Columbia Steak House

Old school Lexington Steak house. Good place to grab lunch, very good special daily. Wait staff very helpful and attentive to your needs.

Once upon a time, Columbia Steak House served consistently good food that brought you back time after time. That no longer seems to be the case. Upon my most recent visit, my meal was disappointing.
I ordered the Ribeye, their second most expensive steak. It is described as 12 oz. and «well marbled for maximum flavor.» If it was in fact 12 ounces, at least 4 ounces of it was nothing more than mere fat.
In addition, it had the appearance of being tenderized with a jack hammer. Visually it was not appealing and in reality, there simply wasn’t much flavor. While a minor point, they have changed their rolls apparently since my last visit and the rolls I was served were cold and tasteless. The butter also tasted odd. (Cheap brand?) Their house-​made Thousand Island was also unremarkable and I wouldn’t order it again. The service was satisfactory but the meal was not.
The next time I am in the mood for a steak, I will most likely drive past Columbia Steak House on Richmond Road to dine somewhere else. It is, in my opinion, in decline from its heydays.

I have eaten here over the years and used to be a real treat. Today food was cold, the night hawk special appears they have cut cost by using a cheap butter like material instead of the real thing.
Service was good but don’t waste time

Ew. Eww. May I just take a moment for one more «eww». My boyfriend’s salad was soggy, he couldn’t even eat it. My tenderloin? Was this congealed piece of beef not even warm soaked in garlic butter. You could barely chew it, much less swallow it. And I wish I had taken a picture of it, because it was grey and slimy! I made due with my potato and rolls. Our waitress was nice, and seemed really overworked. Good service, awful food.

I’ve lived in Lexington all my life. I used to go to Columbia’s all the time with my parents and it used to be amazing, «used to» being the key phrase. While Columbia’s was formerly a jewel of Lexington, with fantastic steaks and service, over the past few years, it has slowly taken a downward spiral to awful. The last two times that my boyfriend and I went there, the service was sometimes lackluster to bad, but other times good. So really depending on the server you get, the service is hit or miss. The steaks, which I like medium rare, have been medium to medium well every single time. One of the times that we went there, they exchanged (without asking me) the steak fries that I loved for crinkle cut fries. If one orders a STEAK, one would assume that one would be getting STEAK fries with their meal. I have quit ordering the Diego salad all together because the last time I ordered it, it was just a plate of over dressed (soggy) iceberg lettuce. The garden salad is much better! The last time we went was the last straw. When our steaks came to us, they were on sizzling fajita style plates. I was literally baffled by this. The plate was sizzling so hard that I was afraid it was going to burn me if I touched it. Why you are putting a cooked steak on a sizzling plate anyway is beyond me. Again, my steak was way overcooked. I don’t know if this is because of the sizzle plate or if this is because the cook has a different understanding of medium rare than I do. I also had to get up to get my own ketchup as no one had offered to bring me any.
TL;DR I used to have high expectations of this place, but now it sucks a bunch. You’d be better off buying steaks and fixings at a grocery store and doing it yourself than go here.

For steak lovers, it doesn’t get much better than this in Lexington!
I’m a regular customer here, the owner Greg is great! I always get the Nighthawk Special. Comes with a 2 sides & mouth watering steak, in a special garlic butter. WOW!
Food is always cooked properly, great price for the quality of food!

Been here multiple times… but this time was absolutly horrible. Waitress never got us refills, could only remember one thing at a time when we asked for napkins and a spoon for our soup. And then got a bit of an attitude when we asked for a refill. Sad.

A restaurant name with «Steak House» must do two things well: steak and potatoes. Columbia disappointed us on both. Sari ordered the 12oz rib eye with steak fries, I ordered the 8oz sirloin with a double-​baked. We both ordered our steaks rare and both steaks were cooked to the correct temperature.
My steak was OK but Sari’s was just so-​so. Both steaks were served on hot cast iron; all that does is steam the beef as it sits on the plate. Cook the steaks to temperature and serve on a warm plate.
The potatoes were the real failure though. Sari’s steak fries were limp and soggy; they were inedible. Half of them were covered by her steak on the serving plate and she hoped that the other ones would be different but they were all the same. Serving the fries that way didn’t cause the problem, it was just bad cooking, but if there isn’t room on plate for the side (s), use another plate. The potato skin on my double-​baked was soggy too so I suspect it was partially cooked in foil or microwaved.
We didn’t expect dry-​aged, prime beef, steaks, but we expected better than we received.

We were in for dinner on Saturday evening and had a great time. We were promptly seated at 5 PM, our waitress did a great job, the food came out fast, and everything was cooked perfectly. We’ve been eating at Columbia Steak House for over 15 years and I’ll be the first to admit that the food quality is hit or miss at the Richmond Rd location. However, tonight it was excellent.

I met a great group of ladies here tonight. The service was just okay, a lot of clutter left on the table and the hostess of our group sat with an empty water glass for over 15 minutes. I paid $ 19.99 for a medium prime rib (judge me for ordering medium, I should have ordered medium rare). It was medium well and well done. The broccoli casserole was more like a quiche or frittata with no flavor. Total, total let down. I brought the left overs home. It was confirmed by my friend who tossed the leftovers in the trash… «Was this a buffet? A bad buffet?» and «that’s unfortunate». Horrible. I can guarantee I will never be back.

