In mid-April 2004 we moved to Pitt Meadows. During the week we were moving in we went to lunch at a nearby restaurant on the Pitt Meadows/Maple Ridge border called ABC Country Restaurant. We started with zuchinni strips that took a long time to arrive. When the waitress brought them over with 2 plates, the plate on the bottom was covered in wet ketchup. She quickly removed it and brought a clean plate. When lunch arrived, mine a shrimp sandwich with fries, there was brown grease on the plate. Kerry, who was eating a burger and fries, had the same brown grease on the plate. The general appearance of the sandwich was not good. Too much sauce and it was soggy. I don't believe any management was on premises. We heard a very loud and interesting conversation coming from the kitchen which is in the centre of the restaurant, about a party. Several staff were involved in the conversation, mostly male, at least one female. We were seated at a window, on the perimeter of the restaurant, so that gives you an idea of how loud the kitchen conversation was. When we returned to our car, we saw a man arrive who looked to be a manager, carrying several items into the restaurant, so hopefully things in the restaurant settled down after his arrival. He couldn't park worth a darn though, taking two spots near the entrance door to park his truck.
We were horrified with the experience. We prefer to dine in cleaner, quieter premises and said we'd never be back.
The ABC in Maple Ridge is not to be confused with good experiences we've had dining at the chains in Langley and the White Rock/South Surrey restaurant. Good food and quiet respectful atmosphere.
On February 4 we were over in Pitt Meadows and Maple Ridge and decided to give the ABC Country Restaurant another try because they were having a special for $22 - 2 entrees and a dessert.
We both ordered fish and chips. The waiter was a young man, probably in his late teens very quiet and unsure of himself. He took our order and stopped by several times to check on things even though we still hadn't received our food. There was another young man, a busboy, also appeared to be in training and hoping to be promoted to waiter who stopped by several times checking on us. Our food arrived. I ate a couple of chips and went to the fish. The batter was runny, not crisp. I asked Kerry to try his because he was still eating his chips. He also took a bite and declared the batter not cooked on his too. The assistant manager was near and we let her know it wasn't cooked enough. She was very apologetic and whisked both plates back to the kitchen. She returned a few moments later and told us we were getting two more fresh meals. And sure enough when the plates returned everything was fine.
The only other mishap was with the dessert. Our waiter put our order in but one of his co-workers swiped our dessert and took it to another table.
Now nothing that happened was the young waiter's fault. And the staff were good and resolved the issue immediately and thanked us for being so understanding.
I really think we won't be back. We should have learned from the first time.
And on the original complaint back in 2004, we advised the head office but didn't receive a response.
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