Something fun to do is going to happy hour. I'm not a drinker but the food is cheaper and it's a great time to chat with friends and it's really just a fun past time for us. Normally I go to Oswego Grill and have even tried Manzana's happy hour awhile ago. I'm also a huge fan of The Cheesecake Factory's happy hour..but they only have it during the day and not at night when closing. Yeah, that was a bummer phone call. And now there's a new place in town that I was ready to try out. Funny, I went for happy hour but stayed for an entree:
Recently in Bridgeport Village a new restaurant opened where the old Macaroni Grill used to be. I'm not entirely sure what happened with Macaroni Grill but it's gone now and there's a swanky new restaurant in its place. I was first drawn to Twigs Bistro and Martini Bar by the outdoor seating that they have. It's been super nice here in Portland lately and what could be better to end your day with eating some yummy food outside on a warm night? Well..a lot of things. Let's just say it wasn't the best experience I've had but I can't say I won't go back. I'm really hoping they get their stuff together or else it's going to tank. I've already talked to a few others about this place and their experience has been the same so far. But let me share with you what happened and I honestly want to share this as a way to give constructive criticism more than anything. I want this place to be successful and I do encourage others to try it.
So let me walk you through our experience at Twigs. We first walk in and I'm just all googly-eyed at the decor. I could tell from how they redid the siding that it was going to have an all new look from Macaroni Grill and I love how it turned out. There definitely is a great atmosphere to the place. After checking out the place for a moment we walk to the hostess to ask about their menu and what food items they had for happy hour. After taking a look over we decided it would be a good choice to try it out. When we first arrived I was a little bummed at seeing all the outdoor seating looked full - in the sense that I wanted to enjoy the warm weather but others had beat me to it. But lucky for me the walls that share the patio are collapsable and open that part of the restaurant so you're almost outside as well. Honestly it's almost better that way in case there was any wind so HUGE plus on that. It's also pretty cool because there are some pretty cool pub-like tables that have booth-like seating for one side of it...does that that make any sense? Haha..I wanted to take a picture to share but they were all full .. and I also wish one was open for us to sit at, but oh well. Well..we'll come back to that actually at the end of this post.
So we get seated and it's all great because the weather is perfect, it's dark out and there's a good mood going all the way around for us. But then it all kind of went down hill from there. Again, I don't want to say "Don't ever go to Twigs" because I actually have plans to go back myself, but they really need to fix the problems that they were having that night (and others that I've heard about).
But basically what the problem was our waitress. The service was the worst. We hardly saw her all night. And it wasn't that busy. Even when I have gone to busy restaurants like California Pizza Kitchen or The Cheesecake Factory I'll still at least see my server way more than I did at Twigs. It really was just awful. And after talking to a friend of mine that went another time he mentioned that his server wasn't all that great either. Back to our server though, at first it wasn't a big deal because since it was our first time there we wanted to look over the menu and were not in any sort of hurry at all. We asked for some water to start since we were pretty dehydrated from the beach and our sunburns that day. And when she came back with the waters and to take our order we asked for more time and again, we weren't too worried about it then. Normally when I'm at a restaurant (and what I expect) is for our server to come back sporadically to check in on us and to answer any questions. Well..no. After we decided what we wanted (which took us a long time) we waited and waited and waited. We never saw her in our section or anything. Eventually some dude from the same area as us asked us if we were ready to order drinks or anything. So we started to tell him what we wanted. Our drink order was a little confusing because neither of us are drinkers but we wanted some sort of raspberry blended thing. Haha. I know on cruises I get virgin daiquiris but when it comes to the real world I have no clue what to get or what to order. So after having a discussion with this guy waiter about what we wanted and figured that out we start to order our food and then our waitress shows up. So this guy moves on which I understand, he doesn't want to come across as taking over her table or anything but he was trying to be helpful. But it was just a bit annoying we had to go through the same conversation and place our drink and food order a second time.
