Reviews for Colleen's At The Cannery

05/22/2024 - Nicole T.
Epicurean!

12/06/2020 - MenuPix User
I would actually like to give Colleens a 4.9 because it really is a terrific place and I only have one small complaint. I have been in Haiku for 2 1/2 weeks and I have been coming to Colleens almost every day for takeout. Until today, all the waitresses were pleasant. Some of them were very friendly.

Today I ordered lunch consisting of two orders of house salad with chicken and three monster cookies. I added a tip for takeout and the bill came to over $50. I don't quite understand how it could be that much money but I never complained.

Here is my complaint.

After ordering and paying over $50, I went outside and waited until I was sure my take-out order was ready. When I got back my order was sitting on the counter and the chefs had left the kitchen. There were a couple customers finishing up their lunch. The place was not busy. There were no orders, take-out or otherwise, up on the chef's counter. The place was pretty dead.

There was no waitress behind the counter.

So I figured I should just pick up my order. I recognized the order because there was a small box for the three cookies and they were two larger boxes for the two salads. And there was no sign of any other take-out order or waiting customer.

Suddenly a woman appeared out of nowhere and grabbed my food out of my hands.

I said that the small order on top should be 3 monster cookies. She looked and confirmed this, But that wasn't enough for her. She seemed pretty certain that there were some other customer, Invisible to the naked eye, that should get those three cookies.

Since the chefs had left the kitchen, she apparently thought that I was lying and that I had never ordered anything and that's why they weren't preparing anything for me.

I patiently played the game. I told her that the next box would have salad with chicken. She dutifully checked the second box and found that I was correct.

Up until this moment, I would never have made a complaint. But at this moment, the situation changed.

I told her that the third box contained another salad with chicken.

But she refused to check it because she knew I was right and she simply did not want to give me my food that I had paid $50 for.

She put both her arms around the three boxes and refused to give them to me or to check them.

I went to another waitress and asked for help. As soon as this other waitress started walking over the first waitress gave me my food. She never checked the third box. She knew very well it was my food.

I think the waitress who tried so hard to keep me from getting my food convinced herself at the very beginning that I was some homeless person sneaking in to grab a meal. I suspect the management is partly to blame because they have probably told the waitresses to be very wary of such people.

In this case, the waitress was actually taking food that didn't belong to her. She was the one grabbing the meal illegally-and foolishly. The management apparently would rather make a regular customer angry than risk feeding a homeless person. I think it would be smarter to be polite to anyone who comes to the counter, even if it ends up causing the restaurant to provide a free meal for a homeless person. Colleen could take it as a tax deduction.