The Plantation Restaurant (UPDATE!!!! NOW CLOSED!!!!)

JUST TO LET EVERYONE ONE KNOW THAT THIS PLACE IS NOW SHUT DOWN AND THE BUILDING IS FOR SALE. 

WOW...what a HORRIBLE experience! I usually try to find the bright side of bad things, but this one just doesn't have one. Please read this before going to this place!

 OK, first off it is a very old restaurant located centrally on the strip. They boast a buffet and you can find some great coupons. That is what lead us there in the first place. It was noon and we had a coupon for buy one get one half off the lunch buffet. I have learned though to call first and make sure that the restaurant is having their buffet on that day as some only have them on weekends..etc. Also I like to check the price per person. Buffets here in Branson can range from 5.99- 29.99 per person! So I called the number on the coupon. A man answered and I asked prices. He said that 4 and up was 7.99. Under that was free. That sure sounded reasonable especially with the coupon so we went in. There was only two other tables with people at them which was surprising as it was high noon and most places were packed. I should have took that as a warning! Stepping inside was like stepping back to my child hood. The front was a small store that sold all kinds of Branson themed items. That part was fine. Then we went to the podium that stated "Please wait to be seated". Well...we waited..and waited..and waited! After more than five minutes had gone by we were about to just leave. Finally an old man came from somewhere in the store area and told us to go find a table. He didn't lead us to one, or anything, just told us to go sit somewhere. So...we did. Now this place had the nostalgia going for it I guess. I don't think it had been updated in the last twenty years or so. Seriously...the curtains were ancient...the table we sat at had a big deep gash across it. The chairs were shabby and it was dark. A waitress came over with her hands full of dishes and said "Doing the buffet?" We were like..."Yes, I think so..." She walked off and entered the back without another word. She came back out a few min. later and asked what we wanted to drink. We told her just ice water and she left to get it. We went up to the buffet. Now I won't say that the selection was bad, but the food was hard and dry. The fish was way overcooked. The rolls were literally so hard you could tap them on the table and they made a crunching sound. I tried the fried shrimp and could not physically eat it. It was like chewing hard tack. It was like they had cooked everything at about 9AM and put it on the buffet, never bothering to change anything. I asked if they were going to put out something fresh and she glanced at the buffet and said..looks like everything is full to me.! I was getting really mad. Then, before we had even had a chance to take more than a few bites, the waitress brings our ticket. Normally I would think that was rude...which it is...but I was glad in this case. She charged us 6.99 for our 3 year old!! I figured that maybe she just made an error in judging how old she was so we mentioned it. She said that was the discounted price for kids ages 3 & 4 and kids 2 and under were 1.99. I told her we had called and talked to a guy about prices before we came in. She went into the shop and came back in with the rude older guy. He said "I am the only person that answers the phone round here and you didn't talk to me." I got out my cell phone and double checked the number. It was theirs. I sat there a moment longer and between the rude service, dirty place, terrible food and insane prices, we decided to leave. The waitress was walking by then and I told her that we were leaving, that the food was not fit to eat and even showed her the stuff on our plates. She said "Fine, but if your not planning on paying then don't be surprised if he calls the cops on you!" We got up and headed for the door. I was so mad right then that I would almost have welcomed the police getting involved. Jerry told the old man we were leaving and he said "I figured you were going to, you look like the type. Just go on get the hell out of here." I was glad that he didn't make a big deal out of it, but the whole thing was so terrible. It is hard to believe that Branson can have a place so terrible stay in business!
 Please understand that I don't normally write a bad review on a place. I take into consideration things like time of day, busyness and such, but this was lunch time with few patrons. NO reason to have terrible food, and certainly no reason to charge 7.00 for a 3 year old to eat! This is one place we will not be returning to EVER and I do not recommend this to anyone. We went to the Out Back and salvaged our lunch out..but that is another review!

