Montana's

For Ridley's b-day, Hubbs, Ridley, Big Brown Guy, and I went to Montana's for dinner.

BBG made the reservations, and we showed up fashionably late (only 10 minutes). Anyway, apparently by the time we had arrived the server had already messed up Ridley's drink order. We ordered water with wedges of lemon, and were promptly informed that they were out of lemons. We ended up with limes.

So began the rest of a disastrous meal. Don't get me wrong - the company was fantastic, but the food and the service was hit-and-miss (and mostly miss). The restaurant itself was pretty Western-themed, with a log-house sort of feel to it. The tables were lined with butcher paper, and atop the tables were crayons and a mug tree (with apparently zero functionality, as far as I could tell).

Hubbs ordered the rustic citrus-grilled salmon salad, and I had the steak sandwich with a side of house greens. Ridley had their pot roast and BBG had the meatloaf. With the exception of Hubbs, I think we all ended up being disappointed with our meals. Ridley's meal, which was supposed to come with yorkshire pudding, didn't - and the server failed to inform him in advance that they were out of that, as well. BBG's meatloaf was too sweet, and my medium-rare steak was actually overly-well done, to the point of dry and yucky.

The only highlight of the evening was the server's enthusiasm that it was Ridley's birthday; she and her fellow servers came by with a large "water buffalo-esque" hat that they forced Ridley to wear, and then they sang a birthday song that uses the melody from the Flinstones theme song. They had the whole restaurant clap for our birthday boy, which was nice. Then they gave him his free dessert, which was uber-cheap: vanilla ice cream, whipped cream, and chocolate syrup.

When we paid our bill using two separate credit cards, our server messed up on the totals, charging one card for the full amount and the other for the additional amount. She didn't even bother to correct it, but tried instead to tell us that since it was a pre-auth, we could write down any amount we wished that was less than the full amount, and that would be the value that would be put through. I'll have to double-check our account once the payment goes through, since her incompetence throughout the night suggested that she probably cannot be trusted.

Anyway, I am glad we had such great company and fantastic conversation, because overall, Montana's food sucked and the service was poor and the atmosphere wasn't exactly classy. I would not recommend anyone going there, period. There are way too many good places to eat, including Smokey Joe's if you want BBQed meat (cheap, greasy spoon with killer huge portions and yummy fattening grub).

Rating: 5 / 10