Red Rooster Cafe

Closed! As of early December this place is no more.

This place has changed ownership again. Instead of American food they serve Mexican food. It was good and the service was too. My wife had the chili soup and I had a burrito. Both were good. They had only been open a few days when we went so we will reserve our opinions until we try again.

The Dead Red Rooster was closed this week by the health department, they had rodent droppings in the kitchen, uuuggghhh!!!

This place has great food at decent prices, and friendly service. Went in and loved that it was not crazy noisy. A good selection of items, and now they are open until 10pm. We did not expect much, but were pleasantly surprised for this smaller, non chain place. Excellent breakfast food seems like all day, and just one of those places you will feel comfortable in, and I think you will want to go back as we now do. Give it a try, certainly worth it, and prices are more than fair. Looking forward to stopping back there!!!

I really hate to write a bad review but this place is not going to make it–
Mothers day breakfast-​ok it was busy but not crazy-​2 servers for the whole place-​way understaffed-​got seated right away and was told he would be back with our menus.
Waited 15 minutes to get the menus-​waited another 15 till our order was taken. 20 minutes for drinks-​food took FOREVER! Once we got it-​it was AWFUL! Potatoes were dry as hell-​my kids rare steak was well done because it sat under a heat lamp too long and the plate was hot as hell! My skillet was not cooked-​shredded cheese not melted and veggies were raw. Where’s our chicken wings after almost one hour?
Server tells us something happened w/​the wings and the cook just now told her. Wait what? What happened to the wings? No explanation. She took off one of the meals on the tab-​she was stressed-​I felt bad for her but there were so many angry people in there-​I don’t think they will make it-​sorry to say. We were in there just about 2 hours-​ugh!!!

I take the kids out for breakfast every Saturday. Usually, it’s Steak n Shake, not because the food is any good, but because the kids like the paper model cars, they think it’s neat that they eat for free, and they like the idea that they can eat burgers at 9 in the morning. Fine. But every once in a while, I can’t bring myself to do Mistake and Shake, so we go somewhere else. Winners include Red Apple, and losers include this very awful place.
By the time you’ve seen my review, you’ve probably seen plenty of others complaining about the long wait and the waitresses that probably got fired from Denny’s, and have appointments at the methadone clinic at 4:15. But let me add one more to the list… the owner. The awful, terrible, no good, very bad owner. When I complained that the potatoes that came with my skillet were completely bland, the waitress said something to the cook, and you could hear an older lady screaming at the top of her lung «WELL OBVIOUSLY, HE DOESN’T KNOW WHAT HE’S TALKING ABOUT! ALL OF THE SENIOR CITIZENS THAT COME IN HERE LOVE OUR POTATOES!» Got it.
The food took forever. When it came out, it sucked. My kids wouldn’t even eat their food. The server acted like it was hell on earth to be there (and with an owner like that, who could blame her?).
All I can say is this: when it was owned by the people who owned Seven Dwarfs, it was on par with Seven Dwarfs. Which is no ringing endorsement. But it was leaps and bounds ahead of this place. With Carol’s Garden, Red Apple and a couple of decent places in downtown Wheaton to choose from, you have to be a masochist to come here by choice. Avoid at all costs.

Not crowded — meal took forever, toast was stale, uninterested staff. Unsatisfactory experience in every regard.

Unfortunately this restaurant is another example of management that does not have restaurant skills.
Slow service on initial order, food delivery and check out process.
Server with dirty apron.
Bacon way under cooked.
Food with missing menu ingredients.
Issues in kitchen could be heard in the dining area.
Customer checks in disarray all over the front counter
A true restaurateur could make this place work… after a good remodel.

