eaten there in at least 4 different cities.

Guess I've been lucky enough to eat at some good Chinese restaurants (and some really terrible ones too) and I just thought everything was synthetic, way too salty and not very authentic.

[bUU]

There are certain chains that make specific decisions about their cuisine that just don't resonate with me. PF Changs is one of them. I found the food there - for lack of a better word - dry. I don't know if they're trying really hard to cook healthier food and therefore going spare on the oil, for example, but everything we ate there seemed to leave me reaching for my water glass to wash down, and nothing was flavored so well as to bring about the necessary salivation by itself.

[ATLTJL]

This has been really interesting for me, because I'm really defending a chain's right to exist and possibly improve offering to compete effectively with high quality restaurants, as I've seen Chili's do.

However, I definitely refuse to ever even try Ruby Tuesday again (due to an unfortunate food poisoning incident several years ago) and I also can't stand California Pizza Kitchen.

I can't stand eating at PF Changs because the best thing about that place is the decor. I can rattle off at least 5 Chinese eateries that are way better and cheaper than PF Changs, but I understand the problem: they are difficult to find. You can't just pick a random Chinese restaurant, or else you risk going some place awful. And I think Chin Chin is also pretty awful. I've had to have a bunch of terrible Chinese food before finding the good places...and they also change. What was great yesterday can easily go downhill today. So I get PF Changs...it's not going to be the best, but it's easy and it's reliable. You know it's going to be pretty good, and let's be honest: for most meals, pretty good is good enough. It doesn't have to be a top dining experience every single time.

The intent of this thread from the beginning was to acknowledge my mistake. I had pretty much written off all chains and wouldn't step foot in an Olive Garden, Applebees, TGI Fridays, and I even struck Outback off my list a few years ago when it started going downhill.

The point was that things change, and you have to refresh your expectations periodically. I was shocked to enter a Chilis and discover how much the menu and service have improved. Maybe, as at least one poster indicated, the same thing has happened at Olive Garden, Applebees, TGI Fridays....maybe even Red Lobster. I'm not going to live my life forever banishing establishments based on information that is 7 or 8 years old or for some silly notion of feeling above eating at them.

I don't like California Pizza Kitchen because I don't like it. How many locations it has in its chain are beside the point. But you know, it's been a few years since I've step foot in a CPK. Maybe it's time to give them another opportunity and see if they've upped their game.

I think the big problem with chains is that the volume of food they deal with is so large that they are mostly prepared in industrial kitchens, flash frozen, and shipped to locations. Many years ago, I was shocked when a server at Olive Garden informed me, "I'm sorry, we are out of chicken parmesan." The conversation literally went like this:

Me: "Are you out of all chicken?"
Her: "No, just chicken parmesan."
Me: "Are you out of marinara?"
Her: "No."
Me: "Are you out of parmesan cheese?"
Her: "No."
Me: "Are you out of bread crumbs?"
Her: "Ummm...I don't know."
Me: "I don't get why the kitchen can't make chicken parmesan, you have all the ingredients."
Her" "That's not how it works."

That's how I discovered that the chicken parmesan must come pre-made. Or as I like to say....cooked in a factory somewhere in Kansas City, flash frozen, shipped out, and then heated up. I don't think I'm too far off from how they actually do business.

But, maybe that's all changed. I was shocked to peer in the back of my local Zaxby's and see employees rolling raw chicken in flour. Obviously, Zaxby's chicken is not breaded and frozen in Kansas City. So maybe Olive Garden's isn't anymore, either. Then again, maybe it is.

And that's all I'm trying to find out, which chains deserve a second look.

[waronxmas]

Originally Posted by ATLondoner

Ate once at PF Changs.....never again. Same for California Pizza Kitchen, probably some of the worst pie I've ever eaten.

In terms of good chains I'd like to throw in Fado irish pubs...been to Chicago, DC and the pair here in Atlanta and all IMO are of a high standard when it comes to food.

Right there with you about PF Changs and CPK. They are both abominations. Their owners should be ashamed to show their faces in public.

Until you said it right now, I was unaware that Fado served food even though I've been there several times. That place is for getting sloshed and watching football my friend.

Originally Posted by bu2

Curious as to what you disliked about PF Changs. I've found them consistent and liked the food. I've eaten there in at least 4 different cities.

Because PF Changs in no way resembles actual Chinese food. Mall Chinese food is more authentic than the Asian flavored crap they spew out of their kitchen at a high dollar.

[bUU]

Originally Posted by ATLTJL

And I think Chin Chin is also pretty awful.

I have to put a plug in for Chin Chin. Sure, it's not great, but we try to eat vegetarian, and I haven't found another restaurant in the area that offers so many entrees with meat alternatives. While we avoid meat alternatives to some extent, having been indoctrinated into our culture eating chicken and beef, occasionally it's great to sit down to something cruelty-free that is almost exactly like General Tso's Chicken or Beef and Broccoli. (PS: The chicken alternative Chin Chin offers tastes better to me than I recall chicken tasting. The beef alternative, notsomuch.)

Originally Posted by ATLTJL

The intent of this thread from the beginning was to acknowledge my mistake. I had pretty much written off all chains and wouldn't step foot in an Olive Garden, Applebees, TGI Fridays, and I even struck Outback off my list a few years ago when it started going downhill.

The point was that things change, and you have to refresh your expectations periodically.

So perhaps you should revisit your perception of Ruby Tuesday's. First, unless a number of unrelated parties were affected your incident may not have been what you were told it was. Second, individual incidents can often be attributed back to one careless employee who may no longer even been employed. Third, even in cases of repeated violations, a change in management could radically change a restaurant's performance in this regard. Fourth, what happens in one restaurant in a chain doesn't necessarily indicate anything about any other restaurants in a chain.

Originally Posted by ATLTJL

Maybe, as at least one poster indicated, the same thing has happened at Olive Garden, Applebees, TGI Fridays....maybe even Red Lobster.

In our experience, Olive Garden and Red Lobster both are very region specific. In both cases, the chains are perceived to offer very poor quality especially in the northeast, while Olive Garden seems to have always done a better job outside of the northeast, and Red Lobster has offered significant better quality in the southeast. YMMV, but this seemed very consistent during our travels over the past fifteen years.

[JPD]

Originally Posted by bUU

In our experience, Olive Garden and Red Lobster both are very region specific. In both cases, the chains are perceived to offer very poor quality especially in the northeast.

That makes perfect sense. The northeast is world renowned for fresh seafood and there has always been a lot more Italians living there than in the south. So, the frozen seafood and fake Italian food offered by these chains are not only perceived as very poor quality, they are very poor quality relative to the other options available in that region.

[ATLTJL]

So perhaps you should revisit your perception of Ruby Tuesday's.

I can't argue against your logic, it's definitely sound.

But it's the psychology of it. Once a restaurant makes you violently ill, you're unlikely to ever return, even though logically you know that it will probably never happen again. In my case, I had salad from the salad bar, which was the most likely culprit as thoroughly cooked food rarely contains food borne illness. It easily could have been another customer that infected the uncooked vegetables I ate.

Maybe someday....but the memories of my Ruby Tuesday experience are still so vivid that I have to allow my gut to trump logic, at least for now.

[ATLondoner]

I went to TGI Fridays in Chattanooga 2 years ago.....hands up the dirtiest restaurant I've ever been in, we lasted about 4 minutes in there.

Shame as my TGI Friday memories are good growing up in London where a visit to TGI's was a real taste of Americana treat haha!