Could I have possibly found the worst chain food restaurant out there? From bad service to bland and cold food, I’ve rarely ever had a good experience at the Applebee’s.

First, my apologies to anyone who actually enjoys eating at Applebee’s, but I honestly can say that a good experience at this restaurant has been incredibly rare for me.

Basics

Applebee’s Restaurants are scattered throughout the northeastern United States (I’m not sure about the rest of the country) and at least in this area – they seem to be the ‘pioneering’ chain restaurant. They seem to be the first into an area and thus, they seem to be almost everywhere.

All of the restaurants follow the same basic theme – Applebee’s is a ‘neighborhood’ restaurant and thus are decorated with a mixture of generic Applebee’s décor along with posters, signs, and other memorabilia that has a local flavor. This could be a local sports hero, high school memorabilia or just about anything else from the local area to give the restaurant its local flair.

All of the Applebee’s that I’ve been in have both a dining area and a bar, though the seating in the bar area is usually considered regular seating. You can however go up and get a drink while waiting for a table or hang around the bar itself if you don’t want to be eating.

Menu

I will give Applebee’s credit for having a large menu with plenty of different selections. This includes a line of appetizers, salads and soups, pasta dishes, chicken, fish and steak meals, along with sandwiches and special entrees for people who are taking part in Weight Watchers.

Overall the pricing at Applebee’s is reasonable and a dinner for two should run somewhere between $25 and $30 dollars (without alcohol). The appetizers average are about $7 dollars, while the entrees are about $13 to $15 dollars and the sandwiches are about $8 to $10 dollars. Obviously the shrimp and the steak cost the most, with most of the chicken dishes being the cheapest.

The appetizers at Applebee’s include the standards you’ll find at most other restaurants and include nachos, mozzarella sticks, quesadillas and boneless buffalo wings. The portion size on the appetizers is more than enough for 2 people and about right for 4 people (depending on their appetite). Quality is mixed as it is with most of Applebee’s food. Personally I stick to the honey bbq boneless chicken wings, though they don’t hold a candle compared to the Ninety Nine’s. Instead of being cooked with the honey bbq sauce, these boneless wings are simply Applebee’s chicken fingers with honey bbq sauce dribbled over them.

You’ll find the basic chicken caesar salad at Applebee’s, along with several other salads that including a fried chicken salad (chicken fingers on top of a garden salad), a shrimp caesar salad, oriental chicken salad and a mesquite chicken salad. Honestly none of them really have ever been that good. I like salads – but tend to like the more traditional garden salad with some grilled chicken on it, along with some basic salad dressing and I just can’t find that at Applebee’s, so I find myself not bothering with a salad.

Applebee’s offers several different pasta dishes, which include a chicken and broccoli alfredo bowl and a shrimp fettuccine alfredo bowl. I’ve tried the chicken and broccoli bowl a few times and the alfredo sauce has been tasteless and one of the times the entire dish has been cold – so cold that I had to send it back.

There is fairly extensive selection of chicken, steak and fish dishes at Applebee’s, which includes sirloin steak, baby-back ribs, bbq riblets, various types of chicken, salmon and shrimp. They also offer a ‘take-two’ menu that allows you to combine these into one entrée – so you would get a steak and a chicken breast, or chicken and shrimp, or ribs and steak. These entrees are either served with fries or rice pilaf. My experiences with the steak and the chicken entrees have been mediocre at best – portion size tends to be significantly smaller than the pictures would lead you to believe on the menu (which isn’t necessarily a bad thing) and the quality of the entrees has varied from acceptable on a few of my chicken dishes to unacceptable when it came to a steak that was so overcooked, it reminded me of a hockey puck.

When I do have to eat at Applebee’s, I tend to stick with choices from the sandwich section. It’s a lot harder to mess up a chicken sandwich, than most other menu choices and at the very least, I know what I’m getting. I usually stick to the bbq chicken sandwich, which is a grilled chicken breast with bbq sauce, monterey jack cheese and bacon. They also offer hamburgers, roll-ups (wraps) and several different kinds of chicken sandwiches. All of the sandwiches are served with fries.

For those people on Weight Watchers, there is a special section of the menu dedicated to them. These are all items from the regular menu, but are low-calorie and/or low fat. The menu gives you the point and nutrition information you need for the program. I’ve never been in the program, so I can’t vouch for how good the menu is.

Desserts at Applebee’s are okay, but none really are all that great. You can get cheesecake, a brownie sundae type desert, a ‘sizzling’ apple pie and chocolate cake to name a few. There are quite a few choices, unlike some other chain restaurants – so most people, if they are in the mood for a desert should be able to find something that they would enjoy.

Applebee’s also has a full-service bar, so you can order pretty much any alcoholic drink you can think of while you are there – either with dinner or alone at the bar.

Service

It’s been very rare that I’ve gotten good service at an Applebee’s. From a lack of coordination up front during busy times to waitresses and waiters who seem to forget they have tables, Applebee’s doesn’t seem to focus on customer service when it comes to training their wait staff. While most have been pleasant enough, it’s been my experience that servers in general take their time, focus on trying to upsell customers everything on the menu and really don’t try to hustle or move along to keep a customer’s experience pleasant. I’ve even been at a table when drinks have been spilled on other people at the table (luckily not me) and the server almost started to laugh and then ‘forgot’ to bring over a towel.

While there have been a few shining stand-outs, the vast majority of my service experiences at this restaurant have been disappointing and in general, I expect slow, if not simply poor service when I am there.

Overall Experience

Generally for me, Applebee’s is the restaurant of last resort. When all other options have been exhausted or there is simply nowhere else to eat, I will relent and go to Applebee’s. I even convince myself that it can’t be as bad as the time I was there before and each time, I am unimpressed and disappointed with the meal that I have there.

I really couldn’t recommend Applebee’s to anyone, it’s just never impressed me and for the same price, there are plenty of other options for diners out there.

Final Take

Personally I try to avoid Applebee’s at all costs. Between the poor service and food quality unless I’m starving and there is nowhere else to go – I would rather go almost anywhere other than Applebee’s.

Experience

I’ve eaten at many different Applebee’s including several in Massachusetts (Milford, Franklin, Millbury), New Hampshire and New York.

Recommended: No