Once we get our food, we were all happy again. It was pretty good. I was a fan of the steak I got, the flavor was great and it was cooked perfect to how I like it. I just recommend to scrape the huge pepper flakes off the top before eating it. But that's no big deal at all though. Just a tip, unless you prefer the big pepper flakes then I wouldn't recommend to scrape them off.
While we were enjoying our steaks we had great conversation and got full on the food .. buuuuuut .. our waitress was never in sight. Seriously. Normally at restaurants (and what I expect) is for the server to come back every so often to check on drinks and to see how we are liking the food. Well, we ate our meal and never saw her. At one point we even were waiting for refills. Eventually we see her within our section on the patio and we had planned on stopping her on her way back to let her know we wanted some more drinks. But really, you would think she would just stop on her way back regardless. Well, we didn't stop her. We couldn't. No eye contact, she walked way to quickly and really there was an empty table in between us at our closest point. Okay, plan B was to ask the one guy server for a refill since he was helpful. So we stopped him and asked for another drink, while he accepts the request for a refill he then goes on to explain they were having computer issues..strange..how does that relate to us not seeing our waitress all night? Maybe she was fixing the problem? But if that's the case she shouldn't have tables to serve. Nice try, dude. A bit later we see our waitress with a tray full of drinks and I can already tell ours wasn't on it. She delivers the drinks to the table on the patio and never stops. Then later we see the guy server again and asked about our drinks and it was obvious he had forgotten but it really shouldn't have been his concern at all. But at this point our waitress was around and so he told her we wanted another drink and since she was there we also asked for our bill, because let's face it, we were done being there.
While we are sitting at our table and discussing the service we received that night, a waitress in the section with the pub-like seating [I'm assuming] overheard us and started talking to us. I can't remember what she said or how she got into our conversation but however she did it was great. You can tell she's great at her job and easy to talk to and we expressed our concerns of the service we had that night. We even told her that we were jealous we weren't in her section since we saw her all night long...literally. All throughout the night we kept saying to each other how we wish we had the one waitress that was always around and catering to all her tables. She told us we were supposed to be in her section until one more group sat down and basically booted us. But I will tell she's the reason why I'm going back and recommend others to go back. There's hope, and her name is Casey. I definitely will ask if she's working the next time I go and pray that she has room to serve me. And hopefully the other servers can learn from Casey and her personality can even rub off onto them. Not saying our waitress wasn't nice, she just .. didn't even try. We even think she gave up at one point thinking there was no way to redeem herself. I've never worked in a restaurant before so I don't know all the "rules" but I'm thinking a free dessert could've improved the tip we left.
So something really odd happened that night .. not related to us at all but .. a serious "no no" in my mind. And again, I've never worked in a restaurant so I don't know all the do's and don'ts but I can't imagine that this was okay. What happened was, after we were seated and waiting for our water or right after we got it, we noticed one of the employees carrying a tray of food over to a table on the patio. I didn't think she was one of the waiters but was helping deliver the food. There were three items on the tray; fries, soup and another plate. She places the fries down on the table and as she's about to put down the soup, the server guy that was helping us later that evening rushes over as she's doing this and they start talking and this guy PICKED UP THE FRIES OFF THE TABLE, grabs the tray and goes to another table across the patio and gives them the fries and second plate. The woman that first had the tray took the soup and went to the kitchen. A bit later she returns with the soup and another plate of fries. Could you imagine the look on the couple that the food was taken away from? They were shocked and annoyed. I don't think they said anything but they looked pretty pissed to me. What should've happened (in my opinion) was the fries should've stayed on the table. The second table across the patio would have never known this had happened and they probably would've needed to wait a little longer but they would've never known. On the other hand, this couple is left knowing they they have to wait longer because of a mistake. I don't even know what else there is to say about that..but I'm still shocked that even happened.
Again, not saying "Don't go to Twigs" .. what I'm saying is when you go to Twigs, ask for Casey. So let us pray that she's working next Thursday when I go for my birthday...but maybe I should be safe and head to Oswego Grill?
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