Tag: waitress

The Golden Corral

On By Michel McDonaldIn Food, RestaurantLeave a comment

Darrin has wanted to go to Golden Corral ever since they opened their doors last year, but we just never made it.  We tried to go there a couple of times but their line was so long outside the door that we just said screw that, and then we would go to either a chinese restaurant or Hometown Buffet.

Last night as I was about to prepare dinner, I emailed Darrin asking him what he wanted.  I gave him choices, Beef Ravioli or lasagna.  He emailed me back saying neither, he wanted to go to Golden Corral.  I was a bit irritated because I knew we would be standing in line outside for at least half an hour or longer.  Fortunately there wasn’t a line at all so we only had to wait 10 or 15 minutes to get to the cashier.

We have never been to a Golden Corral so we weren’t sure how things worked.  At Hometown Buffet you pay for your dinners and drinks and then get seated and go get your drink and food.  At Golden Corral you get your drink before you even pay, then they seat you and you don’t even have to get your own drinks, your waitress does that for you.  All you need to worry about is getting your food.

The only thing that irritated me was the cashier.  They have signs posted all over the place that said that it was 2 for $20 Mon-Thurs after 4pm and then under that “the whole restaurant.”  OK when you read that, what goes through your mind?  Food, dessert, drinks etc. right?  WRONG!  They charged us for drinks,  $2 each in fact.  That is a bit misleading and so I mentioned it to Darrin and made him ask the cashier and she started laughing at us.  That put me off because I don’t like being laughed at and that was a legitimate question.  I feel that it’s false advertising because the drinks are in the restaurant, so why wouldn’t that be included in the deal?  She told us “nice try” and we shrugged it off.

The choices of food at Golden Corral were vast.  They had this long salad bar that seemed to go on forever, across from that were the cooked foods where you had to stand in line for your steaks which you have to wait to be cooked.  Their steaks were so frickin’ good too.  I mean, can we talk?  Their steaks were so good that if it were possible to have an orgasm from eating meat, we would have been screaming “OH GOD, OH GOD” at the top of our lungs while pounding on the table with our fists, that’s how good it was.  I didn’t want to stand in a long ass line to get steak, but Darrin gave me some of his.  He on the other hand kept coming back with more steak and I didn’t understand how he was getting them so fast.

My first plate was a salad and oh my goodness, the thousand island dressing was so good.  I have never had thousand island dressing that tasted like that.  I love Bob’s Big Boy thousand island, but golden corrals was even better, and that’s saying something.  Next time I want to try their ranch.

My second plate had fettuccine alfredo.  Again, orgasm.  Their alfredo sauce was so freakin’ amazing.  I also had some bourbon chicken, I don’t know the exact name but oh my goodness, it was so fantastic.  I was in awe of the flavors that were dancing with my taste buds.

I went back for another plate because I am a glutton for punishment and of course I got more bourbon chicken, macaroni and cheese and a slice of pepperoni pizza.  I just had to have all of these flavors in my mouth all at once.  I knew my stomach couldn’t handle all of the food but I was just too curious.  The pizza was better than Pizza Hut and Dominos combined.  I kid you not, it was amazing.

I was already full by the time I finished eating my three plates, but I wanted dessert.  I went to stand in line for the desserts and I noticed a machine that was supposed to squirt batter into grease to make these little mini donuts, and there were these arms that were supposed to flip the donut so it could cook on the other side too.  I didn’t actually see any donuts being made because it didn’t have any batter in it because their donut bowl was already full, but my mind was blown away.

I grabbed a slice of chocolate cake and put 2 marshmallows on a stick and dipped it in some chocolate.  Speaking of which, they didn’t have a chocolate fountain like in the commercials.  I asked the waitress about that and she told me they were missing a part so it wasn’t working.  That was disappointing, but the taste of the chocolate on 2 marshmallows that I put on a stick made up for that disappointment; it was AMAZING!

They have really put Hometown Buffet to shame.  In fact, I have noticed over the last few months when we go there that they are always empty.  I mean not empty empty, but when we go there, we don’t have to wait in a line, we just go to the counter and pay for our meal and we don’t even need to wait to be seated because there is usually plenty of seating, and now I know why.  I guess when Golden Corral opened up, everyone abandoned every other restaurant in town, and with good reason.

We went to the Golden Corral on Ming Avenue here in Bakersfield and our waitress was Denise, and she was the sweetest waitress.  When the manager told us to come back, I replied “Oh we will, you can count on that” and I meant it.

Clay’s Restaurant

On By Michel McDonaldIn RestaurantLeave a comment

California Avenue IHOP becomes independent eatery

November 28th 2008, IHOP in Bakersfield became Clay’s Restaurant.  We’ve been going to that IHOP since 2000 but we don’t always have the money to be regulars.  We only go once in awhile.  But we actually haven’t been there at all since they changed their name to Clay’s.

Well this morning Darrin wanted to go out for breakfast and the place that he chose was closed for some strange reason.  So he said well let’s go to Denny’s.  I said that’s too far.  He said where do you want to go and I said “well we haven’t been to Clay’s yet” so that’s where we went.

We get there and are seated right away.  There was a person we knew who was leaving so Darrin wanted to talk to him before we sat down.  Our host had our menu’s sitting open on the table waiting for us which I thought was very nice.

So we order and our food comes, I ordered the #6 2 eggs, 3 bacon, 3 sausage, hash browns and pancakes.  Darrin ordered chicken fried steak with gravy, eggs, hash browns and toast.

I can’t speak for him but he didn’t complain about his food.  My food was pretty good.  The sausage was different though, it wasn’t over cooked and wrinkly, it was a nice light shade of brown and it was smooth.  The bacon was also very flat and smooth and it tasted good.  The pancakes were smaller but I guess they can’t sell pancakes that look exactly like IHOP’s so they just made them smaller.  The hash browns weren’t crispy which is IHOP’s signature hash browns but that was fine.  It was still good.  Normally scrambled eggs are 1 solid color but mine weren’t mixed completely so you could see the yellow and white.  That’s not a bad thing, the eggs were good but it was just different.

Our waitress was Donna and she was a very nice woman.  We asked her if the business has suffered since they changed their name to Clay’s and she said that there aren’t as many customers as when they were IHOP but the customers are coming back.  I can say that I would definitely come back because the food was very good.

Clay’s Restaurant is located at 1530 California Ave. in Bakersfield, CA.  There are also other Clay’s, I just know about this one and the one over by Valley Plaza on Ming.  I would recommend Clay’s and I give them 5 stars.