I never eat at OG as my Italian side of the family would disown me, but I must admit, it's probably not a bad deal if you're going skiing all day the next day or something. The carb-loading would be preposterous, but when you're burning 2000 calories per hour, it's okay.

I can't understand the attraction of OG.
For what it is, WAY too expensive. The soup, salad, breadsticks "special" is about $8 each.
Pasta entrees hover in the $10 range.

A 16 ounce bag of pasta at the grocery store: 99 cents.

You've failed to include the cost of chilling those salad plates - I think we need to add a plate-chiller to our kitchen reno. :D

The scariest part about this thread is that there was more than one, and they had to be merged! :eek:

Not to mention Johnny Carinos and Romano's.

Still, they serve a purpose. ^

If we look at the base material prices, we would never eat outside of home.

Each OG meal also includes unlimited breadsticks, soup or salad. I prefer the soup over the salad.

For us, it's got to be special to merit eating out, which is probably why we avoid OG. It's just ordinary, and we can do it better at home for a lot less.

Mind you, we are not gourmet chefs . . . more like lazy cooks.
So, if we eat out, it has to be someplace that specializes in foods we don't make at home, like Thai or Indian curries.

Maybe we also have a really lousy OG in our hometown. The last time we ate there, "unlimited" meant begging the waiter to bring more bread, or hoping the ginormous salad bowl would be more than 1/4 full when brought to us. Also, once the waiter figured out we weren't drinking any wine (smaller tab), he ignored us.

+1. :p

Um, it's called a fridge.

Does your family treat you the same way? If so, they lived up to their advertising promise!

What a swell idea. Maybe I'll add one of those as well in place of the current irony-alert meter displayed for unwary guests. :p

^ I had to read this a few times before I recalled the OG slogan . . .

So, the answer is No. (thank goodness!) :D

Sorry - I neglected to add the irony GIF. @:-)

I guess the populous here loves bad "Italian" chain-restaurant food. Are they as Italian as the Outback Restaurants are "Australian"?

Do you have to eat there to know? I can proudly say I have not eaten at an OG my entire adult life :D

You have no idea how fortunate you are.

For me, my elderly parents love to go to OG when they visit us. But, their standards are somewhat skewed. When we lived in Washington DC, they insisted on going to Bob's Big Boy. No matter where we live, they want to go to Denny's and take advantage of their senior discount. :rolleyes:

Seems ok when we visit.. probably the once a year.

Not a bad restaurant here in YYC.. I wonder why we don't go there more often?:eek:

The soup, salad and breadsticks are fine, it's the entrees I can't stomach as they are far too salty for my taste.

Ya know.. maybe its picking the multi-combo meals that may be a problem..

We ate at OG in HOU by the Space Center because my wife has been bugging me for years why we don't eat there more often.. she likes OG..

So we're driving back to the hotel and my son up-chucks like 7 times.. and we spent an hour and half cleaning out the back seat..

We ended up never get the smell out.. it was odorous reminder for the balance of our 5 night layover in Houston.:D

My grandparents always wanted me to take them to OG. I don't think I've been back since they passed away.

My condolences.. :(

Ah, yes. I read that this morning. Rather scary. :)

After reading the article.. what's so scary?

Between describing the place as impressive, that she's reviewed KFC and Subway.

If you're in the restaurant business as an independent, as couple of my in-laws have been, it's certainly a sign of the times.

Good luck to the little guy trying to stay in business by offering high quality when the giants move in. It can be done but... :(

It's why, for example, we patronize this joint when we're near SEA, although they're now up to three operations and may eventually become another Olive Garden. ;)

Familiarity and Branding is a plus.. but there are quite a few excellent local restaurants that has a good reputation where we visit.. and the good ones seemed to open up a few locations.

But perhaps being a tourist going down International Avenue if in Orlando, one tends to get drawn into the chain restaurant if a bunch of restaurants are offering pretty much same.

Back when I was in Grand Forks I probably would have been thrilled to eat in an Olive Garden. I don't remember there being a whole lot up there.

This right here is the key. I live in a city with about 100,000 people. We have no decent city-like restaurants. We have two "fine dining" places that just aren't. But people here think eating at those places is "like you are eating in New York". I don't particularly like going to Olive Garden but I go there here since the food isn't bad, the service is good, and the experience is consistent. It's all about what you have for comparison.

Similar story for me when I went to Tupelo, MS on business. We were taken the first night to a local Italian place and the second night to Outback Steakhouse. Outback was a far better choice even though the first place was local and more expensive.

As a former boss of mine liked to say, if you're forced to eat sh*t or nothing at all, sh*t tastes pretty good.

I've tried Olive Garden restaurants in a handful of places (in a handful of different states) and found them to be consistently over-salted, to a ridiculous degree. Keeps their drink sales going, I suppose. I generally avoid them when given the choice.

There is only one Olive Garden in Calgary a city of over a million.. and the place is always packed out. To avoid line ups, you pretty much have to show up 4 pm or 9 pm in the day. Lunch is packed as well.

Olive garden
 

Olive Garden purposefully neglects salt to avoid invalidating the extended warranty agreement it has with the manufacturer of its cooking pots.

Apparently, there is an official Olive Garden policy that dictates the number of breadsticks provided at the start of each meal.Starboard claims that $5 million is wasted annually on breadsticks that go uneaten when a server doesn’t follow the formula and unnecessarily serves too many.

This and other fascinating facts about the hedge-fund takeover of the parents company of Olive Garden.


https://medium.com/the-spaghetti-inc...d-1abc09cfc86a

I bet the report doesn't describe the 5 million excess pounds that are waisted annually by those who eat all the breadsticks. :eek:

I have to eat at Olive Garden tonight and I'm not looking forward to it. There are so many better choices in Italian restaurants in the area that offer better food and a better value. I haven't been to Olive Garden in a long time and was hoping someone here could give a recommendation on what items might not be too bad.

Eggplant parmesan.

Lemon Cream Cake.

I've sworn off going to Olive Garden because it's turned into Chuck E Cheese with dozens of unruly children running amok. But I do miss the lemon cream cake.

Take out.

I ate lunch there today, for the first time in 5 months. Other than the reduced breadsticks count, it was pretty good. Comfort food, certainly.