Miranda A.
Yelp
I can't even begin to tell you about the strange experience that I had at State of Beer. I'll start with the good:
Ambiance: Chill crowd. Great location downtown. Lovely interior decor and a huge plus for me - awesome tees and glassware.
Drinks: good selection of local and other on draft and in bottles.
Food: menu was decent looking. Fiancé ordered an Italian, brother got a different hot sammich, and his gf got a salad.
Service: this one... this is tricky. The bartender was awesome. She was quick, friendly, and personable.
The cook.... good god I've never had such a terrible restaurant experience in my life.
Here is where the story takes a turn.
I ordered a turkey pesto with no tomato. Reasonable request, right? The cook brought the food out, and I pointed out "yes, I ordered that, but with no tomato." He looked at me, annoyed, and then noted he would remake it, marched away trying to give my sandwich away to three tables, noting it was a free sandwich. He was clearly agitated. Afterward, he came back to the table about 2 minutes later with the SAME sandwich with the tomato picked off. There was juice, seeds, and residue everywhere. I asked the bartender for extra napkins to wipe it off, and she said she'd just have a new one made and apologized.
Moments after sitting back at my table, the cook came back out with a box in hand, took the tomato tainted sandwich, angrily (seriously, this was an actual angry action) dumped it into the box and muttered something about it being a tax write off. We all watched, stunned, as he shoved the box into a nearby planter. He came back and my fiancé asked if he was okay, and he raised his voice and accused my fiancé of staring at him. At this point, the bartender came out and was so confused by what she was seeing. I explained to her what was going on, the cook said nothing was going on; that my fiancé was "looking at him" so he was looking back. I was just damn hangry at this point and on the verge of tears from frustration. I just wanted a sandwich with no tomato!
Thank goodness for the lovely bartender. She was kind enough to apologize on this guy's behalf, and comped our entire bill. We promptly left and headed down the street to another bottle shop to finish our meal (well, everyone but me. I still never got my sandwich and instead walked away with scrunched shoulders and an eye twitch).