Ruth’s Chris on the Company Dime

Mrs. Eats’s employer, a venerable and generous company, felt it a good idea to take some employees and their spouses out to a little casual dinner at Ruth’s Chris Steakhouse last night. Not being one to turn down a free meal, I gratefully accompanied my beautiful wife.

If you haven’t been to “The Chris” yet and still remember Mace’s restaurant that it replaced, you’ll see many traces of the old place in the new decor. The layout is basically the same (sans the bizarre safari lodge decor and the fake veranda looking out over the Serengeti), but the place is much darker, leaning towards Las Vegas chic rather than Bombay Company classic. But let’s talk about the food:

Because we were a large party, we had limited choices of menu items; nevertheless, the choices were tasty sounding and definitely filling. They started us off with stuffed mushrooms which everyone else liked (I’m allergic to mushrooms (OK that’s a lie, I just don’t like mushrooms, but if I say I’m allergic, people feel sorry for me rather than thinking I’m a stubborn pain in the ass)). Our next choice was soup or salad. Everyone at my table went for the lobster bisque which sounded great. It was, however, very bland, with not much lobster and not much taste other than heavy cream. Next came our entrees, which were presented straight from the oven, or perhaps they were straight from the molten magma of the Earth’s crust, because all of our steaks came out HOT, really hot, melt your bottom jaw off hot. We had to sit for a good ten minutes watching the butter on our plates sizzle and fry while our steaks cooled down. When the terror level had been reduced to orange, we dug in.

The steaks were very good, the mashed potatoes were very good, the asparagus was very good. All were very tasty and prepared simply and well. I would have been very satisfied had this dinner cost me $30. I was ecstatic that it cost me nothing. But the truth is, had I been paying for this meal, just my portion alone would have been close to $100 and the whole evening would have been $200-$250 for 2, including drinks.

For what we ate, I just can’t see paying that much. It just doesn’t add up in my food to dollar ratio calculator. The service didn’t justify the price. While not negligent, the overall service was dull, unenergetic and dazzlingly mediocre. I am by no means a Scroogish penny pincher, but I am a practical guy when it comes to eating out, and for my money, a better overall experience can be had with food just as good at many less expensive joints around town. Be it Moxie, 4th Street Grill or any of a number of upper end eateries in town, your dollar will go farther and your servers might actually smile, or even hug you. Feel free to make “The Chris” your regular hangout if you want; I’m not going to stop you. I guess some people just have too much disposable income.