| rev:text
| - I have had various types of experience in restaurants: some very great, some not so good, some just okay. This one, unfortunately, was just disappointing all around. The majority of my experience is tainted with the deficient service I received.
In my mind, there is no justification for not receiving any service, not even a glass of water, for the first half-hour. Sure, we were a group and for some time we were still waiting on some of our dinner mates. However, why can't those of us already here not be offered a glass of water? Or if we want to order a drink or an appetizer while we wait on our friends?
We asked a few waiters that were there if we could get a glass of water and some bread. Every single one of them answered 'sorry, not your waiter/waitress'. We had been sitting there for so long, I couldn't even remember what our waitress looked like. But even if this is not your table, this 'not my table, not my problem' attitude just makes me feel like we're unwanted patrons. Let me add that we did have a reservation, we weren't that large a group (7) so it's not like we dumped a surprise big group on them on an already busy night. In fact, the restaurant was really not all that busy and there were not really any new tables in the whole time we were there as we had a late dinner reservation.
Once our waitress deigned make an appearance to our table, we asked if we could get a basket of bread. And we got some water. Things were looking up. Except, she disappeared again. Every time she came near our table we tried to ask if our bread was coming. The 3rd time she said 'yes it's been ordered'. It had been a good 20 min by then. We were actually starting to discuss among us if they even had bread but figured, surely, she would've said so if they didn't have any. Finally we see some bread come out of the kitchen and land...on a different table! The 2nd time a waiter came out with some bread and made his way toward a different table we just flagged him down and said that we believe this bread is ours and requested that it be brought to our table. Thankfully, he didn't say anything. That was the best part of the night.
Of course we scarfed down our bread in 10 seconds because we were starving from all the wait so we asked our waitress if we could get another basket of bread to which she said she would bring it right away. Spoiler alert: bread never arrived.
Appetizers went without a hitch. The empanada was a little disappointing. The roasted pumpkin soup was actually delicious, though a little too heavy on the yogurt. I quite liked the spinach balls as well.
The next bit was a little weird. One of our dinner mates didn't order an appetizer so she asked to have her dinner to be served after the appetizers, at the same time as other people's main dish. Except it arrived after the appetizers and before the rest of us got our main dish. When she pointed it out to the waitress she said "oh I thought you wanted it right away". "No, I wanted it at the same time as everyone else's dinner" "Oh well, it's okay, the other plates are on their way, anyway". She forgot to mention that 'on their way' meant 'another 15 min'. She did like her dinner though it was cold by the time she ate it.
When the waitress brought the rest of the plates, she didn't know who ordered what or what she had brought. She could only recall part of the Spanish name for the dish but that wasn't helpful to us at all. In the end we guessed what was on the plate and handed it to the appropriate party and we turned out to be right about what she brought. This was, however, too much unnecessary detective work. The food was alright but nothing memorable. The portions were tiny but we went on an evening they had a special menu. Maybe we should've ordered from the regular menu.
At the very end, we were so appalled by the service or rather lack thereof that this was reflected in our tip. I understand that the waitress was offended but instead of asking us about it she complained to her manager. The manager came to us and we explained everything mentioned in this review. He was apologetic (our waitress never came to apologize) and wanted to make it up to us by offering us drinks or desserts. While this was appreciated, we just wanted to leave the restaurant at that point.
I would like to point out that most of us have worked in restaurants before. We have had our fair share of bad and difficult days and having to keep our game on despite everything going on. As a result we try to be empathetic and patient patrons but this was too much. There did not seem to be any effort whatsoever from our waitress. As mentioned previously, when our waitress was MIA, the other waiters in the restaurant also refused to serve us since we were not their assigned table. I sincerely hope the manager took our criticism seriously and provided further training to his staff but unfortunately I simply cannot take the risk of spending another awful meal here.
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