Olive Garden Italian Restaurant

Food is typical Olive Garden– fine, but nothing special. However, the odor inside the Maple Grove location is nearly unbearable. Disgusting!

Why are you reviewing a chain restaurant? Because I can, even though I’m pretty safe in getting there I want to ensure I hit 100, and because what happened is worthy of reviewing this place.
Friday after work, we’re deciding what to do for dinner. An Olive Garden commercial comes on and touts the new menu and this and that, I even recall hearing something about it not too long ago with a logo change. Then I remember, I have a gift card to use there so why not? Well, I’ll tell you why not… later.
Arrive right before the dinner rush at 5.30, which means you’re waiting for a table. Seat at the bar area and have it.
We order the «specialty app» of the month or trimester, whatever the hell schedule this places uses to recycle their menu. It’s deep fried lasagna stood upright called a lasagna fritta? Well hell if I’ll turn down anything deep fried and I love lasagna. It’s not good. It’s not bad. It’s not even a meh… it lacks real flavor and seems like it’s missing anything resembling sustenance. The only thing you can really get out of it was saltiness from the batter, and richness of the alfredo. Just an odd thing that is more served being fried in tempura batter, speared and served with meat sauce at the state fair.
Ashley went with the chicken alfredo, which from the few bites she took, was ok. Short I know, but, I’ll explain.
I went with the chicken and shrimp carbanara. For being «the new Olive Garden» this place sucks just like the old Olive Garden. First and foremost, why the hell would you put tail on shrimp in the pasta and bury it around? Just to have us hungry creatures go fishing into the goo for the prawns, eat, wipe down, repeat times however many shrimp you throw in? Is tail off pasta shrimp really that hard to come by these days? Instead, assholes make me eat, stop, eat, stop, you get the picture. Chicken was just terrible. Over breaded (which I thought it was going to be grilled chicken, not deep fried), salty as hell, and below taco bell quality with fat and cartilage or something else still attached at the ends that gave it a crunch/​pop when I bit into it. The sauce… overly rich butter and olive oil with a splash of cream. I shit you not, and you’ll see it in the pic, you can see the olive oil pooling in the butter in my dish. Worst part, and I know, how could it get worse? Was biting into my dish about half way through, and finding a rock the size of a sharpie point in my dish. How’d I find it? The pain in my tooth is a dead give away for ya. Considering I was at the dentist earlier this week (see check ins), I was thoroughly pissed and afraid I broke my brand spanking new chompers. I would have got a pic, but, when I spit it out and showed Ashley, she was able to snag the waitress right away who took it and brought it to the manager.
I got the meal comped, oh joy, it would have been free anyway given the gift card anyway. Just happy I didn’t break or chip my new chicklets.
And Ashley didn’t care to risk hers at that point with her dish and opted for bread and alfredo.

The food was pretty good for chain food. The service wasn’t to great but they were busy. Took a long time for wAter and salad but food came right away. Waiter never came back until he gave us check. Again very busy!

Stopped here for a late dinner. Decided to sit at the bar as they had a couple of big screens to watch the Wild game. Tuesday night at 8:45, not busy. Bartender was friendly and got us drinks and took our order right away. Noticed bartender putting dates on juices etc and also keeping a very clean bar. Nice to see that! I had salad which is always good, hubby had a pasta dish which he enjoyed. All you can eat salad for $ 6.69, how can you go wrong. Been here several times and will return.

Not my first choice for ‘Italian’ but I admit OG does a nice job with their entrees and the servers are nice if they aren’t too rushed. Why not my choice? Because everything OG does that leads up to the entrée is wrong wrong wrong. The salad is iceberg lettuce with ‘Italian’ dressing-​throw in a bit of tomato, shredded carrot, croûton and olive. Somewhat filling but cheap and nutritionally speaking its empty. The breadsticks are a kind of oiled and salted white bread. Again, cheap and filling but completely empty carbs and no nutrition or satisfaction eating them. Pity OG, they are trapped in expectations– I guess customers really look forward to stuffing themselves with generic filler, or the kids love it, or something. I’m no expert on ‘Italian’ cuisine, but the two entrees we ordered (Chicken Scampi and Steak Gorgonzola) tasted good and seemed like fair value– leftovers for another meal. The profits are in the beer and wine and they put some effort into selling you a glass half full. Server this time started out nice but dropped the ball after ordering ‘cos he was busy. Note to servers: Being busy is NEVER an acceptable excuse. Well, wife was happy with meal so I guess I’m happy too! Special Note: Bartender Dave dropped everything to serve me a beer during my wait for a table. Nice job Dave!

The prices have gone up and the quality has gone down. My chicken parmigiana looked like it came pre-​made frozen and they just topped it off with sauce and a bit of cheese.

