Kincaid's - October 23, 2007

Her perspective: C
His perspective: D

William and I both belong to the Kincaid's Birthday Club, so every year, we get a certificate e-mailed to us for $20 off sometime during our birthday month. It just so happened that we were able to go on my actual birthday.

I made my reservation via opentable.com, and put in the notes that it was my birthday. We were seated right away. The service was quite slow, it took more than 10 minutes to get our bottle of champagne. We got a champagne that is made by the same vineyard that makes Dom Perignon, named White Star. It was excellent for half the price of Dom!

We both ordered steaks done medium. Usually what happens is that William has the problems with food, service, cleanliness, etc. However, this time was special... just for my birthday. My steak tasted like metal. It was terrible. I tasted William's steak and it was excellent. When the server finally came back, William was almost done eating, but they offered to cook another steak for me. I accepted, but could only eat a couple of bites by then and had the rest boxed up. William had also gotten a side of scalloped sweet potatoes which had quite a lot of onion in it. The menu did not say it had any onion in it. William did not eat the potatoes, there was too much onion and they got taken off the bill. They offered to buy us dessert, but we just wanted to go. They replaced my steak, but did not take anything off the bill for that. I expected at least a small discount since William and I had to eat at separate times. We expect more at fine dining restaurants.

**I'd like to make a side comment: I am very disappointed in the content and descriptions of menus. There are things that need to be in there that aren't. Things such as if something is spicy or if it has certain ingredients that people may be allergic to such as onions. Some people can't take something spicy so if the menu doesn't say so, then that duty falls to the server to check with the customer. I happen to not mind things that are spicy and I'm not allergic to any foods, but I've been in the restaurant business long enough to see dietary restrictions due to dieting, medical conditions and allergies. I would think that in such a litigious society, restaurants would be more careful about these kinds of things. Ok, I'll get off my soapbox now.**

We ended up going to the St. Paul Grill for dessert and were very glad we did. My chocolate creme brulee was amazing and William really enjoyed apple crisp. He took some of it home because he couldn't eat all of it. We will have to go back there for dinner.

We have now had three bad experiences in a row at Kincaid's and it used to be our place to go for consistency in food and service. We will be thinking twice about going there in the future.