Shredded or Slab?

I am disappointed with the International House of Pancakes. I spoke with the individual restaurant and called their corporate office, but am still disappointed with IHOP.

I went to their Bronx location and ordered breakfast. What I ordered did not match what was on the menu. Yes, sometimes it doesn’t look exactly like the menu, but this was totally different, IHOP Corporate agrees, but wouldn’t do anything about it!

So I called IHOP and spoke with Mr. Don Miller who tells me that:

Turns out that IHOP has 5 approved vendors of hash browns and two approved versions: shredded (the picture on their menu) and slabs (the fast food kind you get from McDonald’s or Burger King).

Good ‘ol Don says each restaurant can choose between the two versions.

If they want to serve slabs, let them serve slabs, but please just inform your customer before serving him something that is completely different that what is shown on the menu.

ALSO – what happened to their biscuits and gravy?

Turns out they have one approved supplier of their sausage gravy. Odom’s Tennessee Pride. Well, I’m sure Odom’s and hopefully IHOP, and probably the entire state of Tennessee would be shocked and dismayed to see how Odom’s gravy is being served here at this IHOP location.

Watered down nastiness served over doughy biscuits that needed to be cooked for another 5 minutes. I should have taken a picture because I’m sure IHOP would never believe me.

Don’t worry. When I asked Don if there was anything IHOP could do for me because of this experience, he apologized and told me about their secret shopper program for each restaurant and about their internal review program and assured me of their quality assurance program. Despite all of these checks, my meal still was not up to IHOP standards, yet there was nothing IHOP could do.

So much for the IHOP slogan of: Come Hungry. Leave Happy.