The Melting Pot

BEWARE the Seattle location!! Your business would be more valued (and you'll find a better value) ANYWHERE else. I used to come here a few times a year because I have subscriptions to both the opera and ballet which are a few blocks away. My friends and I used to start the night off with their meat fondue (overpriced but we would share one portion) and after the performance come back for late-night chocolate fondue happy hour. I have NEVER seen this location full â?? as a matter of fact, it usually trends more towards empty unless youâ??re in the bar â?? so I didnâ??t think to make reservations before attending a concert last night, and nowhere on the website does it say that it's reservations only (even the staff last night agreed they take walk-ins).

We arrived at 5:15pm to find an empty restaurant (as I expected) and a hostess that refused to seat us until 6:45pm because we did not have a reservation. I would understand the response if the restaurant was busy, but there was NO ONE in the restaurant and at least 12 empty tables directly in front of us . Two couples who came in directly after us were also turned away.

Perplexed by this unusual behavior of turning away customers with an empty restaurant, we asked for the manager, who also proceeded to tell us that due to lack of available staff we could not currently be seated without a reservation. When we questioned why we couldnâ??t be seated despite the rows of empty tables, he said they did not have enough staff and reservations would pick up later that evening due to a concert (the one we were going to). Further perplexed that the manager knew about the concert but did not plan for extra staff to be available, along with the managerâ??s unwillingness to see that we were appeased in any way, we gave up on Melting Pot and left. We ran into one of the other turned-away couples in the parking lot, and they were also appalled that their business was refused. We then went across the street to Pesos, where we were able to get a table immediately despite the fact that their restaurant was PACKED. Great pre-concert/performance venue if you're looking for one.

We made the erroneous judgment to return to Melting Pot after the concert to partake in their chocolate fondue happy hour, only to learn that since the new manager came on board it has been cancelled. Needless to say I have NO reason to visit this restaurant ever again, they have awful customer service and they obviously are not looking for business anyway.

DO NOT RECOMMEND AT ALL. Seattle has many gems right nextdoor that are not chain-owned and actually value their customers. Pick one of those instead!…

Not good to say the least. My wife and I thought it would be a great place to spend a evening with each other. We heard it had decent food, well to say the least we both were very very unhappy with everything. The service was unreal, (Slow), and the food was very poor, (I would have rather had a cheeseburger from wendys). Then to top it off the bill came and it was over $100.00. For horrible food horrible service, I would recomend Mcdonalds over this place...…

If all I want a nice ambiance, I'd go to the museums.. People who like MP maybe the people who have never been to a good fondue restaurant before. The quality of the cheese and meat is very sub-par. People who liked it may have not tasted A-grade meat/cheese or just couldn't tell the difference.

The restaurant probably feels justified to charge the high price because of the ambiance and the unique experience. Well most non-generic reviews here would give this restaurant 5 stars mostly for the experience and the ambiance. But the food...sad to say, unimpressive. Service wise, it really depends on who you get, some waiters are competent and some aren't. I have gotten each of these two types on my 4 visits.

Special events - yes go if you don't care about the food quality and just care about the experience. Then again if you have actually been to a nice fondue place/event, the MP is not that big of an experience.…

Slow as molasses. I signed up just to write this review. I checked out the reviews for this place the other day, just before I was headed there. I thought the way the reviews were either glowing or hateful was interesting.

Well, unfortunately, you can put me in the unhappy camp.

The food, while good, was overpriced. But, ok, you are paying for an experience so I'll let that slide.

But the service... awful. Dinner for 2 took almost 2.5 hours. The delay between a drink order and then seeing our server again was 30 minutes! And that was typical for the whole meal.

This was the Seattle location, by the way. I heard the Tacoma one is better.…