Are you planning on going to this place? Please read the reviews! Notice that every positive review is written by people that have been going there for decades and are friends of the Studiale family. \r
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I have lived in South Florida for more than 20 years and have always been curious about this place. Many of my local friends have advised me over the years not to go there but like they say you learn from your own mistakes and this, was a really big one. \r
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A couple of weeks ago I came across a groupon for Tropical Acres and thought what better way to test out the newly renovated restaurant? \r
We had reservations for 8 pm on Friday 6/8/2012 we were greeted by an overly rude hostess and totally rude owner who seemed to have no people skills. We were ushered to the bar and spent money there on drinks. 8:39 pm we were finally seated, remember we had reservations. We handed over our Groupons to our waitress, she claimed it was fine. Service was slow, but hey it gave us time to socialize in a depressing, dull and bad smelling atmosphere. We ordered our food at around 9pm. At 9:45 we were told that there was no more prime rib, we are at a steak house, no prime rib, what kind of steak house is this? We changed one of the orders, which was really no big deal. \r
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At 10:10 the first two meals were served, hallelujah! At this point we could care less what the food was, we were beyond starving! At about 10:20 everybody at the table had there meal. The new York strip was overcooked and tough, the scallops were not fresh and the kids chicken tenders were comparable to less than what you would expect from a fast food Restaurant.\r
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As if that wasn't bad enough at around 10:45 the hostess, with an extremely big ego told us that we could only use one groupon because we were all seated at one huge table. However at the time of seating our waitress said it was perfectly fine as long as we had 4 or more meals on each check, which was no problem because we were a party of 9. The right hand doesn't know what the left hand is doing, one waitress gave us the ok after checking with management, while the hostess rudely told us that we could only use one Groupon.\r
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We asked for management and were bluntly told "Not to be so F**king rude!" Thanks for expanding my young daughters vocabulary. The owner/manager came to our table with a snotty attitude. I had my friend take my daughter outside because I expected her to use more profanity. As they say monkey see, monkey do I was afraid she would pick up on the owners attrocious vocabulary. I calmly explained our situation to the owner and her reply was "You don't want to pay? I'm calling BSO (Broward Sheriff Office)" And rudely stormed off, with both of our Groupons and checks. At this point I could care less if I got the discount I just wanted to pay the bill and get out of this musky smelling hell hole.\r
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After getting a partial discount for one of the Groupons we paid our bill and decided, it's time to go home. On the way out we were complimented on being "White Trash" because we were "too cheap to pay the full bill and had to get a discount." The BSO officers advised us to call Groupon, contact our credit cards and write reviews on the Internet.\r
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Well here you have it SOFLA, Tropical Acres is an overrated tourist trap, so next time you're looking for a nice atmosphere and good, prompt service. Do yourself a huge favor, DON'T GO TO TROPICAL ACRES!!
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