A Scottsdale Legend

       

Reviewed by: Carey from Glendale, AZ, USA on Jan 20, 2007



Just say CHEESE!
My fiancé wanted to eat somewhere nice for her birthday and decided on the Pink Pony. We read the reviews here which also supported our decision to try it. Here's the real scoop: This restaurant is staffed and patroned by seniors primarily. My fiancé and I are almost 40, and with the exception of one other couple, we were the youngest people in the place. Gray hair and bald heads were seated at most tables, as was the wait staff. The place has very low ceilings, no partitions and, as a result, it was very loud. Just trying to talk to the person seated next to you requires shouting. The singer 'Steve' people keep mentioning in other reviews, has no band and plays no instrument. He has a Karoke machine and sings Dean Martin/Nat King Cole-type music, which you can barely hear over the crowd. The food is mediocre. My fiancé ordered the prime rib ($30) which arrived 2 inches thick, 11 inches long and 4.5 inches wide (yes, I measured it!) That could have fed four people! It was the single largest piece of meat on one plate I have ever seen. Definitely what a European would expect to see an American eat for dinner. We made our reservation at restaurant.com, which sent me an email confirming the reservation was made. So, it was no shock when we arrived at our appointed time and saw no computers - just a hand-written reservation list, and we were not on it. The elderly lady who greeted us and manages the reservation list was very nice and sat us in a booth. Thank goodness since the center of this restaurant is nothing more than two VERY long tables (think Harry Potter style seating) and booths along the walls. Everyone was very nice, however, our waitress kept referring to us as 'kids.' Such as, "How are you kids tonight?" and "Can I get you kids anything else?" At nearly 40 years old, we are hardly kids, but given the average age of the majority of patrons and workers, I suppose we appear as kids to them. Perhaps there is some appeal to folks 60+ years old, but my fiancé and I just didn't get it. The cheesy atmosphere, the mediocre food, the noise and cramped surroundings were simply not what we were expecting, especially after reading all the rave reviews posted here. I should also mention that they added 18% on to the check automatically ($12.50 in our case) and when you pay by credit card, there is a blank spot for you to write in your tip. I am sure many people that eat there don't realize they are double-tipping, leaving as much as a 30% to 40% tip to the wait staff. It's an awkward position to be in to write a 0 in the tip amount, because I feel as though doing so suggests the service was bad. However, an 18% tip added AUTOMATICALLY, is quite generous considering 10% is the normal, 15% if the service was great and 20% if the service was out of this world. I simply wrote "Included" in the tip amount so as to send the right message. I would have voluntarily left an 18% tip, as they earned it, but I was not going to tip on top of the mandatory tip. If you're considering eating here, be aware you can buy a $25 voucher for $10 from restaurant.com. You pay for it online with your credit card and then print the voucher out on your printer (no waiting or planning ahead necessary). There are some details about it (you must spend more than $40 and can only use one coupon per month, etc...). Apparently there is a lot of baseball paraphernalia hanging on the walls, but it was so busy and crowded (and dark inside) it made it impossible to appreciate it's significance.
Would you recommend this to a friend?
Don't Know

Why? / Why Not?
Because of what I wrote in my review.