Penn’s Santa Fe Steakhouse and Grill

Pretty good food thanks to the cooks. But the Foh staff are rude! Including the manager! If you can go elsewhere, go!!!

The food may have tasted great if it wasn’t all COLD. Add to that fact, the waitress & the manager were NOT nice people. Just 8 mies west from here (on I-​20) are 2 much better restaurants. The catfish at the «Back 40» in Lake, MS is fantastic.
My mother & I went to Penn’s for the Sunday Seafood Buffet at $ 18 each (with drinks, tax & tip it was over $ 50). The food was on the buffet table 20 min before they allowed anyone to touch it, & by then everything on was almost ice cold. I mentioned it to the wiatress & she was indifferent. I mentioned it to the manager & she was unresponsive as well.
We didn’t want to eat cold food & the management was so indifferent that we refused to stay any longer. There was an elderly man sitting behind us & he was actually counting change to buy a cup of soup, so we asked the gentleman if he would like to have our two dinners. He sat at our table & the waitress started to complain. I stopped her and said the meal is paid for & it was mine to do with as I wanted. I paid for the meal & told the manager that she had better not kick the man out, as he was eating OUR «All you can eat buffet».
I have been in food service myself and this experience was one of my all time worst experiences.

Great and friendly service. I went for the catfish was not disappointed. The prices were also very fair, so if your in the mood for fried catfish this is your place

I didn’t have many options for dinner and had my hopes for some southern cooking at Garden Patch. Unfortunately Maria from Holiday Inn Express informed me that they were only open for lunch but mentioned a couple of other spots to try. When she told me this place gives discounts to Uncle Ray employees I said sure why not.
Their menu stated that their staple was the fried catfish, so I ordered a combination of fried catfish, fried shrimp, and french fries. The combo also included hush puppies and coleslaw. The fried catfish and shrimp were pretty good; they were crispy and very lightly seasoned. The hush puppies were my favorite, perfectly fried on the outside yet moist on the inside with a slight flavoring of crab. I actually saw little pieces of the crab in the inside. The coleslaw on the other hand was horrible. Think of Kentucky Fried Chicken coleslaw but 10 times worse.
For a $ 10 meal with a huge cup of sweet tea, the price and quality of the food were reasonable, but I guess that included my extra special Uncle Ray discount. It took awhile for the waitress to take my order but my food came out pretty quick and piping hot.
If I ever have to come back to Forest for work, I wouldn’t mind coming here again. But hopefully I’ll be staying in Jackson where there’s more choices to eat at.