Getting sick of our favorite restaurants

I've found that lately we don't enjoy the restaurants we used to love. It seems to have happened since my recent surgery, but not sure if that really has anything to do with it. I do eat much less, and trying to keep off the weight I lost, but we both just don't enjoy the places we go to anymore, and find more fault with places we used to love. Still enjoy Applebees and Olive Garden, and Outback, but that's about it. Does anyone else have similar feelings? Guess we need to eat home from now on!

Well, I guess you can have too much of a good thing!

There's a Thai place and an Indian place local to my hometown, but when my boyfriend and I were going there once a week or every two weeks, it really lost its spark. Same with a local Italian place, and a European place. The food was still good, the service was still good, but it turns into the same old, same old. Once it's lost its novelty, it's not really worth going out of my way to go to anymore.

Maybe try checking Yelp or Google Maps or Trip Advisor for some hidden gems, hole in the wall places/restaurants, and check out something new. Cleansing your palate with a new place's flavours will renew your appreciation for old and new dishes! And of course, when in doubt (or in my case, when too cheap to eat out), try some new recipes from home!

I find that some of my favourite restaurants have either had a change in management or a change in chef.  Either one of those things can and do affect the experience.  There was a Mexican restaurant that I loved!  I went there a couple months ago and it was terrible!  The menu was cut down to a single page, and there was 3 choices for entree.  

The food was mediocre, the service slow and sporadic.  I ordered a side salad and all I could taste was salt and vinegar; it was the worse salad I'd ever had in my life. And it was chopped so fine I needed to eat it with a spoon!

Won't be going back.

Natalie_ca said:

I find that some of my favourite restaurants have either had a change in management or a change in chef.  Either one of those things can and do affect the experience. 

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That's something I've often experienced, and it can be a real disappointment when you've been looking forward to a special celebration.

We don't really have that problem......we don't eat out that often anymore at all.

I gave up on the Outback when the ones around here stopped carrying French Onion Soup. Fortunately they did bring it back to some of their restaurants, so the Outback is on my list again. I refuse to step foot inside an Applebee's.

And we've started to stray away from the national chain restaurants and have started looking at our smaller eateries locally. You'd be surprised how good the food can be! There's a local Mexican place; it's a BYOB. Great food! Absolutely wonderful food! There's an Italian restaurant that opened about four years ago; again the food there is wonderful. Chain restaurants can be good if you're looking for the same old stuff. But there's a lot to be said for looking at your local restaurants.

We don't eat out as often as we used to either.  One thing my area lacks is UNIQUE places to eat.  We have so many chain places and they are ok.  it can be nice to know that the one on the north side of town serves the same menu as the one on the south side or the in the next town over.  But it's not very exciting.  A friend of mine was good about finding new places; but they usually involve city parking (limited) or driving.  Even the places in the downtown area seem to have trouble staying open for too long.  Where my husband is from; little cafes and coffee houses are all over!  They are usually scattered between antique stores and one was even inside a really neat antique place.  My MIL and I used to have a great time exploring those together.  Once you go into the more modern part of their area you have every sort of chain restaurant you could want; but not 5 of the same thing!    

Part of our reason for not eating out is having small kids.  They eat too and have less patience for waiting.  We do take them places every now and then; or order take-out, but not like in our pre-kid days.  Back then we were regulars at Sonic just to get the slushies with fruit mixed in after we'd eaten dinner at home.     I think almost all of those have closed in my area.  

We really can not afford to eat out. If we do it has to be a chain that has coupons or some promo. First pick is Fridays as they do not make you feel weird about splitting a meal and are very helpful. Only had 1 bad experience there where server seemed lazy about taking plates/refills.  Ended up flagging some random server for refills

pinkdagger said:

Maybe try checking Yelp or Google Maps or Trip Advisor for some hidden gems, hole in the wall places/restaurants, and check out something new. Cleansing your palate with a new place's flavours will renew your appreciation for old and new dishes!

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I am a Yelper and have found so many new places by browsing through those types of sites.

Winchester said:

And we've started to stray away from the national chain restaurants and have started looking at our smaller eateries locally. You'd be surprised how good the food can be! There's a local Mexican place; it's a BYOB. Great food! Absolutely wonderful food! There's an Italian restaurant that opened about four years ago; again the food there is wonderful. Chain restaurants can be good if you're looking for the same old stuff. But there's a lot to be said for looking at your local restaurants.

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I rarely go to chain restaurants any more and when I do it is when someone has given me a gift card. You usually get a much more unique menu at a non-chain.

AbbysMom said:

I rarely go to chain restaurants any more and when I do it is when someone has given me a gift card. You usually get a much more unique menu at a non-chain.

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I agree.  We have lots of little non-chain restaurants around here that are fun to try.  Somebody just told us about a Thai restaurant that's been here for ages, but I'd never heard of it.  We had a great meal, at a reasonable price.  Yay.  

I very rarely eat out so for me it's a special occasion thing and I rarely go to a chain restaurant. It's usually one of the moderately priced little places, the hole in the wall type place that has good food and is clean.  At least the dining room is clean, kind of have to hope for the best with the food storage and the kitchen.  I do like the salad at Olive Garden and the Minestrone soup.  I have been there a few times for their salad, soup and bread stick lunch.