Applebee’s

Look, it’s Applebee’s. They are in the same vein as TGI Fridays and Olive Garden. You don’t expect or receive gourmet when you say hey, let’s go to Applebee’s! It’s chain food, the whole family on a tight budget food, secretaries from the office night out food. But they did it well tonight. With a gift card from the mother in law we stopped here for dinner. The service was attentive and accurate, our food would not win any culinary awards but darn it I really enjoyed the sriracha shrimp. None of the food was cooked improperly and everything was good within the context. The price was right, I have certainly payed more for less. Overall a great experience for what it is. Would I come back without a gift card? Unlikely. But they are good at what they do and if all you are looking for is an inexpensive meal from a chain, come here and bring the kids. They almost lose a star for the birthday song and clapping at the next table over, but again it isn’t a place you go expecting your foodie palate to be sated and high brow sensibilities to be appeased. 4 stars for being good at what they do and who they are!

Holy mother of siracha shrimp. I could live off of that mouth watering goodness. Talk about epic mouthgasms… I was always hesitant about Applebee’s outside of the closest and cheapest place to drink after a long night at work. Pick a flavor and they will make it into a freaking Long Island. I’m sold. Booze and shrimp 4 lyf3!

Used to be a great location, but we had a very poor experience recently. Extremely long waiting, poor service and grumpy waitress.

Blast to the past – Applebee’s, ye of the dotcom boom and overwhelming 1990s popularity, only to fall out of favor in recent years.
So if you haven’t been to Applebee’s in a decade or so, here are my impressions.
In general there is generous amount of staffing (servers, runners, bussers) and and service is fast and friendly.
Despite that flat screen TVs have been the norm for years, you’ll find Applebee’s that still have CRT TVs (aka giant tube screen). This particular location has upgraded to the flatscreen TVs, I counted about 7 or so mostly centered around the bar in the middle.
Sugary drinks here are CHEAP. Now, the drink glasses are deceptively sized and have a lot of ice but still, $ 2-​$ 3 for some of their sweet mixed beverages (such a Long Island Iced Tea) is pretty darn cheap.
Even Applebee’s has bought into the local movement and they offer a small selection of Wisconsin beers (Lakefront, Tyranena, New Glarus, Ale Asylum, etc) for $ 5/​bottle.
Food: Applebee’s is pretty much the worst place for vegetarians, aside from BBQ. Vegetarians, prepare to eat french fries, salads w/​no chicken (but not discounted), a grilled cheese, or, uh, more french fries. The majority of the entrees are chicken based: lots of variations of grilled chicken breast on a bed of rice/​veggie, with cheese and sauce.
A Weight Watchers menu with calorie counts is available, and these appear to be some of the best of the bunch, although there’s no way I believe their calorie counts (I think it’s quite an underestimation). The WW menu is mostly the abovementioned chicken/​rice/​veg combo, salad, or salad. Although it’s an American restaurant, interestingly, they’ve seemed to really play down their burger selection, and instead focus on grilled chicken breast everywhere.
All locations are child-​friendly with kids’ menus, high chairs, crayons, etc.
After 10PM, some drinks& appetizers are discounted.
Overall, I’m not sure how to rate this place: compared to other restaurants? Not that great, but not bad. The entrees aren’t mindblowingly amazing, but get the job done, and service is quite effecient. If I were to use an Applebee’s or other similar tier chain restaurant as a metric, I would actually rate this higher. They did upgrade their TVs, good service, and by Applebee’s measures the menu is getting more progressive (avocado, cilantro, local beers).
Summary: If ye are scared of going to Applebee’s, don’t be, it’s really not a sad story as some of us have been taught while being obsessed with the latest local organic small batch artisan place. Except if you’re vegetarian; in that case, brace yourself for some romaine lettuce and french fries.