Pizza World (Carryout)

  Well, I got a menu stuck to my door from Pizza World and had read over it a couple of times. Their pizza's really sounded good, but the calzones really sounded great. They said they were filled with ricotta and mozzarella cheese and your choice of two toppings. They were 7.50 apiece, but I was wanting a quick supper for just myself as everyone else had dinner plans. I wanted to stay home as I wasn't feeling too great so Jerry called it in for me. I ordered one with Canadian bacon and mushrooms. The menu had both Canadian bacon and ham so I assumed by that there was a difference. At any rate he headed in and picked it up. Took about ten min. from our house to there and back. I opened it up and was a bit disappointed. It wasn't much to look at, but I figured that was OK if it tasted good. The first thing I noticed was a lack of cheese. I actually had to open it up and look to find any cheese and believe me, there wasn't much. The meat was sliced ham...like the packaged deli style ham that you buy at the store. It was like they took it out of the package, folded it over and stuck it inside. Then they put mushrooms in around it. The ham was cold in the middle and the mushrooms were literally raw. I love raw mushrooms on salad, but not on pizza. To top it off it was all liquidy on the bottom and therefore the bottom crust was soggy. I don't know if it was due to the pizza sauce, or the ham juices, but it was horrible. We called them back and complained. The customer service person was not at all friendly but offered to either remake it or put us down for 50% of one another day. We opted for a new one even though we had to waste the gas. He got back and they had improved the amount of cheese, but nothing else was changed. Too much cold meat, raw mushrooms and soggy crust. I was not impressed...it was horrible. Now it might have been that the toppings I ordered just made a bad combination....or they were having an off night. It is also possible that it would have been better if eaten in the restaurant. This review does not cover their pizza in any way and I may try that in the future, but this experience was sure not a good one! I do have to say though that their ranch dressing is awesome!! Always a light in every dark tunnel..lol

Grand Country Buffet (BREAKFAST)

I am rarely out and about for breakfast even though it is my favorite meal of the day. Jerry and I had some errands to run a few days ago and decided that we wanted something small for breakfast as we were neither one very hungry. We tossed a few ideas around but I was really wanting bacon and biscuits and gravy. I had heard there was a breakfast buffet at the Grand Country Buffet (Located right on 76 strip and part of the very large Grand Country complex featuring a motel with water park, several fantastic shows, a mini mall, miniature golf, papa grands pizza and arcade. Physical address and phone are

1945 West 76 Country Boulevard  Branson, MO 65616 (417) 335-2434 ). We decided that we might as well try that even though we weren't going to eat much, at least we could get what we wanted. The price was 7.49 and we got a discount for being local (one of the perks about living in Branson!!) Drinks do not come with the buffet but I ordered an orange juice and the refills were free! Jerry got coffee. Your tray is carried to your table by a server and they are all very friendly.

 I will start off with decor and get to the food in a moment. There is a LOT to take in in this place! It is geared to seat a large bunch of people so you rarely have to wait for an available table or booth. Either choice is nice and spacious though I usually opt for a table here. There are lot's of old time items decorating the walls, from a Kewpie doll display, to old washboards. Very interesting to just wonder around and look at things from the days gone by! They also have an area where there is a TV in the wall and an older couple come on and do several skits about farm living, married life and of course eating great food! It is entertaining for the kids, but the adults as well! It is something that really sets this apart from other restaurants. The waitresses ( haven't seen any male waiters, but that isn't saying there aren't any) are very nice. They make you feel like your part of their family and your dining in their house. They work hard to make sure everyone has what they need at all times. You don't have to spend long looking for someone to help you if you need a refill as they are always on the floor. Now..onto the good stuff!!
 I will try my best to list everything though I am sure I will miss something! There is a cold bar that has oranges, bananas, apples, strawberries, melon, cantaloupe, watermelon, yogurt, granola, several kinds of cereals with milk, puddings, and fruity sweet salads of all kinds. Then for meat you have sausage links, sausage patties, smoked kielbasa, bacon both crispy and soft, and I think they may have ham on the weekends, but not sure. There were biscuits and two kinds of gravy. One with sausage and one peppered. Grits, cheese sauce, scrambled eggs, rice with sausage, potato casserole, and many kinds of muffins. There is an area for waffles, toast and pancakes with all the toppings. Then you can make your own omelet! Just plate up the ingredients you want and they make it while you wait. The guy that was doing it was so much fun, it was like going to a show! Needless to say, we went from not being very hungry to eating everything we could fit in. The bacon was amazingly good. The biscuits and gravy were perfect. If I had to complain about something I would say that the sausage patties were pretty dried out and not too great. Everything I had was seasoned well and really had the down home southern flavors I grew up with. According to Jerry, the coffee was terrible so he wound up drinking water. I did notice that was a complaint at the tables around us too. He says it tastes burnt like Starbucks (which he hates) So I guess if you like Starbucks coffee then you might like it here, otherwise I would stick with the juice..lol.
 Overall it was a fantastic meal and I can't wait to go again. In fact I may just have to visit there in a few hours when Jerry gets off work!!

