The Brunch Bamboozle

As avid “deal hunters” and subscribing to every possible groupon/voice/living social deal of the day, Sara and I are always on the hunt for some delicious food at a more reasonable price. Sara purchased a 60% coupon off of a meal at Kathleen’s Sky Diner, located on Lovers Lane just west of the Tollway. We perused the online menu and decided that the brunch looked like our best bet.

We headed to Kathleen’s early on Sunday morning and arrived around 9. The place was not too crowded, but appeared to have a steady crowd. We were seated in a back table and did not see anyone for about 10-15 minutes. Another waitress came up to us and asked if we had been helped; as we told her we had not she stated that she would go find our server. Our waitress came up a few minutes later and seemed very “uninterested” but confused as to how we could have possibly been waiting for so long. She apologized and took our drink order, and we saw her again about 5 or so minutes later. Sara ordered fresh squeezed orange juice, which just might be the highlight of this diner. We agreed that this was the best OJ we had ever had. However, note that the small order is about as big as a healthy mixed shot you would order at a bar.

They brought us a basket with two muffins in it, a little stingier than Breadwinners, I thought to myself. The muffins were decent, nothing to rave about. However, they came in handy for holding us over to our long awaited meal.  The manager then came over at this point and asked if she could move us to another table as there was being work done on the roof. We abruptly left the table and moved, as we were informed that our meal would be comped.  This put us at ease a bit after the unpleasant beginning to our experience. 

Then we waited for our entrees, and we waited. About an hour into our wait the manager came over again and stated that they had lost our ticket, that she was again very sorry and wanted to comp our next meal there as well. We looked to each other and slightly smiled in disbelief of our unfortunate and lucky experience. We both admired that the manager acknowledged her wrongdoing and was very persistent in making sure we knew that they were at fault and wanted us to have a better experience in the future.
Our food eventually came out. Sara had the “lighter than air” ricotta pancakes with walnuts and banana praline syrup. The pancakes were true to their name and were very fluffy and delicious. I had the Rigo’s Especial, which was a play on Egg’s Benedict using chorizo instead of ham and with a jalapeno hollandaise. I must say that the jalapeno hollandaise was actually just a jalapeno on top of the sauce, which I was disappointed with. Overall, it was a decent meal and had I paid the actual price for the entrée I probably would have cared for it less.

Although our experience was less than ideal, the staff did ensure that we will return shortly. We now have two trips to make, another free meal and using our coupon! There are some other items on the menu that look “blog worthy” including a breakfast pasta with bacon. If not, I suppose there is always  that heavenly orange juice.