I visit the new local spot, Holler and Dash #HollerAndDash which is Cracker Barrel’s fast casual chain. Yes, it’s casual. No, it’s not fast.
I miss my ol’ Half Restaurant. Half Store. All Country. This is definitely No Holler. No Dash. All Millennial.
Pros:
- Food is actually pretty tasty.
- Price is ok.
- It’s another typical millennial spot in SouthEnd in Charlotte.
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- Very homogenous.
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- Think West Elm serves biscuits.
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- Think HomeGoods serves up every cutesy calligraphy decoration you could want. Add ironic statements all having to do with biscuits.
As you can see, everything is biscuit centric. I love biscuits. Biscuits don’t love me. I can’t blame the restaurant for that. From this card, I learn Biscuit Etiquette. I’m supposed to hash tag this. Maybe later today, I’ll figure out how to share and hash tag this blog on Instagram. Yes, I’ve gotten this far behind on social media!
So a picture is worth a thousand words? My Everyday I’m Brusselin’ salad with roasted chicken is a SAD sight.
Cons:
- The parking lot is too small. You’re fighting with people getting groceries at Harris Teeter along with the half dozen plus retail shops along the strip mall. The only way most folks can get a spot is to follow someone out of the grocery store or stalk a row of cars until someone leaves. Think the mall about a week before Christmas. Yes, it’s that bad.
- In the restaurant, process flow and wait is horrible. You walk in. It’s chaos. It’s hard to tell where to stand in line. You order, get a pager, and take it to your table (in theory).
- Problem is that there is too little seating so we stand for about 20 minutes before a family gets up and motions to us to take their table. While we wait, we are constantly being shuffled around since the place is pretty small. I guess they see how we missed several other opportunities that got scooped up. They are kind to do flag us down and offer the table.
- Then we wait some more. In all, it takes about 40 minutes for the last person to get food. We are all standing together in line so we all ordered within five minutes of each other.
- The food presentation is abysmal. Sure, we order our items to-go because at the time, we aren’t sure if we’ll get seating. I’m not a food presentation snob but it’s true that the salads in the plastic containers at Chick-Fil-A look nicer than this.
Prices? Not over the over the top but not cheap either. We pay $20 for two partial lunches. Sure, Joe gets a cappuccino because he’s fancy like that but only has a biscuit for his main meal. I get a water as usual. We have no tip because interestingly, their point-of-sale system didn’t ask for one but also, we really didn’t get any service!
No one wants to take a selfie. Looks like I did a pretty poor job as well with the blurriness but who cares? If I didn’t capture the moment in a photo, then it didn’t happen, right?
Greg eats his greens in a few minutes flat. Magnum? Gregnum.
C’s Overall Verdict
I’m glad I try a new place. I love Cracker Barrel so I’m sad this place doesn’t live up to those standards especially considering it’s supposed to be the fast and casual version. I suspect I could have been in and out of a regular Cracker Barrel in less time with much less stress.
Holler and Dash is one of Charlotte’s latest, newest, and shiniest new spots. I suspect the 8 million new apartments across the street will help keep the business going. A captive audience never hurts and who doesn’t love a fancy pepper jelly covered fried chicken biscuit?
It is worth a try but it’s one and done for me. If my tummy feels up to accepting a chicken sandwich, I’ll most likely grab one from Bojangle’s or Chick-Fil-A for half the price and 1% the stress and wait.
I’ve eaten one down in Fl and not a fan either.