Olga's, Oakland Mall, Troy, MI

This is more of an un-review today, as we ended up not eating at Olga's. We were at the mall for a little Christmas shopping and decided to have a bite to eat beforehand. We'd been interested in trying an Olga's. We were seated promptly in the nearly-empty dining room and our drink orders taken fairly promptly, as well. I was surprised to find no hot tea on the menu, but it wasn't such a big deal and they did have coffee for Jeannene. She asked for room to be left for her creamer & was given half a cup, with not nearly enough little cartons to make a whole cup. It would have made the coffee cold, anyway, and that was the last thing we wanted on a day on which we woke up to 12 degrees outdoors.

Unfortunately, cold would be a theme at Olga's. We ordered their snackers and the waitress was kind enough to help our indecision by offering a small side of the Swiss almond cheese, their standard side with the pita chips, along with an order of the spinach feta dip. We accepted gratefully. The Swiss almond cheese was fine, if you're a fan of the cheese spreads that come in a Hickory Farms assortment, and the pita bread was warm and nicely seasoned. 

However, the spinach feta dip was cold in the middle and lukewarm on the sides. Since our waitress didn't check back with us, even though there were only a few other occupied tables, we couldn't ask her to warm it. Jeannene was also out of coffee in very short order, with not a refill in sight.

It wasn't until our sandwiches and soup came that we were able to alert the waitress to the chill on the dip. She offered to warm it. We didn't really need an appetizer anymore, since our meal had arrived, but we agreed. However, our sandwiches, the Olga's version of gyros, were also cold. Cold sauce, I expect. Maybe even room temperature bread would be acceptable. But cold meat? Not terribly appetizing. And our peasant soup was also cold. With oily slicks on top and an oily orange-red ring around the cup. We waited briefly to see if the waitress would return, but my hopes were low for an adequate temperature on anything, even if we sent it back. And waited. 

When we decided to leave without eating, something I have never before done once my food has arrived, we received no apology from the young woman we asked, in the complete absence of our waitress in the dining room, to get the manager. We waited, then, for the manager to come. And we waited. We were told, "He's just in the back putting away food." I thought, "Can the food not wait five minutes while he speaks with us?" Apparently not. Finally, another woman, perhaps an assistant manager, came to speak with us. She acknowledged that the food should not have been cold and did not expect us to pay or try to persuade us to let them make it right. Not a good first impression of this chain that seemed to hold a bit of promise.