321 North Lake St.
Aurora, IL 60506
February 22, 2007
We'd been to the Aurora Pancake House once before this visit. I got blueberry pancakes last time, which I remember as being thoroughly mediocre.
My experiences on our most recent visit were more positive. This time I opted for the banana crepes. Stuffed with sour cream and bananas and covered with some sort of apricot glaze, they were quite satisfying. Lately I've been having more luck with crepes and blintzes than I have with traditional pancake meals.
The Aurora Pancake House has a fairly standard "family restaurant" feel to it, kind of cozy and understated. Our waitress was friendly, though she seemed strangely astonished by the fact that we had brought our digital camera into the restaurant with us ("Is that a CAMERA?") During most of our meal we could hear her having a loud political discussion with some other people in the corner of the restaurant, and she kept mentioning Barack Obama, but she slurred his name so it sounded like "Aquabama," making me wonder if Barack has some sort of superhero identity which enables him to breathe underwater and communicate with dolphins.
As you can see on the sign, the Aurora Pancake House invites you to "Try our new menu." They say it like it's an option...as if the waitress is going to ask you, "Would you like to try our new menu today?" They also include a phone number, which is helpful but kind of strange to see right there on the sign. It makes me wonder if the restaurant is just really lonely and looking for someone to talk to.
Joe here. Our second trip to the Aurora Pancake House in a few months was a bit better than the first time around. The service back then? Pretty bad... no other words for it, really. The restaurant wasn't very busy at all, but we were more or less ignored the whole time. I never expect the white glove treatment when I go out, and I know it's not fair to judge a restaurant based on just one visit, but that left a lasting impression that was hard to forget. I was skeptical in coming back, even when I saw the signs on the windows announcing NEW MANAGEMENT. Did the new boss bring in sweeping changes? I have no idea, but the service was much better this time.
I ordered the Swedish pancake, which comes crispier than most and with a generous portion of lingonberries to be spread however you like. Some restaurants also offer lingonberry butter with their Swedish pancakes; The Aurora Pancake House doesn't, but I guess that's probably for the best. I'm sure it's not the healthiest stuff to put in your body.
Unfortunately I forgot to take note of the prices at the Aurora Pancake House. I don't remember them being unreasonable, or too much to discourage anyone from giving the APH a try.
15 comments:
We just ate at the APH yesterday. The place has been cleaned up quite a bit, but there was no soap in the bathroom. I was wondering where the waitstaff is washing their hands.
We had lunch and ordered a baked apple pancake to go. The server brought the apple pancake to me, opened the lid and it was very black. When I went to the manager at the cash register I asked him if this looked burnt to him. He said, "No, that's just the sugar on top." Now, I've had these before and never known the to be black. So I paid and went home. I tried it, it was definitely burnt!IT was not the sugar, the entire 1/4 inch layer of the pastry was burnt. I am so sick of these family restaurant owners/managers ripping people off like this. What is wrong with these people and don't they know that I will never come back because of this? I guess they do not care.
I've gone to Aurora Pancake House for two years and those are the best apple pancakes in the whole city of aurora and maybe tamie doesnt even know what an apple pancake is and an apple pancakes ingredients are sugar and cinnamon so thats what causes it to be brown or maybe tamie person just wanted the apple pancake freemany people have tried to play this little game just to get things free
to me it looks like you have no education as you said dim wit nobodyis forcing you to go 2 this resturant i think your one of those persons who is lazy and criticizes things i mean if you don't like it then don't go there nobody is telling you to. plus why didn't you call right away they might have gaven you better service and your money back and seriously who uses the word dim wit
"they might have gaven you"
Last I looked "gaven" is not a word.
Who is uneducated?
Doh!
the one who is uneducated is you and last time i looked dim wit wasn't a word that adults use
first thing i don't work there and at least i have a job and a life because it looks like you don't and seriously who uses the word dim wit
Leave me along. I have the right to express my opinion.
You are just some hateful freak who has no friends so you go around harassing people for attention.
Yuk. Creepy... Back off, stalker!
I'm outta here.
We visited Aurora Pancake House a few times over the past 3 or 4 wks.On Sat, Feb 6, we visited for our final time around 3 pm.Our waitress was very curt and unpersonable.Not once did she offer my husband a refill on his empty tea glass.I asked for coffee and was not given cream.I had to flag our waitress down for cream. I was given a refill on coffee and had run out of cream.I had to get a refill from another empty table.I had to get my silverware from another empty table.I ordered the banana nut bread french toast as a side to my late afternoon breakfast. When the french toast came out, it did not look as I expected.It look very unappetizing and my husband thought the same. Even so, I tried it and ended up taking two bites.I could not eat any more than that.It was very dry tasting, stale, without much flavor, and the presentation was poor.It was 3 small thin slices of old banana bread that had been dipped in very little egg without any milk in the batter.Then they tossed on a few slices of banana with a tiny bit of pecans.No or syrup as a topping, just cold maple syrup on the side.I was very disappointed.Aurora Pancake House charges $7.40 for this slop I don't like to send things back, but it was called for in this case.The waitress balked at sending it back and spent a few minutes giving us the third degree about sending back the virtually untouched French Toast.At the end of our meal, our waitress brought the check with the item still on the check.She told us that it was still on the ticket and that if we didn't want to pay for it, we would need to bring it up with the Manager when we check out. We told her of course we weren't going to pay for it and asked her why she hadn't taken care of it with the Manager. She kept telling us that we would need to take that up with the Manager.She apparently couldn't be bothered with it.At this point, we were not only upset about the food, but the attitude of our waitress.We asked to speak to the Manager. Finally, a young man about 16 years old came to our table.He said his name is Tony and that he was the Manager. This kid Tony had a worse attitude than our waitress.He had absolutely no concern that we were having a poor experience.He again gave me the third degree about sending the French Toast back.He argued with me that there was nothing wrong with their Banana Bread French Toast on this occasion.He said that it looked ok to him and that he touched it and it was warm and not dry.He told me that if I thought it was dry that I should have put maple syrup on it. After much arguement, he finally agreed to take the charge off.This is a family owned restaurant.We were so upset by the treatment we were receiving that I asked to speak to the real Manager or Owner.Tony said there was no one available.I asked Tony if he was a member of the family and he said yes.I was told that his uncle, Jesus Arceo owns the restaurant.I asked to speak to his uncle on the phone.Tony told me that he would give me his phone number and I could call later on.We were waiting on the phone number for Tony's uncle. He came back a few minutes later and said he couldn't give out personal information.I got the impression that Tony did not want us speaking to his uncle.I asked him to call his uncle from the phone there.He then said he did not know his uncle's phone number.When I challenged that fact that Tony first said he would give me the phone number to call in a complaint to his uncle and now he tells me that he is in charge and doesn't even know his own uncle's phone number, this kid just turns his back on us and walks off without a word.We felt devalued as customer's and were humiliated.Therefore, my husband and I will never eat there again and we urge others to think twice before they spend their hard earned money at a place with such poor service and inconsisent food
I agree with your tamie. U r entitled to ur own opinion. We had the same bad experience. That place sucks!
I agree with u Paula. They r rude!
I agree with u Paula. They r very rude. Told us to get out of there and gave us the middle finger
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