Blue Nile Ethiopian Restaurant

09/07/08

Terrible Service

by Jamila914 at Citysearch

I was visiting from out of town. I decided to try Columbus' Blue Nile, because the ones in Michigan are fantastic. However, when my party came in, we weren't even greeted. We were told we could sit wherever, so we chose the traditional style seating. I had ordered tea, but the food came first. When I asked about it our waitress was like "Yes, it's coming", with an attitude. She didn't even check on us one time!

The manager came by and I told him we were done. The food wasn't that great, it was pretty bland. I've had much better Ethiopian food at the Blue Nile in Michigan. The food was also way overpriced. I was with two other people and our bill came to $55! All we ordered was the vegetarian plate, and a few sambusas and tea. Plus, when they brought us the check it was so messy we could hardly read the handwriting on it.

But we did make out the word "table" and next to it it said $3.75. I asked the waitress what the table charge was for and she told me that there's an extra charge for traditional style seating. But she didn't tell us that when we came in! She was just like "It's in the menu". So, I asked to talk to the manager, she's like, "You can talk to him on your way out". I was like, "Well, he needs to come over here". So he comes and he was just like "The extra charge is on the menu" and he refused to take it off!

I asked where it said that on the menu and he didn't even know himself, he flips through the menu then he finally finds it on the last page in fine print! I was like, "Who is supposed to see that?!" He was just like "That's to help support the business". But we just spent over $50 on vegetables! He was just like "We never had a problem with this before". Then our waitress mumbles under her breathe "No one else complains about it!" Needless to say we left NO TIP, and vowed never to go back!

Beware, they sneak an extra charge on the bill in messy handwriting! It's $1.25 extra per person for the traditional style table!

• Pros: Nice Ambience
• Cons: Bad Service!

09/25/07

love this place

by biketour2007 at Citysearch

pyroburns:

i do not know you but you sound like an arrogant jacka$$. if you really can make better ethiopian food than blue nile, why don't you stay home, eat your own food, and don't run down a restaurant that the rest of us enjoy.

for everyone else reading this:

give the blue nile a try. i think you will find it to be a place with the feel of a family-run kitchen, spicy food, and great music. the owners are friendly and personable. i live nearby and eat there at least every couple of weeks. the blue nile is a gem!

09/16/07

Very very bad.

by pyroburns at Citysearch

I was STRONGLY disappointed with The Blue Nile. Recently, I started cooking African cuisine just for the hell of it, and I did WAAAAY better than they did on my first try (It won third in a dutch oven cooking contest).

Their service was slow, and overly informal. My water didn't even come until I was in the middle of my meal. The one waiter wouldn't even give me more chicken in my doro wat which was basically just a bone. But I will admit that the waitress was really sweet and made me feel special.

The food was mostly bland an uninteresting. Their injera pancakes were really good, though. Nice, and spongy. And with proper color. My beef stew that I made in the cooking contest had much more flavor than their's did. Their's had a really bland flavor, as if it came out of a can. I couldn't even tell if they used Berbere or not. The portions were VERY small, and like I mentioned earlier my chicken was just a bone!

Of course everything was overpriced, and they even wanted to charge me for sitting at their basket.

I definitely wouldn't recommend this place to anyone.

• Pros: Sweet Waitress, Nice Injera
• Cons: Garbage food, bad service, poor atmosphere.