Montana’s BBQ & Bar

Here for Sunday lunch as part of a group of eight. We were seated and drink orders were taken promptly. The waitress seemed a bit confused when delivering the drinks — identifying 3 different brown-​colored soft drinks. The food was delivered by another staff member. At least three of the hot dishes/​sides were cold and had to be returned. Server was very attentive at the start but less so later — had to find her to get our bills. We were not that impressed today.

Having worked in the service industry for many years I have to say this was by far the worst dining out experience of my entire life as well as the rest of the people at my table. I had just moved to Hamilton and went there with my family… Where to start… Everything went wrong and when I say Everything I mean EVERYTHING! The restaurant was not busy at all and we arrived at a earlier hour for dinner we had to wait 15 mins for our table… ok no big deal there probably just short staffed… We then were walked to our booth with dirty dirty sticky menus thrown on the table… we waited close to 15 mins before we were ever acknowleged. again restaurant not busy at all maybe 8 tables…6pm… seen lots of staff… Finally we ordered. Our drinks came another 15 mins later my dad and grandmas tea were ice cold and they messed up our sodas… another 25 mins goes by and someone comes to our table I informed them on the mix up and they said they would bring hot water for the tea and new drinks (never happened ever) 10 mins later they bring one entrée out and no one elses’s we were a party of 5… My grandma had to eat her ice cold meal alone… 15 mins later they brought 2 more out and 10 mins later the last 2 entrees… uhhhh arent tables suppose to eat together??? …Every single entrée was ice cold and missing something on it or just straight out the wrong order… at this point I asked to speak to someone as no one had ate or drank and we had been there well over an hour… The waitress said a manager would be straight over 15 mins later she showed up I was very kind in my complaint to her but at this point it was getting redicioulous… She took all our entrees back and swore we would recieve our drinks and proper orders.(hot) in no time and she also would bring us few extras to try… this never happened ever. Our meals came back out again 20 mins later again cold and wrong orders… seriously??? We never ordered anything difficult… we were all so disgusted in the lack of customer service I woud think being a chain restaurant they would have stantdards and formal training on the staff and management. I told the manager I too worked in the service industry for many years and was appalled. She comped 2 out of the 5 meals… that we never really ate and offered free dessert for all… She also gave us a $ 50 voucher to come back… No one in my party wanted it we all laughed you couldnt pay us to return…

We always go for the all you can eat ribs on Wednesdays nights. The pork ribs are great with the Texas Bold BBQ. Always have excellent service too. The waitress is always on top of our order making sure the next rack of ribs goes on before we are done the first ones. You can also take you what you don’t eat which is not the norm for all you eat places. The price is high as it is 27 bucks for one person so go hungry. Our bill with a man mug of beer and all you can eat ribs works out to about 80 bucks (2 people). Always a great experience there

This used to be my absolute favourtie place to eat. I used to come here at least once a month with my boyfriend and ordered an appetizer (different most of the time) and 2 orders of quesadillas every time we went. My order was to have no chicken as I am a vegetarian, and my boyfriend’s meal DID have chicken.
Imagine my surprise when my quesadillas also had chicken — almost every time I went there! It starts to get annoying when they can’t cater to someone with such a simple order. I am not asking for tons of extra ingredients, I asked to eliminate ONE. Anyway, that started to get annoying and that is where I began to lose interest. However, I still gave them a few more chances as the food still tasted great.
Unfortunately two of the times that my boyfriend ordered the chicken quesadillas, he found BONES in his food! We complained both times this happened and were told both times that this is not common (obviously, right?) and they apologized profusely and made it up to us by one time giving us a free dessert and the other time, by taking the meal off of the receipt. I will admit that when Montana’s Cookhouse does make a mistake, they do a lot to help fix it/​make it better.
Another time I went there, we waited 40 minutes in our booth before anyone even came to our table. We were seated right near the hostess and the front door and kept looking over there to try and show that we were there, waiting to be served (yes, we were seated by her and they knew we were there… maybe they forgot!). After about half an hour my boyfriend went to the hostess and told her we had been waiting for 30 minutes and nobody had even come to our table to hand us a menu or take our drink order. The place was less than busy. Finally about 10 minutes later someone finally came, apologized, and started the ordering process.
My final straw was when I went out for a celebration with my boyfriend and once again, ordered the same chicken-​less quesadillas. The first time the meal came to me, it was burnt beyond recognition. I didn’t even take two bites before I decided it was inedible. I kindly asked for another one as it was burnt to a crisp and was told «No problem, let me just get you a new one!» After waiting longer than the first time around, my boyfriend was already done his meal by the time mine came (I told him to go ahead so his food didn’t get cold). This time the quesadilla was on a whole wheat piece of flatbread (I didn’t ask for that!!) and it was so soggy it made me gag when I picked it up. I didn’t complain again as I hate to be «that person» so I just ate the appetizer and didn’t touch my meal. The girl came over to me and asked if there was a problem and I said yes, I told her that my quesadilla was so wet and soggy underneath that it literally fell apart when I picked it up. She did apologize and offer a new meal but I refused. I was so utterly repulsed by this disgusting meal that I didn’t even have an appetite after seeing it. (That’s right! Their nasty piece of work actually caused me to refuse free food!) That was the last time I have EVER been there.
Montana’s Cookhouse used to be great. The food (usually!) tastes awesome but lacks in effort a lot of the time. If you are looking to have some drinks with friends and grab some pub grub than this place might be a good option. But if you are going out for a fun night with a significant other, or a family dinner, I would definitely steer away from the Montana’s on Upper James. I am not sure if there is new management, owners or cooks, but something is different and it’s not for the better!
I don’t want to speak for all of the Montana’s Cookhouse’s as it used to be awesome — I loved it there! But the one on Upper James (the only one I had ever gone to) is actually extremely disappointing more times than not.