Worst restaurant ever?

[grasshopper]

Quote:

Originally Posted by ls99 Taco Bell. Not exactly upscale, but did succeed in giving me food poisoning. Edit add: On further thought, there was a place in Owings Mills MD, pretending to be a NY upscale restaurant with burl wood veneer, fairly good food, served by surly waiters at exorbitant prices. My tip reflected the quality of service, 5%.

Must have been Linwood's near the T Rowe Price campus. Sorry if you had a bad experience. An old roommate ran the liquor end of the business about 1992 or so, we were there on opening night.

[Original Wally]

May I nominate two?

Denny's. Dunno what they do, but their breakfasts give me... ummm.. the runs. I refuse to eat there. Unless, I suppose, I am constipated.

A local place (thankfully gone) that was called Atruro's Mexican. They had a "strolling" musician that was truly horrible. The food was OK, but he offset it in spades.

[karluk]

Strictly speaking this may not qualify as a "restaurant", but far and away the worst pizza I've ever eaten was at Ocean Park in Hong Kong. It appeared to have been repeatedly heated and reheated until the toppings looked like a solid slab of indigestible cheese with various discolorations that may, or may not, have been other ingredients.

And this was in Hong Kong, mind you - a place known for some of the finest Chinese restaurants in the world. The lesson I took away was to stick to the local cuisine. After all, that's what they've been cooking for centuries, and presumably know how to do it right.

The worst local restaurant experience I've ever had was due to poor service, not bad food. The food was below average, but I would have quickly forgotten the meal if not for the two hour wait after being seated.

[youbet]

Quote:

Originally Posted by dmpi I've only been food poisoned at high end restaurants..

I've had Salmonella twice....... and that was two times too many!

1. A high tier river front restaurant in St Charles, Illinois. (But the view from the elevated deck was nice.)

2. A quaint and attractive restaurant in Hamburg where I should have stayed away from the featured plate of cold sliced meats. Thought I was going to die. The morning after the meal I flew from Hamburg to Singapore via Amsterdam. (Lots of hours in the airplane.......) I had one of the washrooms tied up at least 25% of the time. I learned quite a lot about medical providers in Singapore and found them to be excellent.

[audreyh1]

The pickings are horrendously slim in the small rural towns of Texas. We've avoided many places, and learned to stock up well on the food in our RV before heading out into the boonies (one reason why traveling rural TX requires an RV). You can usually count on a decent meal in a TX BBQ place - otherwise you are out of luck.

Anyway, before our RVing days, we were stuck with whatever diner/restaurant existed in a given town, and sometimes there was only one! Never could bring ourselves to eat at DQ which is ubiquitous in TX. One town only had a Golden Corral, and for some reason that one really sticks out on my "never again!" list. Only yellow food? The Golden Corral buffet in McAllen, TX is totally packed every time we drive by even though there are several much better places nearby, and I just shake my head and wonder - why? why?

[ls99]

Quote:

Originally Posted by grasshopper Must have been Linwood's near the T Rowe Price campus. Sorry if you had a bad experience. An old roommate ran the liquor end of the business about 1992 or so, we were there on opening night.

Bingo!

A third was the NCO club in Frankfurt Rhein Main airbase circa 1970. I ordered steak, shoe leather would have been easier to chew.

By the way, I predict this will be one of the longest threads, without porky.

[grasshopper]

Quote:

Originally Posted by ls99 Bingo!

Maryland Public TV studios were 3-4 miles away, Uncle Lou Rukeyser was seen there more than a few times. I lived near by, but my home was bulldozed for another new I-something. Ms G was the president of the American Wine Society in this era, so we were invited out comped at some nice places.

[ls99]

I know the area well, lived in Woodstock for 15 years. For a while I w*rked in the same building as the restaurant. For lunches I preferred the deli across the street. Or another deli in Pikesville a little way down Reisterstown rd.

Can say that since we moved to PA, there is absolutely nothing in that area that I miss.

[grasshopper]

Quote:

Originally Posted by ls99 I know the area well, lived in Woodstock for 15 years. For a while I w*rked in the same building as the restaurant. For lunches I preferred the deli across the street. Or another deli in Pikesville a little way down Reisterstown rd. Can say that since we moved to PA, there is absolutely nothing in that area that I miss.

Valley Deli, the dry cleaners in the strip mall was excellent too. I use to hike about the woods there at McDonogh school, led bird walks there, and found a small colony of Wood turtles about 100 miles east of their know range. I think there are homes there now.

