Olive Garden Italian Restaurant

I am not big on franchises, but I like Olive Garden.
On Friday night, I was seated by an older blonde woman who frowned at me the whole time. I was never rude and I wasn't dressed like a hobo or the sixth Doctor Who.
My server was the exact opposite! Very friendly and outgoing. He checked on me to see if I was enjoying my meal.
The salad and bread sticks were good, but, I wish I could have chosen how much dressing I wanted on.
I had the mushroom ravioli with a creamy mushroom sauce. Good. I had tiramisu for dessert. It wasn't bad, I liked eating it, but, I have had better at restaurants with there own bakery.
They will sign "Happy Birthday" for you on your birthday.
It gets quite busy on Friday nights, so, expect a short wait.
I recommend a visit.

Love the food. Love the soup. I love the breadsticks not just because its free ????. Our waitress ,she's so nice her name is Deborah G. And they will give you a free chocolate ????. Love the Chocolate brownie lasagna.

We went here with a group of 13 for a family dinner, and this was by far the best dining experience my husband and I have had, ever. Our servers, Cam and Shane, were outstanding. Shane and the manager (Bill Gaudet) made sure our son's food allergies were addressed and made sure his food was safe. Shane and Cam were attentive and checked in often, and was readily available throughout the meal for refills and help with anything we needed. Both servers were friendly, and fun. The food was outstanding and served hot from the kitchen in a timely manner. I would recommend this Olive Garden to any of my friends or family.

Update August 2nd, 2019 The company got back to me and were apologetic. I still don't think customers should have to write a bad review to get a response. Nonetheless, I am increasing the stars back up based on their response and the overall time I have had visiting there over the past 4 years.

Update July 28, 2019: my reviews have fluctuated quite a bit over the years, as we first started coming here spring of 2015. On our most recent encounter, two of us got sick. they had a meal special where we could eat lunch and take home another meal, and I believe it was possibly the take-home meal because within a few hours of eating, both of us were feeling sick, cramping up, and spent the next day in the bathroom.

I called to let them know about this, after all we spent over $50 on meals, and only two of us were sick, who happened to have the same dishes The manager told me there's nothing they could do for us and that we would need to go to the hospital, or see our doctor, which it's on a weekend right now so they're not in, and would need to go get lab tests done. If we were hospitalized, all of this would make sense, but we simply got sick after eating one of their meals, and let them know, so I'm not sure why they would find it reasonable if we were starting to get better after around 24 hours. By the time we paid the deductible, the lab test, our coinsurance, we would have spent far more than the meal. In the first place, we were just trying to let them know that there was a problem with either the refrigerated meals or the meals we ate there, because both of us got sick that night, and we did not eat out anywhere else. What a terrible policy to have. This is definitely the last time we will eat there.

Previous Review:

I must say, service there is spotty. We stayed locally and visited regularly for lunch and dinner. We are vegetarian, so we were limited to where we could go. We were new to the region, and it was a familiar brand with salad and pasta, so it was an obvious choice for us.

We must have been there at least 30 times. Sometimes, service was great, other times, not so much. The same goes with the food. Sometimes it was fresh, and tasted fantastic, while other times it was watery, and disappointing. Because we visited so frequently, it was difficult to tell which times were the best; but ultimately, I would say lunch was where we got the least appealing food.

Some of the servers there are excellent, but ultimately, I'm not sure if it is a policy, or what, but they tend to seat people with young children in the back, near the kitchen door. Even if there is empty seating elsewhere, and the back was completely empty, that is where we were regularly seated. Whenever we were seated back there, the only other people would be others with young kids. I noticed a pattern after visiting there 3-4 times. It does seem quite discriminatory, and honestly, it is one of the reasons we no longer eat there when we are in that area. There are some better local places in Portsmouth anyway.

It’s a wonderful place to go when you want more then burgers. Good price, servings are plentiful. You won’t drain your pockets but feel your in a higher end restaurant. Services are trained well to meet their customers needs.