Not the International House of Roast Beef
Written: Jul 04 '01 (Updated Jul 05 '01)
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Product Rating:
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Pros: Good milkshakes and delicious pancakes, friendly service.
Cons: This is not the place to have dinner.
The Bottom Line: Known for its great pancakes, IHOP is a good place for breakfast, but don't tempt fate by straying from that part of the menu.
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| kazu's Full Review: IHOP |
A new IHOP restaurant recently opened in my medium-sized suburban town, and every Saturday and Sunday morning it has been too crowded to get into without a 45-minute or longer wait. Because of that, I hadn't gone until I found a two-for-one dinner coupon for IHOP in the local paper last week. "That's perfect," I thought, "they're not very crowded at dinnertime anyway." Little did I know there's a very good reason for that.
The International House of Pancakes, now known across the country by the abbreviation IHOP (eye-hop), is known for their great pancakes. I love IHOP's pancakes, and I'd go back again and again for them. However, their non-breakfast menu leaves a lot to be desired.
After my husband and I signed papers to refinance our house (love those low interest rates right now!), we thought stopping by IHOP for dinner on the way home would be a good idea so we could use our coupon. I had high expectations because it was so new, and I thought since it looked nice from the outside there must be wonderful things within.
It took a while -- probably four or five minutes, long enough for my husband to take a potty break and come back to continue waiting -- for anyone to notice that we were there and to seat us. Our waitress was friendly and slightly spacey in a charming kind of way. My husband had to flirt a little since she was young and pretty. He just can't help it.
I ordered breaded shrimp with baby red potatoes, broccoli and salad. Hubby got the roast beef with a baked potato and soup, and also a vanilla milkshake. My salad showed up pretty quickly. It had red onion in it so I was happy, and it was about what I'd expected of an IHOP salad. The soup looked a little scary, though, as if someone in the kitchen had taken a can of condensed soup and poured it into a pan, forgetting to add water. That's how thick it was. Have you ever seen bumpy soup?
When my meal arrived, I tried the potatoes first. I like well-cooked foods, but these looked like they'd been sunning themselves in Bermuda for about a week. They were too far past the edge of doneness to taste good. The broccoli, in its own little dish in the center of the plate, was also a victim of too much preparation. It had been steamed until its little florets must have been begging for mercy. However, the breaded shrimp was very good and came with a small tub of cocktail sauce.
My husband's roast beef was unspectacular and, with dark gravy on top, looked a little like you might expect fake roast beef to look if such a thing existed. He reported that it was dry, but edible. He did enjoy his baked potato, however, and raved to our waitress about the delicious vanilla milkshake she'd delivered. She proudly admitted that she'd made it herself, and added that when she'd worked at Denny's she used to make all the milkshakes.
When we finished our meal the person who checked us out at the register was friendly and said lots of people had been using the two-for-one coupons that night.
Although my meal at IHOP was one of the worst I've had in recent memory, I'd go back -- but only for the pancakes, or so my husband can get another milkshake from the cute waitress.
Recommended:
No
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Epinions.com ID:
kazu
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Member: Beth
Location: Seattle, WA
Reviews written: 20
Trusted by: 12 members
About Me:
Out standing in my field, chewing clover and waiting for rain.
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