[FIREd]

I use Yelp to weed out the worst places out there. But I've had a few pretty bad restaurant meals - none that made me sick thankfully. The last one: two and a half hour wait for some mess on a plate at a coastal restaurant in CA. Never had seafood tasted so bad right off the ocean.

[ls99]

Alas they pretty much paved over everything. Even the McDonough school sold off some of their land for business offices. Last year we were in the area and got lost.

They paved paradise and put up a parking lot.

[grasshopper]

Quote:

Originally Posted by ls99 Alas they pretty much paved over everything. Even the McDonough school sold off some of their land for business offices. Last year we were in the area and got lost. They paved paradise and put up a parking lot.

Ha, ha, ha, I ended my previous post with Joni's/Counting Crows words, but edited it.

[Lcountz]

ANY "restaurant" on a cruise ship.

Blechhh.......!!!!!!!!! Glop.

[photoguy]

Quote:

Originally Posted by karluk And this was in Hong Kong, mind you - a place known for some of the finest Chinese restaurants in the world. The lesson I took away was to stick to the local cuisine. After all, that's what they've been cooking for centuries, and presumably know how to do it right.

I've found that any sort of western food in Hong Kong is subtly off and not really very good. I imagine it's been modified for the Chinese palate but I would have though with the british influence it would be better.

[tinlizzy]

I've delivered to a lot of kitchens and locally Bennigans and TGI Fridays where not only disgusting but had raw meats in dirty sinks or sitting out for long periods.

The worst food poisoning I've ever had (but dysentery would probably be a more accurate description) was from a "farmer's restaurant" in rural China. I ate an eggplant dish and also had coffee. Someone told me (afterwards) that they frequently fertilize their own gardens with human waste so it might have been that or the water (coffee). It lasted 2 weeks and I literally spent the first two days in the bathtub in the hotel room because it was coming out both ends in continuous waves. A truly awful experience.

[martyp]

The Melting Pot this past Sunday.

My sister somehow got a $100 gift certificate. She thought it would be great to get my mother and me and my wife together for dinner. I tried to ignore her first email invitation because my first thought was that a Fondue restaurant was going to be a bad nightmare from the 80's. She eventually called me and I couldn't get out of it.

It was truly vile and I felt sick for the rest of the night. Not because of food poisoning but just because of their food. You expect bad food in a fast food place or dive but not in a place with the pretensions of being an "nice" restaurant. Those disappointments can be the worst.

[GalaxyBoy]

Quote:

Originally Posted by urn2bfree No horrendous experience jumps to mind but I have never been favorably impressed by the miraculously popular, large ashtrays that exist around the country under the name Waffle House

Haha, the Awful House! Hey, it's better at 3 am after many servings of alcoholic "appetizers." I recall a spot in Atlanta where you could stand in front of one WH and look right and left and see two more.

And yes, I think they handed out smokes if you didn't already have one.

[anethum]

I've visited southeast Asia 3 times, and the wonderful food there is one of the joys of travel in that region. The street food and "night markets" are great. I've not always known what I was eating, but it was always good and usually delicious except for one meal. That was in a restaurant in a small town in Laos. The simple menu had 2 unusual items on it: "Mole" and "Large Lizard" (Don't you just hate when you order a lizard and get one of those small ones?) There were 4 of us. 3 of us ordered a chicken dish, and one got a noodle dish. Nobody tried the mole or lizard, at least not knowingly. Well the chicken was awful and didn't taste like chicken. Nobody got sick, though.

[jollystomper]

Worst experience was in a Dennys in Florida. It wasn't so much the food as the "ambiance":
- Hostess who chatted on phone while we waited to be seated in a restaurant that was 2/3 empty
- Waiter who we think was illiterate (every order he had to look at the picture in the menu and made some marks in his notepad) and screwed up every single order. And half the stuff that was forgotten that we reminded him of we never got.
- Practically had to beg to get our water refilled - one comment from someone walking by with a water pitcher was "sorry, you ain't in my section".
- Waiter disappeared at the end, never brought us a check (we speculate he may have quit in the middle of serving us); had to go to cashier to get check and then argue about taking off the items we were never given.
- When we finally got that all straightened out, friend of the cashier comes in and they proceed to have a 10 minute discussion while we (and others are waiting to pay)

We were soooo glad to get out of there!

[ohyes]

Ruby Tuesday. Gave them two chances (once in a different state) after we had bad experience, hoping it was a fluke. Never. again.

An ex co-worker was married to a restaurant inspector. She shared that there was only one restaurant in town he would dine. Bummer information.