Restaurant Review: City Cafe Diner

I had a large weekend and plan to tell you all about it, but first I feel I must issue a Public Service Announcement about a new restaurant in town. I feel I must get this information out to you immediately for fear you may want to try this place and I assure you, it would be a complete waste of your time and money.

Since her folks were out of town and the kids were with their dad, Jackie sat with me and my family at church on Sunday. I asked her if she wanted to go to lunch afterwards and she agreed. Neither of us really had a particular spot in mind and so I suggested Zoe’s and the new City Café Diner on Drake Avenue next to Cracker Barrel. She said let’s try City Café and so that’s where we went. We ran into my Aunt Linda and her friend Saundra there, but they ended up leaving because after a glance at the menu they decided the prices were too high. I wish we had followed suit.

When they called the name for my aunt and her friend, we took their spot since they had left. The lady running the place was a total spaz and when we tried to tell her she had called our name she told us they were taking names at the door. Finally we were able to help her understand that our name had been called to be seated and we were then led to a table. While everyone was waiting to be seated, there were free muffins and juice. I grabbed a muffin (they were wrapped in plastic wrap) to eat for breakfast on Monday.

The place was packed. There were people at every table and standing outside trying to get in. The waiter in our section was struggling to keep up and told us that one of the other servers had not shown up. The menu at this place was extremely overwhelming. There were probably 100 items on the menu and I’m not even exaggerating. I felt like I was in a panic and couldn’t make a decision as to what I wanted to get. They brought some bread to our table while we were waiting and it was dry, and tasted like it was a week old. Finally I made a decision on what to get only to then be told that I couldn’t order from that menu that I could only order from the daily specials. Then, I felt pressured into ordering and just decided on the chicken marsala. Jackie ordered the spaghetti and meatballs.

The guy brought out our salads. I had not ordered one but he gave me one anyway; Jackie got one with what she ordered. For all I know I should have gotten one with what I ordered but it didn’t come up when I was ordering (did that make sense?). The salads were not bad, but Jackie didn’t eat much of hers because it had some cheese on it and she steers clear of dairy these days.

Then our food came out and y’all, just the thought of that food makes me want to throw up a little bit. It was not good – at all. I ate make three or four bites of mine and then piled the other plates on top of it and said, “I’m done”. Jackie ate 1.5 of the three meatballs and maybe one spoonful of noodles and she was done. It was disgusting. The server noticed I did not eat mine and voided out my check. I guess Jackie’s 1.5 meatballs counted as eating the whole meal because he didn’t offer to void hers out. I told her I would pay for half of her lunch since I didn’t have to pay for mine but she said no so I just left the tip for both of us.

Jackie was overcharged by $1 for her dinner and her drink was $2.39 – her total came to just under $15. This place is overpriced and the quality of the food is terrible. The only positive thing I have to say is that the server, Brian, was nice and took good care of us while we were there. I’m not even kidding when I say my stomach is aching a little right now while I am typing this story. This was the worst meal I have had in a long time. I’m assuming a family must operate the place and I think they are Greek, or at least that was my guess and everyone who seemed to be in charge seemed to be Greek so that’s my guess and I’m sticking to it.

As for the muffin I mentioned earlier, I didn’t even eat it on Monday. It was squishy and felt like it had not been fully cooked and after the terrible lunch on Sunday, I didn’t want to ever eat anything from that place again. After I left there on Sunday, my stomach was achy and I stopped by Star Market to get some Ginger Ale which I only crave when I’m not feeling well if that tells you anything.

City Café Diner on Drake Avenue – don’t even bother stopping in!