Took my 2 young girls, as the word «Family» appears on signs all over this restsurant. Hoped this would be a diamond in the rough, good place to grab a bite with the kids. «Family» apparantly pertains only to people related to you over the age of 70.
Offered a booster seat, gross. It had that sticky feel of old cabinets from a greasy 1970’s kitchen, and it was just plain old visibly dirty. I wiped it down with baby wipes, didn’t make a dent on the seat, but the wipes turned dark grey.
We received breakfast menus, both utterly filthy. Crusted yellow goo and stickiness. Asked for lunch menus, but there were no kids menus. Our pleasant server said they had all the regular kids stuff.
Lunch menu is basic diner fare. And once again, the menu hadn’t seen a cloth and cleaner in… ever.
Ordered mac n cheese for girls since all diners that claim homemade food have this staple, right? Nope. Grilled cheese and fruit instead. I got the French dip w/​fries, came with beef vegetable soup.
Ordered milk for girls, which came in small glass glasses with a long straw in it. No plastic cups with lids. I have a 2 year old with me… Thats a disaster waiting to happen. Server said «They didnt send any lids for the cups». I would still prefer a plastic cup to a glass. The soup was a decent portion and fairly tasty if you are craving a bowl of salt. The «beef» only referred to the broth, as there was absolutely no beef in it.
Lunch was about as plain and bland diner food as you could get. Nothing inherently wrong, but nothing very good either.
The biggest problem with this restaurant is cleanliness. The backs of the 30 year old vinyl chairs and booths are filthy. Greasy hand prints, dried gook, sticky everywhere. Tables that are set have visible shmutz on them. The front foyer of 2 separate glass doors are both disgusting with greasy handprints, blechy stuff, and a full face print with lipstick!!! Maybe somebody fell into the door!!! Ew!
The bathroom soap dispensers are empty. There was a fancy looking hand pump on the counter refilled with pink soap so watered down and ineffective, even Dollar General wouldn’t sell it. Also greeting me in the bathroom was a very creepy doll displayed on a table. Double Ew.
I have no one to blame but myself for eating here. I should have turned around when I walked past the filthy front doors and my first view was a shut down and grubby empty food display case. So sad, so sad. I was hoping to find that special off beat place with «real home style cooking». This ain’t that!
I do want to add that our server was very friendly and checked back with us at appropriate times.

Had the red rooster burger yesterday and loved it. They said it was 100% Angus. Had grilled mushrooms and grilled onions and juicy! Very filling

I have been coming here since it was called Peppercorns. In my opinion the food has never been better. The manager Rosanna is polite, courteous, and an amazing cook! She has made me excellent hand tossed salads, which were very reasonable in price. My favorite dish is the cheese ravioli with her HOMEMADE pasta sauce that is to die for! They also have consistently good soup as well. If you are looking for somewhere to go and have a quiet, peaceful lunch or dinner where you can actually hear the people you are with and see the menu… come here. You will not be disappointed!

Went here for lunch with my mom and daughter. The was on other person in the restaurant. It just looks outdated and dirty. Fresh bread was brought out and waitress gave us plates. Mine was filthy… still had food stuck to it. My mom’s plate was sticky! I returned the plates and our soup came out. Cream of chicken. First few bites were good, but than i got to the fatty pieces of chicken and was pretty much disgusted. Our food came out… my daughter had ordered pancakes. Just plain pancakes. It came out with whip cream all around the circle of the pancake. Sprinkles all over it and a smiley face made of some very old looking fruit. The waitress was pleased with this and said «look what they did for you!» Nice gesture but my daughter hates whip cream… she should have asked. What if she was allergic to any of those fruits?
Anyway, my reuban comes and it was so greasy and slimy i couldn’t eat it. My mom bit into her patty melt and spit it out. The meat there had a strange sour taste to it. Not edible and not worth getting food poisoning. We decided against eating here. We explained this to the owner went to the back and came up about 10minutes later. She expected us to pay half the bill to cover who food cost!!! I refused but my mom being as nice as she is paid the woman half. We had a bite each of this nasty food… swatting flies away the entire time. All that was missing from the experience was a cigarette hanging from the cooks mouth!!! I give this place negative stars!!!

This place is disgusting. My husband thought our normal breakfast place would be too crowded it being Easter so we decided to give this place a shot. He was right about it not being crowded. The décor reminded me of the kitchen nightmares episode I watched this past Friday night. Nasty torn booths and 80’s rolling chairs for the tables. The food took forever and when my denver omlet arrived, I could feel a grabber coming on from the coagulating cheese inside. My daughter ordered the Mickey mouse pancakes with chocolate chips and it came out with three slices of banana and a strawberry. The kids menu spelled Mickey wrong … who doesn’t know how to spell Mickey that grew up in this past millennium… there is a song that spells it out. Never going there again.