Typical Applebee’s. My boyfriend had a gift card to go here otherwise we definitely would’ve tried somewhere else. The food is just okay. We started with the white queso dip which is decent. The chips were hot which was a big plus. I had the Three Cheese Chicken Penne and it was meh. Not enough sauce and the chicken was on the grill for way too long. So dry! My boyfriend had their 9 oz sirloin and he said it was okay as well. However they gave him about a cup of sour cream with his mashed potatoes which was weird. We also had margaritas which you could hardly taste anything but a pre-​made margarita mix. Bleh.
Our server was super strange too… he was very busy talking to another table and it took a lot for us to get his attention.
Place was kind of dirty. Our table was so sticky we were afraid to touch it.
Meh meh meh meh meh.

I couldn’t believe the amount of sodium and the calories in the oriental chicken rollup I had yesterday! I went to their corporate site and checked out the nutrition table they have posted (kudos for having it!). 1180 calories for the rollup — that doesn’t count the fries, and 3220 mg of sodium — that’s more that 50% over the recommended daily intake of 2000mg. Last time I will ever eat at any Applebees. They do have a 550 or less calories lunch menue, but not on weekends!

Someone at Applebee’s upped the game. their cedar salmon and roma tomato sirloin were amazing!

My husband had the new 5-​cheese Mac and Cheese with chicken. Looked pretty good and he said it was tasty.
I however had the tried-​and-​true baby back ribs. Awful! Very dry to the point the meat was very cooked down and the ends were all but burned. They didn’t even try to cover it up with globs of bbq sauce, which is a common stunt. Very BLEH… Won’t ever get the ribs there again and highly dis-​recommend them from others. Ew.

Had the Santa Fe salad (half order) and tomato soup. Delicious!

2 for $ 20 is still a great deal. A lot of TVs made it nice to watch the Badgers in the Big 10 championship game. Aubrey P. was a great server. Overall a great meal out!

I used to go here a lot with my son but when I switched my diet to lower fat dishes I was disappointed at the menu choices available at Applebee’s. They sound good on paper, look good, and taste okay but the portions are so minuscule it’s easy to see why they’re so low-​cal. Good in a pinch but watch the salsa. One time we got a bad batch and the tomatoes or something had turned — blech! Anyway, now that we’re more into supporting local establishments, eating at chains is no longer part of the plan.

Earlier today my friend & I ate here. She seemed to enjoy her meal. Mine tasted fine.
Unfortunately I got in my car leaving Applebee’s parking lot feeling extremely ill. I had to restrain from vomiting the entire ride home (this was my first meal of the day). I have been sick ever since I ate there. Do not order the bruschetta salad. In fact, just do not go there. Period. Your stomach may thank you. I called Applebee’s to let them know, and the manager was very stoic and said an insurance company would contact me shortly. That’s it. No apology. Nothing other than, ‘what’s your name and when did you come here?“
So in summary, I would not recommend this place to my worst enemy.

This Applebee’s is about standard for any other Applesbee’s. We went for lunch on a Thursday and it was about 90% full at 1 in the afternoon. We were seated quickly close to the bar area. Our waitress was very attentive, a little too chatty sometimes but was on par with refills. Food came out quickly and hot! Drink prices were ridiculous. We ordered two sweet teas and we paid $ 6 a tea. Overall if you do the 2 for $ 20 it’s not a bad deal. The location surprises me as it’s kind of away from the rest of the chain style restaurants on the west side. More power to them to draw people to Whitney Way though.

So-​so. We used to go here a lot but the quality started to go downhill. My wife noticed it first. I had a hard time admitting it because I liked this place but I had to after time. The quality doesn’t meet up to the price. Their portions are smaller than we would like for the entrees and their flavors are absent. The atmosphere of the place is typical «chain restaurant/​sports bar». Something we don’t really like and consider somewhat cookie cutter and Sept 10.
Sorry Applebee“s but we would rather go elsewhere for better atmosphere and quality.

Had dinner there a couple of weeks ago with my wife, daughter and 2 grandkids. Everybody enjoyed the food and overall experience. Nice to know what to expect when traveling.