Cracker Barrel Old Country Store

My husband and I eat here at least once a week. Enough said. The service is always good and homey for us. We know our servers by first name now, so we are definitely regulars. The food is always good. Sometimes lukewarm, but still good. We love this place!

RV parking is not always available as the RV lot is full of cars. When I complained to the manager about it he said «It’s always full of cars. There’s nothing we can do about it». RV drivers be aware that there may not be promised/​advertised RV parking! Manager doesn’t care about it.

I’m a simple person (no matter WHAT my hubby says!) I am proud to be one of millions of GRITS* (*Girls Raised in The South). So any restaurant that serves Southern ‘family’ cuisine is going to get high marks from me, whether it is located in the South or in Chicago (Q).
I have had maybe 3 or 4 less than perfect meals at various Cracker Barrels throughout their service area since they were founded many years ago. But this review is for the location in Ashland, Va.
It is clean; the staff, both in the restaurant & the store, have always been friendly & efficient; my meals have been consistently good, timely, warm & hot.
I’d like to tell you my favorite meals as when I find a dish I love, I usually stick with it for a long time. #1: Vegetable Plate (personal favorites: mashed potatoes with gravy, turnip greens served with pepper vinegar, fried apples, sweet baby carrots, & corn muffins. #2: Olé Timers Breakfast (2 scrambled eggs, bacon, biscuit & gravy, fried apples & hot buttered grits) #3: Chicken fried steak with mashed potatoes with gravy & turnip greens with pepper vinegar)#4: turkey with dressing & my favorite veggies. Can you guess which they are? You are sooo smart!
**********REVIEW REVIEWED*********** 11/​22/​2015
As I was returning from northen VA to eastern NC earlier this month, I stopped at this Cracker Barrel at about 3:00 pm for late lunch early dinner. I was seated promptly. There was a couple finishing their meal and a lone diner who had ordered and received her drink but was waiting for her dinner. I waited… and waited. The couple finished and left. I waited and waited, still no one came to take my order. I looked at the hostess stand and no one was there. I turned to the lone diner and asked if she been served yet. She responded no, but she had ordered. I could not see anyone or any movement in the kitchen area. So I went to the hostess stand which was still vacant, then turned to the registers and they were vacant! Then a checkout girl appeared very quickly, but I explained that no one had taken my order nor had the lone diner had not been served. She said she was sorry, but just looked ‘doe in the headlights’. I asked her to contact the kitchen or manager for service in the restaurant, which she did. A waitress came out with the diner’s order and took mine, apologizing for the delay, and all was once again right with the world. Food was great and the service was fine after that. Shortly after, the restaurant started filling up and there were no missteps.
Not sure what the blip was and it was corrected. I am not going to change my star rating at this point. Everyone has moments. I stop here often. If it occurs again, I’ll adjust my rating.

Every time my family goes to eat at Cracker Barrel we get great service and hot freshly made food.

Slow service and took 40+ minutes to get my food. The other locations are faster than this location. They are slow are its very noisy in here.

I asked to place an order to go. The hostess said she’d go find a server to take my order. 10 minutes later, no server and the hostess had also been MIA for 5 minutes so I couldn’t even ask her as a follow up. I walked out without placing an order because standing around at the hostess station with no assistance is just ridiculous.

Possibly the slowest and worst CB I’ve ever been too. Upon entering, we’ve seen our server two times: to place our order and deliver drinks, and even after 40 minutes, food still hadn’t arrived, nor had the server to check in with us. Complete disappointment.

This is probably the worst Cracker Barrel Restaurant I’ve ever been to. The food was not as good as those of other chains. The Stewart’s Orange n’ Cream didn’t come with iced mugs. The homemade Strawberry Lemonade was way too sweet. Even though the refills were free, didn’t bother to ask for one. Our meal came with biscuits and cornbread. I ordered the House Salad without bacon and a bowl of Vegetable soup. Our server mistakenly brought out a cup but apologized about mishearing the order. My mom ordered the Grilled Chicken Tenderloin with carrots and two orders of string beans. The entire dish was bland and lacked usual flavor /​seasoning. The good thing was my dad’s order of Apple Cider BBQ Chicken Breast with Apple Chutney, Rice Pilaf, and Steamed Broccoli. I liked how the sauce consisted of apples and cranberries and was sweet and tangy.