On my usual drive to and from work every weekday for the past 5.5 years I’ve passed a small family restaurant/​pancake house that has changed names quite a few times over the years. Initially it was known as Peppercorns, then Lumani’s and recently I noticed they were sporting a new sign called «Red Rooster», I decided to put Red Rooster on my «To visit» list and this morning a friend of mine and I decided to give it a try for breakfast. As I pulled into the lot I noticed that the sign shows the full name of this place «Eddie’s Red Rooster», I snapped a picture and headed inside.
I’ve reviewed a lot of breakfast restaurants throughout Chicagoland and nearly 400 places so far this is going to be one of the strangest reviews I’ve ever written. My friend and I walked in, there were two visible waitresses who were running around. After a couple of minutes they told us to sit anywhere we would like and they’d bring us a menu. We sat down after finding several booths that looked dirty or had taped up seats and waited to get the menu. It seemed to take the waitress an awfully long time to return to our table to take our order.
When she finally arrived she took down our order and we waited, and waited, and waited. I was within a reasonable view of the kitchen and noticed not a lot of food was coming out. It wasn’t very busy either, as time clicked by first 10 minutes, then 15, then 20 this seemed strange. After a full half hour had passed, I decided it would be a good idea to write a tip on Unilocal about the wait. I am going to copy and paste the tips I left in order.
«SLOOOOOOOOOOW over 30 minutes since ordering and no sign of the food. They aren’t busy and weren’t quick to take my order either.»
«35 minutes since ordering. Was told it will be „right up“. Other patrons are getting upset»
«40 minutes since ordering. Still no food. Some customers just left after only getting drinks»
«45 minutes since ordering. No food yet. It’s not busy. This is a new record in ineptitude. I’m overhearing „We have to close“ coming from the kitchen.»
«Waitress is crying. I“m leaving»
So what happened here? From what I could determine there was some sort of argument between the cook/​kitchen staff and the waitresses. Around 35 minutes in we were told it would be right out. Some other people who arrived a little after we did had some strong words for the waitress and just up and left their table abandoned not too long afterwards. In the over 1 hour I was there, I only saw one actual food order go out to a customer.
Right before we left I could overhear «I NEED THESE SKILLETS, I CAN’T go back out there without them» and «We have to close!» followed by tears. As more people tried to come in I overheard them telling would be customers that there were some problems and that they should expect a «long wait», keep in mind, this restaurant was 85% empty tables at this point. While I was waiting to see this cataclysm fully unfold, my friend hungry and impatient walked over to where the opening in the dining area to where the kitchen was, offered to pay for his drink and told the waitress he was going to leave. She said don’t worry about the drink and we left.
Overall, my feelings on Red Rooster are obviously quite negative. Since I didn’t actually get served any food I had some reservations about even posting a review. But so as to provide a public service so other Unilocalers know how disorganized this place is, I figured it would be worth posting my experience anyway. A restaurant that doesn’t serve food really defeats the purpose, it’s like a movie theater that plays shadow puppets with a flashlight in place of a projector. I’m rarely this blunt in reviews but the name Red Rooster is somewhat fitting as this place sucks, cock or rooster whichever term you prefer.

My family decided to check this place out after seeing it had changed names/​management for the third time in recent years.
Overall, the food was very good. My mom really enjoyed her Spanish eggs benedict, and my Popeye skillet was very good, as was my father’s skillet. However our hash browns, which the menu said were made from scratch, did not have a whole lot of flavor.
There were a few general problems with the place that did not help endear the place. There was a piece of carpeting that stuck up, causing a waitress to trip several times while we were there. Also, the carpet was fairly worn-​down in a number of places. Thirdly, we noticed that the upholstery on a number of booths were torn. In general, the décor could a bit of sprucing up.
The food was good, but there are other places both nearby and closer to our house that we would rather go.

Great food! lots of hot sauce to check out and some pretty good specials if you check out the website