I’ve eaten here many times, and would have ordinarily given them 5 stars, largely because of the great steaks and baked potatoes. But the quality of food has declined, and now I’d only give it 1 star. And then today I get a rotten potato on one order, and a hard potato on the other order. I called to complain, and I got an apology and a $ 5 credit. But why would I want to drive 30 minutes across town and waste another 20 bucks and tip, when I know the food has a good chance of being bad.

Waited over an hour ½ at the table for our dinner. We ended up leaving. Horrible service. Won’t be coming back.

Awful, awful, awful… I came in to get a carry out order and was sat at the bar. I took my jacket off and had short sleeves on and sat my arm down in something sticky that I have no idea what it was and not sure I want to! The bartender that took my order was extremely nice. She gave me a wet towel to wipe my arm of lf and all lol. But she took my order and gave me a free soda while I was waiting. So I get my food, paid and left a really good tip ($ 8) for the amount of work she had to do. I’m not upset about that at all as she deserved it and is the only reason I didn’t give a single star. Anyways I get home and am exited as can be to eat. I open the foil up and my steak is drenched in butter of some sort and looked great. So I get everything put on a plate and sat down ready to dig in. The potato was gross from the first look. It was cold and was every bit of a week or two past it’s prime. The steak like I said looked amazing but as soon as I cut into it, we’ll tried to anyways, I found out it was solid gristle.. like I took one bite and couldn’t even chew it up… So I tossed it and basically the only thing I ate was the salad… But I tried the one that delivers and it was just as gross. If you want Columbia Steakhouse then stick with the down town location!

I would give this place 2.5 stars if they’d let me but I can’t. I heard this place was fantastic but for me it didn’t live up the the hype. They were a little busy when we got there. We were told a ten minute wait that ended up around 40 minutes. The food was good. Not great just good. My steak was cooked just right which sometimes it’s hard to get a steak cooked medium. Our waiter was horrible. He looked very overwhelmed. He took our food order, someone else dropped off our steaks, and we didn’t see him until after we had finished eating and sat there another ten minutes wanting a drink.
I would avoid this place during busy times as that was most of my complaints here. I might do that myself next time I’m in town.

The best part of the meal was the server. It was very packed and he did very good under understaffed conditions. The nighthawk special was not like I remember it. The grilled pork chop was very blan also. The kids meal Mac and cheese was out of the box very sad.

Sat at the bar and was greeted right away by one of the bartenders. She was nice compared to the other one working the bar. Food was ok but the service was less than desired.
1. The rude bartender splashed her dirty dish water into my beer glass. When she was told about it by the other bartender she didn’t apologize and just acted like nothing happened.
2. During our visit the rude bartender was making rude remarks about other customers and employees at the restaurant.
3. Never once did the rude bartender measure a drink to make a correct mixed drink. Eyeballing the drinks all the way…
4. The rude bartender was giving away drinks for no reason. So if you’re looking to get drunk, she’s your gal.
Overall, won’t be back.

The Manhattan and vodka tonic i had were very good! The prime rib I had was terrible… I usually get my steak rare, but since i had not been to this place before I asked for medium just to be careful. The steak was so cold i couldn’t even bare to eat it considering the price you pay this was very disappointing. In the experience I’ve had with food and beverage i never send food back to the kitchen. The service was excellent but i wouldn’t go back.

Disappointing service was poor, I am long time customer of Columbia’s when only limestone location was the place to go. But tonight we ordered ribeye sandwiches our server did not ask how we wanted them cooked everyone does not like rare to medium rare steak, on the menu horseradish sauce is listed we had to ask, again server did not ask what dressing I wanted on my salad I had to wait a long time to get dressing after rest of my party was enjoying their salad, I asked for steak fries and was served frozen crinkle fries and again I had to wait for my fries by the time I received the horseradish sauce and fries I was finished with my sandwich. Almost forgot it took 2 tries to get the horseradish sauce the first was sour cream.

This place is my cousin’s favorite spot, so I decided that despite the fact that I don’t eat steak, that I must try Columbia’s out with her. It had been years since the last time I’d been, when I did eat steak. Apparently they no longer offer the Night Hawk special though.
We were there on a busy Friday night, we waited about 30 minutes for an available table. Then it took a while to get our drinks once we were finally seated. Not a big deal really, just not tip top service throughout the whole meal.
I ordered the Hotbrown, as if it weren’t huge enough, it came with 2 sides. The Diego salad was ok but didn’t seem as big as the regular side salad. The baked potato was huge! Back to the Hotbrown, yummmm! One of the best I’ve had but the recipe seems to be commonly known within several local restaurants. If you’re visiting the area and haven’t had a hot brown, you must not miss it here. Thank me later.

What can I say about Columbia Steak House, other than Y-​freakin-​UM, I love this place. From the Nighthawk, to the Hot Brown it’s amazing across the board. I’m a huge fan of good bread too, and the bread here is to die for (and with the butter they use, chances are you will!)
I alternate from the Hot Brown to the Steak, but ALWAYS. ALWAYS and The Rock Means… ALLLLWAYS get the Corn Pudding. It’s the star of the show and keeps me coming back year after year.
I don’t live too far away from Columbia’s, so it’s easy to get in and out fairly quickly. The only reason they didn’t get a 5 star rating from me, sadly, is the service. I’ve failed to have a server here in ALL the times i’ve went, that actually took proper care of us. Sure we got our food, and our drinks, but the attention you get from a server sets the mood for the meal.
Moral of the story: GET THE CORN PUDDING OR GTFO!