10 Overhyped and Overpriced Restaurants That Aren’t Worth Your Time & Money

There’s nothing – I repeat, nothing – worse than having to pay a ludicrous amount of money for a subpar dining experience. Unfortunately, many of us have been in that exact situation at one time or another.

Having indulged on cold fries, a partially-frozen burger, or over an overcooked piece of chicken, we still have to endure the shameless humiliation of paying for our horrendous meal once the check finally arrives.

If it weren’t enough, we had to gnaw on the half-baked culinary creations on our plate reluctantly; now, we have to fork over our hard-earned money at the end of our disappointing meal.

From sit-down sports bars to walk-up fast food venues, here are 10 restaurants that are overrated, overpriced, and generally over-praised by the public.

Panera Bread

Most people accurately describe Panera Bread as offering what looks and tastes like a fancier version of hospital food. With a menu featuring soups, salads, sandwiches, and fresh-baked goods, there’s no question that Panera makes generally decent (if somewhat unremarkable) meals.

However, for the cost you’re pricing on that tuna salad sandwich, you’d justifiably expect to get an entire baguette slathered with fresh-caught tuna and homemade mayonnaise. Instead, you’re just getting a smaller meal that will satisfy you for an hour or so, only to feel hungry two hours later.

Starbucks

We’re not going to lie – we love pumpkin spice lattes and vanilla cream cold brews as much as the next person. But you don’t have to be a coffee connoisseur to recognize just how darn expensive Starbucks is whenever you check out at the register.

With an average coffee clocking in at around $6.50 in most U.S. locations, Starbucks’ higher quality coffee comes at a dire cost, especially if you opt for a specialty latte or seasonal coffee flavor.

Shake Shack

Don’t get us wrong, Shake Shack does serve some incredibly tasty burgers. But any burger joint that sells burgers and fries separately deserves to earn its fair share of well-earned criticism every now and again.

Though it’s hard to take anything away from the In-N-Out-level quality of their burgers, you could just as readily get an entire meal at a sit-down restaurant for the price you’re paying at Shake Shack (with an order of fries included for no additional fee, no less).

The Cheesecake Factory

Admittedly, you get what you pay for regarding The Cheesecake Factory: steaming plates of food big enough to feed a rampaging bear after they’ve woken up from hibernation.

Sadly, the price tag attached to those meals tends to be just as astronomical as the portion sizes themselves. I mean, $11 for a single slice of cheesecake? With a price like that, Paul Hollywood had better personally hand-craft our desserts in the kitchen back there. 

Buffalo Wild Wings

Once upon a time, Buffalo Wild Wings seemed like a genuinely strong alternative to Applebee’s, Chili’s, or Friday’s casual atmosphere. Yet, like the glory days of $1 Margaritas, nothing good in the dining industry lasts forever.

Where once Buffalo Wild Wings peddled sauce-coated wings, affordable draft beers, and shareable appetizers, the once decent restaurant chain offers overpriced chicken wings with the sauce haphazardly splattered into the center. It’s just disappointing.

White Castle

Every Harold and Kumar fan has made it their mission to eat at White Castle at least once. When you finally take your first bite of the restaurant’s signature sliders, however, you might instantly wonder why the characters were craving White Castle in the first place on earth.

For better or worse, the patties you order at White Castle are unlike any other we know of in the fast food industry, thanks to the restaurant’s famous slider steaming method. Sadly, despite its innovative cooking procedure, the slider you pay for tastes like the cardboard box it’s served in.

P.F. Chang’s

There are great Asian restaurants, bad Asian restaurants – and then there’s P.F. Chang’s somewhere in the middle. A slightly upscale version of a typical Asian American restaurant, P.F. Chang’s has all the classic dishes one might crave when it comes to classic Chinese and Japanese cuisine, including Mongolian beef, kung pao chicken, and assorted sushi platters.

Yet, like any restaurant serving pan-Asian delicacies, P.F. Chang’s doesn’t truly live up to all the hype surrounding it. Instead of this moderately classy Asian fusion bistro, your money would be much better spent at an actual Chinese restaurant (one that doesn’t charge $23 for most beef entrees).

Red Lobster

If you’re in the mood for decent seafood, why in the world would you choose Red Lobster?! That’s like wanting to eat a home-cooked burger and settling on the dilapidated McDonald’s inside the nearest Walmart.

Regarding pricing, Red Lobster might be a tad cheaper than the more upscale seafood restaurants nearby, but the dishes served in their kitchens leave much to be desired. At an average of $20 per plate for frozen seafood platters, you have to wonder if you’d be better off simply paying $5 more for fresh-caught salmon or crab at an altogether finer establishment.

Olive Garden

Like most chain dining establishments out there, Olive Garden ropes the average customer in with promises of unlimited breadsticks and bottomless garden salads. But underneath these few cost-friendly deals lies a restaurant of hopelessly mediocre quality.

Again, you might be won over by those free breadsticks, but all you need to do is look at Olive Garden’s full menu to see that this casual Italian eatery is hardly worth the penny. (Plus, let’s be honest; those breadsticks are basically buttery hot dog rolls heated in the microwave.)

Rainforest Cafe

If you’re going to Rainforest Cafe for anything, it’s for the spectacle of your immediate surroundings. Sitting down in a jungle-coated restaurant interior, dining at the Rainforest Cafe does offer plenty of adventurous moments, complete with an atmospheric thunderstorm sequence straight out of Tarzan or The Jungle Book.

Unfortunately, the actual food served at the Rainforest Cafe is … subpar, to say the least. Like Medieval Times or Dolly Parton’s various dinner theater shows, the plates come secondary to the theatrics of your environment, and the entire restaurant seems like a bigger-budgeted version of Chuck E. Cheese.