McDonald's on Red Route

 I had done an earlier review of McDonald's and it included the other two. We went to this one yesterday and got four double cheeseburgers, two with no pickles. And two drinks. Nothing major...but when we got the food the burgers were marked special but still had the pickles. It is just annoying to have stuff like that happen. We had MANY bad experiences with our McDonald's in Fort Scott, Kansas so were worried that this place may be like that, but they were very apologetic, fixed the order and tossed in a large order of fries for the trouble! That was certainly unexpected. The burgers didn't taste right though, so we tossed the second two. Not that they are spoiled or anything, just had no flavor..no salt or pepper. I won't write them off and will sure go back and try again as anyone can have an off day. I will keep this open to add more reviews as we visit there again. 

El Charro Mexican Restaurant

 Hello everyone! I haven't posted in a while due to having an icky cold. One of those where nothing has much flavor..you know the type!! At any rate, coming out of that my taste buds were wanting spice!! I can't take too much heat, but really wanted Mexican. We had a wonderful Mexican restaurant in the town we moved from called El Charro. We noticed that there was one here in Branson near the downtown end of the strip. We figured it was worth a shot and so out we headed!
 It doesn't look like much from the outside. I think it used to be a taco bell or some other fast food place. The inside, however really shocked us! There was art and color  everywhere! The booths had huge carvings of birds, suns, moons, and many other things. They were painted with bright colors giving the place an almost whimsical feel. There was all kinds of art on the walls, from paintings, to sculptures. We opted for a table and were led to a sun porch sort of area. It has a lot of windows facing 76 strip. The seats were nice and padded and quite sturdy so they were really comfortable.
 The waiter brought us chips and salsa along with our menus. We knew the menu front and back so were going to get our usual. However...the menu they set down was not what I was used to....it was like five pages long!! SO many choices and new items! It took us over fifteen minutes to decide on what we wanted. While we were looking we munched the chips and salsa. OH my was it good! Just the right amount of seasoning, it was amazing. The chips were not thin things like usual. It was as if they had taken corn tortillas and cut them into fourths and deep fried them. They were thick, warm and crunchy.
 Our order arrived after only a few minutes of waiting. We both ordered the enchilada's Mazatlan. It had three enchilada's..a cheese, shrimp and crab. They were covered in cheese sauce and came with rice. They were really good, but the crab was imitation, so not overly tasty. The shrimp, however was to die for. It had that juicy "pop" I look for in a properly cooked shrimp! The rice was great too. Even our drinks tasted good. I had planned on having some fried ice cream, but ran out of room! Maybe the next time round...and hopefully that will be very soon!!!
 If you love Mexican food, this is the place to go. Prices ranged from 8.00-12.00 with most being around 10.00. There were a few higher and some lower, but nothing too bad. They do have a kids menu as well. Prices ranged from 3.99-4.99 depending on what they ordered. We didn't have the kids with us on this trip, but took note for next time. As for cleanliness it was right up there. I mean it wasn't like a suit and tie place, but was clean. There were a few water stains on the ceiling, but the floors shined so brightly you could probably have eaten off of them.
Overall, this was a great trip out and can't wait to go back.  I will be adding some photo's soon! Happy eating!