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| - While the food here isn't bad, I am practically duty-bound to leave a 1-star review for Chautara due to the unacceptably poor level of service I received one Saturday afternoon.
I had such a terrible dining experience here that a friend and I actually got up and walked back to the kitchen to complain about how poor of a job they were doing. It takes a lot for me to vocalize directly to the restaurant staff that they're ruining my meal, because of how painful and uncomfortable of an experience it is for both parties. I also hate that I'll end up manipulating my way into (or having my opinion manipulated by) a comped check; yet this was such an incredibly embarrassing and infuriating waste of time that I was outraged by the $9 discount they offered for me my trouble.
Their response to a clearly-upset customer was to hand me an order ticket and have me write my complaints in the empty space on the back. So I had to return to my table and scribble down all their problems for them, while I should have been enjoying my own meal that they had failed to deliver up to this point. I promptly ran out of space on the ticket and handed it back to them, and watched them pin it up on the wall next to their take out orders. At no point was I even offered the chance to speak with a manager.
We had come here with a friend who was gluten-intolerant, on the recommendation of a local gluten-free group's listing of "gluten-free-friendly" restaurants in Madison (I've since e-mailed them to recommend they remove Chautara). They had apparently been mistaken, because when asked about the menu the server was practically clueless as to what it meant nor could he fetch someone that did know. After insisting that 90% of the menu contains gluten and shrugging (i.e. not offering any alternatives), my friend ultimately ended up ordering the salmon salad. That is, until the server returned about TWENTY MINUTES LATER to inform her that they could not fry up a piece of salmon without using gluten - why I can do this in my kitchen at home, but a bunch of trained chefs at a restaurant cannot do so, is beyond my comprehension.
It also blows my mind how the waiter could not be bothered to go back to the kitchen and say "hey guys, remember how we got accolades for accommodating gluten-free customers? Can we do whatever we did then and whip up something for her that has no gluten?" Nope. I'm just gonna stand here like an idiot and shrug at her. The lack of flexibility was appalling. Even McDonald's will change up my burger if I ask.
So, about 45 minutes in, we receive our fucking appetizers. They're decent but I can't even notice because at this point I'm so seething mad about how long the food has taken and how I've brought my friend to a restaurant where the waiter insults her. Main course shows up maybe another half hour later, and my friend's plate (a plain salad) twenty minutes after that.
The thing is, when you have a really good meal at a really bad restaurant, your customer isn't going to remember you for the food. They're going to remember you for the abuse you put them through, and so the details of my meal are inconsequential to this review.
Keep in mind that my friend's unusual diet was not the root of our problems. It was the unbelievably slow and unprofessional service, which affected every customer who was present that day. At one point someone saw the aforementioned salad being assembled leaf-by-leaf.
When a customer walks in to your restaurant they're not just a bag of money - they are also choosing to invest 30-45 minutes of their time for you. When you rip a customer off for their time, thus making the experience the opposite of what they expected, it is far less forgivable than ripping them off for their money. At least the menu has prices to narrow the disparity between expectations and reality.
I walked out of the restaurant two hours after I had entered, regretting that I had ever come there and swearing that I and hopefully nobody I know will ever go there again.
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