Original Joes

Very good restaurant. I am a UVic student and often go there for dinner. They do takeout which is very useful when there is a long night of studying ahead. The food is very good and reasonably priced!

Good food and the prices are fair– regular entrees come with 2 sides, and on weeknights after 9pm, all appetizers are half off, a deal I love. They have a good selection of drinks and lots on the menu to choose from. I have never experienced bad service, even on nights where it’s been packed. Sure, it’s not a super fancy place– it’s catered to young people and students, but that doesn’t mean others can’t find something to enjoy as well.

Surprisingly good all around. This location of Original Joe’s seems to have the formula for cheesy American-​style Chain Restaurants down pat.
Ordered the Saigon Sub — not bad. My partner had the Jalapeño Mac and Cheese with Chorizo. She really enjoyed it (even though it was NOT chorizo, just uncassed standard pork sausage). Lettuce wraps for the appy were good — except served with Romain… weirdest choice of lettuce for lettuce wraps.
Service was prompt and courteous. Drinks are reasoably priced and menu is huge.
If you come in with expectations of what it is — Original Joe’s, a chain restaurant — you’ll have a pretty decent experience.

Went in for dinner on a Saturday night. The service was good and quick. The food was very good and the prices were reasonable. The environment was a little loud, but it is something of a sports grill environment, not a family dining restaurant, so I can’t complain much about that. The menu has a nice variety of items.
Overall, we had a good experience and would go back without reservation.

Nice staff. However we had the ribs, ouch, dry and hard. Waitress asked how it was and she shrugged her shoulders and said sorry. Ah… customer service? Like the room anbience but needs help being run as a restaurant.

The only place that, when suggested, I say ‘noooo, ANYWHERE else!’
The food is the worst combination of unhealthy AND un-​delicious. Service is alright, but can be really slow at times. Their caesar was so overly salty and disgusting that I went through a phase of not drinking caesars ever (tragic).
I’ve eaten here fairly often, but only because of the lack of other restaurants in the area.

UPDATE: My first review for The Tuscany Village Original Joe’s was 5 stars. It was amazing and I frequented Joe’s at least once a week for many months. It was my ‘Cheers’ and I loved it. I got to know the servers and received nothing but the best service. The food was always delicious and they handled my friend’s extremely picky taste and abrasive personality extremely well. Unfortunately the last few times I’ve gone it has been awful. I understand that around 6 employees have left and there are new people in the front and the back, but that doesn’t excuse the poor service and long wait times. One night we were served food with charred onions that were very visible on top of the food and my aunt got a stone cold Double Dog and they forgot to add the banana peppers (something that is always on the food, not a random add on). This time it took a good 3 minutes to be seated and I know that doesn’t sound long but I’ve worked in restaurants for a long time and the general rule is to be greeted and seated with in 10 – 30 seconds. We walked in and there was literally no employees and barely any customers. We eventually got seated and ordered food. There were 4 or 5 other tables and all we ordered were appies and a veggie burger. It took WAY to long for our food to come out. The fish in the fish taco’s were cold, and some of the muscles were cold. I don’t know if people just aren’t being trained properly and aren’t getting the proper support they need from management or what but I am getting frustrated with how things are going. I truly love Original Joe’s but I’m not willing to spend money there if I’m not getting the best service. I’ll keep checking in every once and awhile to see if they get back up to the high standards they have set for themselves, and I truly hope that management will step up and support their new staff with proper scheduling and training.

Worst service ever! Even on the slowest Saturday I’ve seen for lunch at any restaurant lately. Now I can see why it was so dead.
I went with my family for lunch last Saturday. We thought it was a seat yourself type thing, as no one acknowledged us until we were walking towards a booth. Then a male server came over to seat us with menus.
We sat down, ordered drinks and looked at the menu. A bit later (a bit too long later), our server came over to finally take our order.
We sat around for an hour and our food still didn’t come and the restaurant was DEAD. It would’ve been understandable if it was packed, but there was maybe 4 other families. Our server never addressed the fact that it had been 30 or even 45 minutes since we had ordered. Usually a server will acknowledge the fact that the food is late and apologize and bring over a complimentary appetizer as you wait. It was like we didn’t even exist. To make it even worse, the other people that came in after us had gotten their food before us.
I can’t believe the horrible service we received especially with how dead it was. I can’t imagine how the staff could handle a busy night. Yikes.
I have gone to the location in Langford and never had anything like this happen. This makes me not want to visit an Original Joe’s again after this. I definitely will never be back to this locations ever again.

It’s all Good at O.J.‘s
Great room, great food, reasonable prices, good location, great service, extensive and varied menu, large beer selection, beer served quickly ice cold in a large pint glass, what’s not to like? Had the Pacific Noodle bowl and sampled some of the poutine. Both fantastic. Noodle Bowl was the largest size bowl I have ever seen in a restaurant. Tons of good noodles, chicken breast, veggies and prawns. Also had lots of big screen TVs, which makes it great for watching sports. This place just might become a new favourite hangout. I’ll definitely go back. Good work OJ!