Here in the small town of Yuba City we live in, there aren’t many places to ‘eat’. Sure, there is a dearth of fast food and plenty of crummy chains, but a place to sit down and enjoy something delicious that wasn’t delivered to the kitchen pre-frozen from a corporate distribution center? Those are few and far between.
One of my MOST favorite places in town is a little sports pub called “The Happy Viking” on Plumas Street. Their wings are great, their burgers are tasty, they have cider on tap (apple AND pear), and they have exquisite Guinness Onion Rings. I like that they have multiple sports on the myriad of screens around the place and they have a great happy hour menu.
Herein lies my quandary…The Happy Viking has also screwed up our order the past several times we’ve gone there.
Joel likes the place too, but is usually unwilling to go because of the constant mistakes and after this last time, I’m finally leaning his direction. I’m so frustrated that this place where I love to eat has such a lackluster kitchen and a wait staff who takes the concept of “waiting” to all time high.
Here’s what happened this afternoon…
It’s been quite awhile since I was able to convince Joel to go to The Happy Viking, but today I was finally able to do it. (He agreed I think mostly because he had a coding project that took a long time today and because of that, we missed the lunch hour at the sushi joint we were planning on going to instead.) We ordered right before 4pm and didn’t get our appetizers or wings until after 4:30 and both came at once. We each noticed that we only had 5 wings apiece, which was odd since we thought the order was for 6, but figured that it had been awhile, so perhaps we were mistaken, especially since we each had 5.
The bill comes and lo and behold, we’re charged for 6 wings apiece. Now, this isn’t a huge deal financially. It’s happy hour and wings are $0.55 each, so we’re only talking about $1.10 plus tax, but it’s the principal of the thing.
We pointed out the mistake to the waitress who was reluctant to do anything about it until I also pointed out the counted bones on our plates. At first she offered to have the kitchen make us two wings…which was kind of a ridiculous offer since we were ready to leave and wings take 20 minutes. Then she went to talk to the manager and a few minutes later, she returned and told us that the manager had taken $1.00 off our bill.
Not $1.10 plus tax. Just $1.00.
You know sometimes when you know you’re right, but there’s just no point in continuing to push the point? That’s what I felt as I just took the bill from her and filled out the tip and total. It was pointless and futile for me to dicker over the proper cost.
So I did the only thing I could…I took it out of her tip and I hope she does what she said she was going to do and yells at the kitchen.
We’ll probably never know since sadly, we won’t be going back.
It’s not often that I actually go to a restaurant within the first month of their opening and even more seldom do I bother to review it if I do. This is for several reasons…normally a new restaurant is just getting its culinary legs under it. The wait staff is still working on remembering the menu let alone procedures and are stressed out and harried, the kitchen has yet to perfect its processes and sauces are usually either bland or taste like someone had an accident with the spice jars and the place is usually mobbed by folks that get crankier by the second every minute they have to wait in the sweltering lobby crammed with too many people. Not my idea of a great dining experience.
One of the best kept little secrets we have here in Yuba City is Brock’s Ice Cream Palace. The little white and red building that holds the delicious creaminess that is Brock’s is located on Gray Avenue behind the Wells Fargo.