This is a chain restaurant and for the most part, I like to eat here. Lots of selections, breakfast all day if you want, inexpensive, plus a quaint store. But this one might need some employment help. They crammed us into a corner. The food was extremely slow and not accurate. We were tired from traveling and not in the mood to have things corrected. So hopefully it was just an odd day for them.

Just had a great experience with the manager at this location as we are asking for donations for a charity golf event! Couldn’t have been nicer and more accommodating of a request during a busy lunch hour! Our family has eaten here many times and have never been disappointed!

This place rocks consistently. If you want a hearty and old school breakfast I haven’t ever been disappointed at any cracker barrel.

Went in for a great home cooked meal away home and as usual I wasn’t disappointed. Excellent service and the food was tasty and hot.

Waitress was slow, then had a huge attitude because I told her I have a gluten allergy. I have celiac disease. $ 4.99 to get 1 egg, 1 meat and 2 biscuits. Asked to substitute ½ order of hash browns in lieu of biscuits I can’t eat. She said there was no way she would do that, but I could add the hash browns for an additional $ 2.99.
Hubby ordered sausage gravy and biscuits. He got plain gravy with black pepper minus the sausage.
Most off putting was our disrespectful waitresses.
Even my hot chocolate was very watered down.

So after a loooooooong morning of traffic court down in Chesterfield, VA we needed to put something on our stomach for the ride back home. My go to is always Cracker Barrel but please note this chain is not always created equally, lol… my uncle and I came in and were seated within 5 min of arriving and they definitely were busy. A waitress came and took our drink order, but inadvertently mixed up our drinks, sweet tea (easy mistake) with a another table but it was OK because she immediately fixed it.
When our waitress arrived she took our orders: my uncle got the catfish (fried) daily special, which she suggested because he was hesitant on getting the menu staple as he knew he wasn’t going to eat all 3 sides, so he got mashed potatoes & coleslaw w/​hush puppies. I was indecisive between the pancakes and the French toast and she suggested the French Toast breakfast (4slices) that I paired with cheese eggs scrambled hard & turkey bacon with a side of sawmill gravy (smacking my lips thinking about it, lol). We also got biscuits with apple butter, OMG… can’t have Cracker Barrel biscuits without apple butter. The pancake syrup is maple not corn & it’s not to heavy or light… just the right amount of sweetness. I couldn’t eat all my food so I brought some back to DC. Everything was nice & hot and cooked exactly as requested, so this Cracker Barrel will definitely be on my must stop list going up/​down I-​95.
I wish I knew my waitress name because I would give her a shout out… oh well… until next

I’ve stopped here so many times on the way home from VCU that I’ve lost count. The bottom line here is this: This is a super reliable Cracker Barrel. We’ve never had bad service here, the food has always been good, and we haven’t had bad wait times.
You know what to expect when going to this location. Like all Cracker Barrels, the food won’t blow you away. It’s not meant to blow you away. It’s meant to fill you up and get you on your way. This Cracker Barrel is solid, and I would recommend it to anyway as a nice place to stop for a good filling meal.

Great country style American food. Excellent breakfast. Pancakes and biscuits are awesome! Friendly service.

Just gross! The service, the food, everything was very disappointing and not even worth the money we paid. The only thing acceptable was the lemonade and sweet ice tea. We didn’t get refills though. And then my son’s chicken was supposed to come with gravy but was overlooked. The waitress went on a quest in search of the gravy– 40 mins later the manager came out with a tiny bowl with some coagulated sticky slop– yuck! Luckily my son had already eaten his meal. Disgusting. Never again Cracker Barrel. You won’t see us again, EVER!!!

Ordered the same thing as when we stopped the day before at a Cracker Barrel and had a hard time with them getting scrambled eggs cooked to my liking. They were runny the first time, so I asked our waitress to cook them more she said she’d bring me out some more but they still weren’t done. So I didn’t eat them just ate the bacon and hashbrowns. Coffee was delish. Waitress was attentive and friendly.

As with most Cracker Barrel restaurants, they are right off the highway and a convenient stop for a bite to eat while traveling I95. The parking lot has ample space for RVs and cars and the restaurant offers great service and very nicely prepared food.

Cracker Barrel is a fav, no matter where we are visiting or even when at home. Thursdays they have AWESOME turkey dinners (just like Thanksgiving!) and Sundays the homestyle chicken can NOT be beat! I had the french toast on this visit, yummy as ever with real, warm maple syrup. Service, food and the atmosphere was great. Can’t wait for the fireplace to be lit!
IMHO, always a favorite for that homemade tasting country breakfast, lunch or dinner!