A complaint letter I sent to Waffle House

Good morning,

It is with a saddened heart that I am writing to you today. I love Waffle House and have been eating at your places for years, some time back I even wrote a blog about how great your restaurants are. Here is a link to that Blog, http://mroatmealsoratories.blogspot.com/2009/07/waffle-house-is-best_15.html.

So, on July 25th, 2010 my Wife and I were on our way back to Florida from a family picnic that was held south of Fort Worth and we stopped at store 1765, located at 1120 west highway 67, Alvarado, TX 76009, the time was at 1:38 in the afternoon. Our visit was by far, the worse visit I have ever had to a Waffle House and I have eaten at Waffle Houses from right to left and from the top to the bottom of this Great Country. It started bad and I should have taken it as an omen when we were not greeted with a “hello, welcome to Waffle House” when we walked in the door. I really enjoy that because I can think of no other place that greets the customers when they walk in each and every time, it was one of the initial draws for me.

We took a seat in a booth and although neither of needed to look at the menu’s, they were laid out as placemats. The person, who I would later learn was our server, was trying to make time with another server. We commented to each other about her apparent lack of interest in him and his eagerness to impress her and of course his lack of interest in us, the paying customers. Anyway, after about three minutes he breaks ranks with her and comes over to take our drink orders, still no welcome to Waffle House. I ordered water and a milk with my meal and my Wife ordered orange juice. When he leaves our table, he makes his way back over to talk to the female server. After a few minutes he brings us two waters, my wife tells him, I ordered orange juice to which he replied, “oh yeah, I forgot – but keep the water.” No worries I thought he is young and obviously not thinking about us but the other server. He stops and talks to her again before going and getting the orange juice. When he returns he asks if we are ready to order, we are and we do. My Wife ordered a ham, mushroom and cheese omelet, scattered hash browns and a waffle and I ordered waffle and a bacon egg and cheese sandwich.

So then Romeo goes back over to the female server and is back in deep conversation, and I noted the time because I wanted to see how long it would take him to actually place our order – it was almost 3 and a half minutes. I was irritated but took it in stride and we were able to laugh about the follies of youth. We are watching, another part I enjoy, our meal being prepared. The ring was flipped down for the hash browns, the eggs for the omelet are placed in the blender cup and some plates were put out. At the waffle station I saw an amazing site, it was filthy and looked as if it had not been cleaned in days, it was so bad I took a picture, enclosed. There were three of the plastic tubs there with waffle mix in them, odd I remember thinking but by this time, I already had determined there was something amiss at this Waffle House. The cook was scraping the three containers, looking for enough batter for our waffles I suppose. The eggs were still whirring away in the blender. Finally, he goes and gets a new tub of batter from the fridge, it looks as thick as old porridge as he deposits the blobs on the waffle irons. I almost cancelled the order then but I was really looking forward to a great waffle.

The cook finally takes the eggs off the blender, they were for sure whipped by now I remember thinking. He proceeds to make our order, I knew already that the waffles were not going to make it at the same time as our meal. I noticed when our order was complete our server, still engaged with the female server, was slow to go and get our food and bring it to us. He finally brings my sandwich and my Wife’s omelet and hash browns. I was shocked at the hash browns, they were by no means scattered. They were obviously cooked in the ring and never removed - one side was burnt, the other had never touched the grilling surface – it resembled a hockey puck. I have never received scattered hash browns that looked so poor. The omelet was about three inches thick, a result of the over blending the eggs I assume. As such, it did not cook correctly and was an odd shade of light brown. My sandwich was delivered on burned white toast, not slightly over toasted but burnt to the point the crust was blackened. There were also no pickles and mayonnaise on the plate, not that I eat them every time but I get a reassured feeling just knowing they are there. Wow, I remember thinking this is really bad for a waffle house, I had no idea at that point that it could have gotten any worse. As we start to eat an employee, the only one who appeared to be actually working was sweeping the floor, she came right by our table with her broom going 90 to nothing. The floor was disgusting so I understand why she was sweeping but the debris cloud she was raising, at our table, did not make the already poor meal anymore more enjoyable.

Our waffles finally came, we were nearly done eating by this time, mine was covered with little black things. When I asked the server what are all these little black things he said “it must be some burnt stuff that was left on the grill” I was shocked! I was in the process of cutting that section off when he was explaining that. I handed him the ticket he just dropped on the table and asked that the waffles be removed from the bill, which he did. So, we are making our way through this awful food, we just want to get it behind us and get on our way, which is why we stopped at a Waffle House in the first place – fast and good food. It is then that the employee, sweeping chores now completed stopped by to refill the sugar dispenser. She asked me if I minded handing it to her so she did not have to reach across the table – at least she asked I suppose. She then proceeded to stand at our table and fill the sugar dispenser from a giant whitish clear pitcher, not 18 inches away from where we are eating. We are working our way through this substandard meal talking about stopping at some other Waffle House further up the road by this time.

I noticed an older employee (obviously the only adult supervision in this store I thought) as we were getting ready to leave and I thought I would mention my dissatisfaction to her as I was paying my tab, I had no idea this visit could get still worse. As I approached the counter the woman I was going to talk to starts spraying down something with a hose that is right beside the counter and proceeds to slash who knows what all over me, my wife, the two guests at the counter and the register. She cackles with laughter and says to one of the younger employees to clean the register. I responded with, maybe you should be more worried about spraying the customers than cleaning the register. The blank stare I received told me that there was indeed no adult supervision at this store and it would do no good to mention anything to her, her incompetence level would not allow her to begin to comprehend the damage she was doing to the Waffle House name anyway – of that I was absolutely sure. I then paid my tab and proceeded out the door, I did not hear what was said but as we walked out, I could hear a raucous laughter. I did not even care at that point I just wanted out of that store and hoped that this very bad Waffle House experience would not taint the chain for me forever.

I have been going to Waffle Houses for over 25 years and some are better than others, but there are some standards that are common amongst all stores. Ya’ll say hello and welcome to Waffle House, every time, without fail. Ya’ll put pickles and mayonnaise on the plate when a bacon, egg and cheese sandwich is ordered. Ya’ll also keep the stores clean and have cooks who promptly cook the food. This store had none of those qualities or any other quality that was even remotely like any other waffle house I have ever visited.

I just wanted ya’ll to know about this rogue store you have in Alvarado Texas so you can correct the issues before they sour the taste of Waffle House for any other customers.

Duane Smith