American restaurant in UK

This would be exactly the type of restaurant I would seek to avoid! 

Yes. Save me from singing waiters!!

Yes. Save me from singing waiters!!

This. 1,000 times, this.

Save me from restaurants that do multiple different kinds of cuisines! It's just never good if a place tries to do Asian, Mexican, Italian, American, etc. all in one go. This is why I have never understood why so many people like The Cheesecake Factory. The food is horrible and the menu is about 25 pages long! To be fair, I've never had the cheesecake though because cheesecake is the devil, so maybe people go there for that and put up with the rest!  

Give me 5 apps to choose from, 5 entrees to choose from and 5 desserts to choose from in the style you cook best together with a long beer list and I'm happy!

I have never understood why so many people like The Cheesecake Factory.

I agree totally. A long menu, not to mention multiple cuisines, is always a tip-off that you should be eating elsewhere.

I understand what people are saying about long menus/multiple cuisines, and I do agree, to a point.  You're never going to get best of anything from a place that tries to do everything.  Or that has a kids' menu, at all.

But, most of the time, I don't care!  On a special occasion, I'll want something really good, and really special, and will be quite fussy about it, and am prepared to spend money to get it.  Generally, if I'm in the mood to indulge my inner foodie, I prefer to shop for the best ingredients, and then cook at home.  Most times, when I go out to eat, I just want something decent, reasonably-priced, and that I didn't have to cook or clean up after!  I'm not looking for a Michelin star.  I don't care if it's authentic.  I just want to eat before my blood sugar drops so low that I go on a cranky murder spree.

As Terry Pratchett puts it:
 
[Vimes had]noticed that sex bore some resemblance to cookery: it fascinated people, they sometimes bought books full of complicated recipes and interesting pictures, and sometimes when they were really hungry they created vast banquets in their imagination - but at the end of the day they'd settle quite happily for egg and chips. If it was well done and maybe had a slice of tomato.

So I say three cheers for Denny's, Applebee's, Cheesecake Factory, Harvester, or any other establishment with a menu so broad that I can walk in, without any prior consideration or hand-wringing or endless debate with my family about 'what are you in the mood for,' and know that I'll find something decently edible, that appeals to whatever I happen to be craving at the moment, without spending a small fortune, and so will everyone else in my party. At the end of the day, they're alright.  And anyone who claims their food is inedible has either encountered a one-off bad batch/bad cook (which can happen anywhere), or is just being pretentious.

But, please--- no singing staff.  (Maybe Happy Birthday.  But only for kids, and don't expect me to join in.)

Most times, when I go out to eat, I just want something decent, reasonably-priced, and that I didn't have to cook or clean up after!

Those three things are important! Decent, reasonable prices and most importantly not me cooking ... but that doesn't mean it has to be mass-produced and microwaved. I still care about what I'm ordering and eating. It definitely doesn't have to be Michelin star food, but there's no reason I can't have good, simply-prepared food. It's not as if our only choice is between five star restaurants and The Cheesecake Factory!

I wouldn't turn my nose up at a place like Denny's or Appleby's etc. but really--Red Hot is not good.  And their mashed potatoes are Smash (powdered).  I know this because my friend said, "They look like Smash" when they were being refilled.  She was sort of joking and the guy said, "Yeah, they are".

We have a TGI Fridays locally, but with being spitting distance to much better fare in London we rarely go there. Still, it scratches a particular homesickness itch on occasion!

Those three things are important! Decent, reasonable prices and most importantly not me cooking ... but that doesn't mean it has to be mass-produced and microwaved.

Um...yeah, a lot of times, it sort of does.

Perhaps you're blessed with an unusual array of high-quality, low-cost restaurants in your area.  Quite possibly, your definition of a 'reasonable price' is higher than other people's. 

But, generally, there's a trade-off between price and quality.  And you'd probably be very surprised at the extent to which even your 'good, simply-prepared' restaurant food has been mass-produced and/or microwaved, even in the best restaurants.  It's about economy of scale, and service times. 

My problem is that those places aren't decently priced as far as I'm concerned. Yes, you're probably getting a plate of food that you won't be able to finish and can take home with you, so I get in that respect you're getting 2 meals out of it, but it's grease and poor quality ingredients and they try to dress it up like it's something more than it is.

I go to cheap diners (in the UK I would go to pubs) or takeaway places for grease and poor quality ingredients. Sometimes that's all I want to eat. Sometimes I just want to eat crap. And if I'm going to eat garbage food, I'll go to a garbage-y joint to get it. They're the ones that do it the best, after all, and I'll probably spend about $7 on it, which is great.

But if I'm going out, and I'm going to spend $12-$15 on an entree (which is at the start of pricey to me, and is what the average is on a Cheesecake Factory/Applebee's/Fridays entree), there's plenty of other places at that price point that actually take at least a little bit more care with their food that aren't a massive chain, and that's where I would be headed.

Plus, I suppose my biggest problem with The Cheesecake Factory is that their decor is The Eye of Sauron, and that I just cannot abide. 

LOL... I didn't even know Cheesecake Factory was a real place!  I thought it was just a made-up place in the Big Bang Theory!

My problem is that those places aren't decently priced as far as I'm concerned. Yes, you're probably getting a plate of food that you won't be able to finish and can take home with you, so I get in that respect you're getting 2 meals out of it, but it's grease and poor quality ingredients and they try to dress it up like it's something more than it is.

I go to cheap diners (in the UK I would go to pubs) or takeaway places for grease and poor quality ingredients. Sometimes that's all I want to eat. Sometimes I just want to eat crap. And if I'm going to eat garbage food, I'll go to a garbage-y joint to get it. They're the ones that do it the best, after all, and I'll probably spend about $7 on it, which is great.

But if I'm going out, and I'm going to spend $12-$15 on an entree (which is at the start of pricey to me, and is what the average is on a Cheesecake Factory/Applebee's/Fridays entree), there's plenty of other places at that price point that actually take at least a little bit more care with their food that aren't a massive chain, and that's where I would be headed.

Plus, I suppose my biggest problem with The Cheesecake Factory is that their decor is The Eye of Sauron, and that I just cannot abide. 

This times a million.

I think maybe in some ways we're lucky in the NYC area since there are a ton of good, cheap, ethnic restaurants with better quality than Applebees et al. And some of them are super crowded and come with chili pepper lights hanging from the ceiling--and are BYOB to boot! Diners are better than the chains when it comes to just wanting simple and greasy--they're also usually a lot cheaper. Sometimes I'll go to Chipotle for a quick, very filling, relatively healthy (lots of beans and veggies) meal but otherwise, I pretty much completely avoid chains. But doing that cheaply is a luxury that comes with living in a dense city, I think.

Yep, we're never in chains, but we do have Curry Mile on our doorstep, which fulfills the cheap and cheerful AND some of the posh requirements, depending. It's a nice perk to living in Manchester.

We were just discussing whether we could ever move out of the city centre, currently the answer appears to be no, based a lot on walking to work and walking to the Mile!

My son and I would often go to a local diner called "Franny's" for breakfast or lunch. He was by far the youngest person there and I was probably second youngest!  Real greasy spoon but they have a fantastic beef stew!

At college my friends and I would often sneak out to a nearby bed and breakfast that offered lunches and dinners as well -- stuff like burgers and fries.  But I mean REAL fries. The landlady would cut them up and deep-fat fry them herself (we came in the kitchen door so we knew!)  And she made the most fantastic sticky buns 

If I'm going to have greasy heart-clogging food I would much prefer to go to places like those.

And some of them are super crowded and come with chili pepper lights hanging from the ceiling--and are BYOB to boot!

We need to go back there soon!