Napa River Grill (Bad Meal , Very Bad Meal!

Thanks for the feedback. I feel this is the best way to let other viewers know what’s good or bad with restaurants. If you feel telling the manager about a bad experience at the time of the meal that fine. But, some dinners do not and I am one who would rather call back or e-mail. The most important thing is to let them know when you experience a bad or good meal or service. For what we pay out for a meal these days, the meal should be right, always! But when things go wrong, speak out!
Thanks to Napa River management responding back to me.
If restaurant owners are smart, they view the comments on the forum, which most do. For most of the negative comments I have made on the forum over the past 2 years most of the times the owners have responded back.
Doug Chin

Thanks for the feedback. I feel this is the best way to let other viewers know what’s good or bad with restaurants. If you feel telling the manager about a bad experience at the time of the meal that fine. But, some dinners do not and I am one who would rather call back or e-mail. The most important thing is to let them know when you experience a bad or good meal or service. For what we pay out for a meal these days, the meal should be right, always! But when things go wrong, speak out!
Thanks to Napa River management responding back to me.
If restaurant owners are smart, they view the comments on the forum, which most do. For most of the negative comments I have made on the forum over the past 2 years most of the times the owners have responded back.
Doug Chin

I agree, Doug. I would never ruin the evening for my wife or business partner (or whatever the situation) by complaining and being negative about the experience. I'm just not comfortable doing so.

Thanks for the feedback. I feel this is the best way to let other viewers know what’s good or bad with restaurants. If you feel telling the manager about a bad experience at the time of the meal that fine. But, some dinners do not and I am one who would rather call back or e-mail. The most important thing is to let them know when you experience a bad or good meal or service. For what we pay out for a meal these days, the meal should be right, always! But when things go wrong, speak out!
Thanks to Napa River management responding back to me.
If restaurant owners are smart, they view the comments on the forum, which most do. For most of the negative comments I have made on the forum over the past 2 years most of the times the owners have responded back.
Doug Chin

I agree, Doug. I would never ruin the evening for my wife or business partner (or whatever the situation) by complaining and being negative about the experience. I'm just not comfortable doing so.

Okay . . . I'll play devils advocate here.

I, too, am uncomfortable complaining at the time, although I do it from time to time. I know the feeling--you don't want to ruin the evening by complaining or having the rest of the meal marked by overly solicitous service. I have gotten better about it, and try to give feed back at the time.

I can see contacting by phone or email. But . . . because you are uncomfortable pointing it out in person you post it on an internet forum before contacting the restaurant?

I'm sure it is effective, but I'm not sure it is fair to the restaurant. OTOH, I have written off restaurants without letting them know at all why I was disappointed.

I must admit, that sometimes I complain when something isn't right, sometimes I don't. I don't know what the deciding factor is. However, given the description of the fish dish, someone in the kitchen had to know that wasn't right. Four 1/4 inch scallops and 4 tiny shrimp? Now somebody had to pick those up and put them in the packet before baking. A squeezed out lemon? Again somebody had to see that. Where had the lemon juice gone? Squeezed onto the plate and then the used up lemon placed on top as a garnish? Comeonnow.

the Carrot Cake which was a large spice cake muffin

But to me, since I'm kinda "into" cake this is inexcusable. A spice muffin is not carrot cake. Carrot cake at least implies layers of cake and icing, usually cream cheese icing. Carrot cake is one of those thigns that conjurs up a specific image in most consumers minds. Now I've had some interesting things that have been described as carrot cake, but at least those all had carrot in them. Again, a spice muffin is by no stretch carrot cake.

Thanks for the feedback. I feel this is the best way to let other viewers know what’s good or bad with restaurants. If you feel telling the manager about a bad experience at the time of the meal that fine. But, some dinners do not and I am one who would rather call back or e-mail. The most important thing is to let them know when you experience a bad or good meal or service. For what we pay out for a meal these days, the meal should be right, always! But when things go wrong, speak out!
Thanks to Napa River management responding back to me.
If restaurant owners are smart, they view the comments on the forum, which most do. For most of the negative comments I have made on the forum over the past 2 years most of the times the owners have responded back.
Doug Chin

I agree, Doug. I would never ruin the evening for my wife or business partner (or whatever the situation) by complaining and being negative about the experience. I'm just not comfortable doing so.

ditto that. Why make a bad situation worse?

This had to be one of the most disappointing meals.
I started off with soup special Cream of Broccoli which was spicy but overpower with salt. Almost seemed to come from a can.

My entrée was the Pacific Coast Snapper
Snapper, bay scallops, rock shrimp and central valley vegetables baked in parchment, basmati and Himalayan red rice 23.95
The fish was a very small piece (Little over ¼ lb), with the smallest scallops (4each) you could buy about ¼ inch diameter and the shrimp (4each) were about the same size. There was very few strands of vegetables cooked with the fish. There was no seasoning, very bland and overcooked. To top it off there was a juiceless half of lemon I could not squeeze a teaspoon of juice from.
There was about a ½ cup of bland (No seasoning at all) Himalayan rice that accomplished the fish. The name sound good but Rice-a-Roni would have had better seasoning

I had better baked fish yesterday at Mike linings for 4th of the cost of this entree.
Could it get worse? Yes, then I had the Carrot Cake which was a large

spice cake muffin (stale) which was very dry and again bland. It did come with a scoop of ice cream which gave the cake some moisture.

I had one glass of wine, the best part of the meal. Plus they brought out a small iron skillet of cold corn bread.
Their dishes read well on the menu with exciting descriptions, but the taste and presentation is the pits.
The server was good but could not make up for a meal that totaled $46.54.
Doug Chin

Bay scallops are supposed to be that small. Sea scallops are the big ones. I actually prefer the smaller bay scallops. Sounds like the size of things was the least of your problems.

You mention that the cream of broccoli soup was overpowered with salt but then complain that the rice was bland and "Rice-a-Roni would have had better seasoning." 1 cup cooked (serving size) rice-a-roni has 690 mg of sodium. According to L. Grieger, RD, CDE, "any food with more than 480 milligrams of sodium per serving is considered a high-sodium food and should be avoided."

Serving size of fish (from USDA/food pyramid) = 2-3 ounces of cooked lean meat, poultry, or fish

I won't comment on the rest ... just pointing out that as far as serving size goes, Napa sounds right on with the fish/scallops/shrimp. And if you didn't like the saltiness of the soup, how could you say that Rice-a-Roni would be better?

I applaud restaurants that try to focus on quality versus quantity and perhaps don't try to get too many flavors going on at the same time. After all, you ordered the entree for mainly for the fish and that should have been the dominant flavor.

Let the record reflect that a restaurant is being criticized and it is NOT A CHAIN!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

What, no one wants to defend the dessert?

Serving size of fish (from USDA/food pyramid) = 2-3 ounces of cooked lean meat, poultry, or fish

I won't comment on the rest ... just pointing out that as far as serving size goes, Napa sounds right on with the fish/scallops/shrimp.

If that serving size is actually appropriate, as you believe, what would your opinion on the $23.95 price be? I think that price would be considered ridiculous because not many would pay $23.95 for a few ounces of snapper - I think that was a large factor in the customer's disappointment.