I Heart Mac & Cheese has only been open for a month and is constantly flooded with customers.
Jamison Shelton, a freshman here at KHS and employee of I Heart Mac & Cheese, states that “definitely ‘The Best of Both Worlds’” is the most popular dish on the menu. It includes grilled cheese with mac and cheese, short rib, and barbecue, so it really is “The Best of Both Worlds.”
Shelton notes that “there are so many” different options on the menu. “There’s signature bowls, you can build your own bowl, build your own mac and cheese, or build your own grilled cheese,” he adds.
I Heart Mac & Cheese is said to be very friendly. “The owners are married and they have a really good bond… They’re really kind to everyone,” Shelton comments.
The restaurant is set up similarly to Chipotle and Moe’s. It has a bar of many toppings to choose from. Customers walk down the bar and tell the employee their order as they go. This allows the customers to see exactly how their food is made and ensures the accuracy of their order. The bar setup takes away the long wait that customers in typical restaurant settings face. The food comes in heart shaped bowls, which is a cute little edition considering the name of the restaurant is “I Heart Mac & Cheese.”
Shelton always suggests that customers get the “‘build your own bowl’ or grilled cheese because you can never go wrong if you know what you like. So you can just put whatever you want on it, and if you don’t like it, well, you chose it.”
Despite the bustling business this restaurant brings in, Mr. Wilson, English teacher at Kempsville High School, did not have a pleasant experience. He states that the food was “garbage. Absolute garbage.”
He explained that he didn’t pick up the food, so he didn’t have the chance to encounter the service, but “the food itself was depressively mid.”
Mr. Wilson ordered the chicken parmesan mac and cheese dish. He “was expecting chicken strips and marinera, and some mozzarella cheese on top… It was like these chicken meatballs that were, I guess they were kind of fried, I don’t know. The marinera didn’t go with the mac ‘n’ cheese… and the mac and cheese wasn’t seasoned at all.”
He added that the consistency of the mac and cheese wasn’t up to par. Instead “it was really loose, it wasn’t like a thick mac and cheese sauce, it was kind of watery. So, it wasn’t great, it wasn’t great.”
Mr. Wilson mentioned that his coworker said the same thing about her food; she didn’t enjoy it either.
Many people have ordered from this place and have expressed that their experience was the opposite of Mr. Wilson’s. Nevertheless, every person is going to have a different encounter due to when they go, the food they order, or how much they order. All these factors add up to the type of experience that person may get. The specific dish they ordered, like Mr. Wilson, may have been made by a new worker, or the dish may not have been perfected quite yet. All in all, the restaurant itself is a very lively place, and has mostly had positive comments about it. Remember that this is a new business and there are many things yet to be improved and perfected, so take your order with a grain of salt.