Not sure if a lot of people write reviews for chain restaurants, but as a big fan of Olive Garden growing up, i’m sure i’m not the only one that has noticed how they just don’t taste as good as they did growing up. But this Olive Garden we visited back on the 23^rd of december had amazing service and food! I was so excited. We got a nice table by the fireplace and had an amazing waiter, Mark C. We ordered stuffed mushrooms, spaghetti, and endless soup salad and breadsticks, and also placed an order of Lobster Cannelloni to go. Mark was very attentive, refilled drinks before they were empty, and offered wine tastings that convinced most of us to order that wine, and brought the to-​go order we placed right at the end of the meal so it was nice and warm for our family member we were bring it to. The breadsticks tasted like they did 15 years ago, and their salad and Zuppa Toscana has not changed. Some people don’t like change, I don’t like it. So all in all, I was very pleased with the food and our waiter.

Terrible service. We waited 20 minutes for the check and another 15 to sign the ticket. To top it off, the server called my husband picky because he chose not to have soup or salad. We will never be back.

great food and good customer service!!!
i had fish and it was very good, my wife had chicken… good price and great atmosphere!!!

This is a first impression review. (Only ate here once.) The food was amazing for both me and my date, service was fast, staff was friendly and polite, there was no wait (Monday night)

We ordered the flatbread and it wasn’t very good. Cute place, decent service… but we came here for the food and it was very disappointing. Never again!

I wish Unilocal would develop separate categories for rating service and food. I give OG three stars for service. Their service approach rivals that of upscale pricey restaurants. My server was attentive, friendly and efficient. Now, the food… I had the lunch special of soup, pasta entrée and dessert. The entrée was hot which was appreciated on a cool day outside. OG cooks their pasta to death! It’s limp and uninspired to say the least. With even lower expectations than I had during this visit, I would go back.

I have a personal vendetta against any «Italian» restaurant that cannot crank out a good spaghetti and meatballs.
Went out to dinner with my dad on Tuesday night and I let him choose where he would like to go. After much hmmming and hawwwing, he finally decided on Olive Garden. I don’t really have much to say about the experience. The food was alright, not horrible — but not great either. I did really like our server, Alex. He was really funny and did a great job making sure our glasses were always full and that our salad bowl always runneth over.

Waitress was attentive and food was prepared well. What you would expect from a chain restaurant. I would go back.

I am giving this review 2stars based solely on the service we were given. The host staff was very pleasant and honest about the wait time and Kaitlyn, our waitress, was courteous and pleasant. The pace of the meal was spot on. The food however, was another story. While I am no stranger to salt, but this meal took sodium levels to a new high. The salt taste was so strong that it actually burned the palette! That was a first for me. After dinner we went to a play and actually drank 2 bottles of water each and still couldn’t quench our thirst. I went to their website and voiced my dissatisfaction with our meal and to my surprise, we received a call from the general manager. He was most apologetic and assured me that he would email the corporate office about our concerns. I’d rather they backed off on the salt as I am perfectly capable of using the provided salt shakers on the table. I should have known better. Fool me once…

My daughter and I visited Olive Garden in Maple Grove. We had a 45 minute wait, but that was not unexpected on a Friday evening. We spent the waiting time «catching up». Once seated, we found our server to be prompt, attentive, and friendly. I ordered the Fettuccine Alfredo and she ordered a shrimp ravioli dish. The alfredo sauce was bland and the fettuccine noodle edges were crunchy — almost as if the plate had been under a warming lamp for a while. The shrimp ravioli had more flavor than the fettuccine. The salad was just ok — I used to really enjoy the salad. The starchy garlic breadsticks were probably the best part of the meal. The restaurant was very noisy and, surprisingly, was filled with families with small children. Next time I want Italian food, I am disappointed to say it will not be from the Olive Garden.

My wife is a big pasta fan, so we go to Olive Garden occasionally. I am a fan of the soup and salad here for lunch and not much can beat the soft bread served with it.
The food in itself is okay. I have tried the veal before and the portion was a little small and left me still hungry. Sure it is a calf and all, but come on.

I was disappointed during my visit here. I came here for my 21^st birthday with my husband and friend, hoping they’d do something special for my birthday, but they don’t even offer anything — not even a little bit of ice cream or cake. That was disappointing because I really like the free stuff for birthdays. We had a boring, drone server who wasn’t very consistent or helpful.
The food was alright, but it was something I easily could have made at home in less time and for less money.
I’ll be going somewhere else for my birthday next year.

Haven’t been to an Olive Garden in years and the wife really wanted to go so we did, I now remember why I haven’t been here in years. She had her mind made up after seeing the commercial for the new Italian crepes that supposedly start at $ 10.95, no they didn’t start at $ 10.95 they started at $ 14.95. I really don’t know how they can advertise this when it’s not true, but it doesn’t matter because I will not be talked into the Olive Garden again. Don’t waste your time or money coming here, service is nice but really slow. Food is mediocre at best and people flock to this place like every other chain restaurant in Maple Grove. It’s annoying as hell when all you want to do is leave, and when you finally that opportunity, you’re honestly to find the door because of all the clueless yuppie idiots that fill up the entry way thinking that it’s going to be worth it to wait for 30 – 45 minutes to eat here! Sorry Olive Garden never again, what was I thinking?