Jeff S.
Yelp
I am the first one that understands that restaurants have a bad night, and it's very rare that I'll post a one-star review especially on a restaurant that we've visited multiple times. But last night was a disaster, and to make matters worse it was my wife's birthday - - there were 4 of us anxiously looking forward to a nice celebration dinner.
We were [fortunately] seated in our favorite booth past the bar where it's quieter than out in the main lobby, but that's where the experience ended. We waited 10 minutes before being acknowledged, and another 10 minutes before our drinks and chips/salsa arrived. My wife ordered a margarita with no salt, but it came loaded with salt. Another 10 minute wait for a replacement...
Note: Azul was NOT busy
We ordered appetizers before thinking about what we wanted for dinner. The cheese on the nachos wasn't melted at all...I'm not talking about cheese sprinkled on top; I'm talking about the cheese that you find throughout the nachos that you look forward to binding all the goodies together when you pull out a chip. But by this time we were hungry and decided that we could power through it. Another thing we noticed was the quantity of nachos/goodies in this order: it was only 75% of what a typical order would be...shrinkflation perhaps?
Next came the chicken quesadilla - completely soggy from the pico that was ladled onto the plate. My wife tried sopping up the liquid with a napkin but there weren't enough napkins on our table. She sent it back by flagging down a passing waitress (who by the way was annoyed that we would even think of sending back a dish as simple as a chicken quesadilla.) Another 10 minute wait for the replacement, but it was only moderately better (the tortilla had already begun soaking up the liquid from the pico.)
We quickly pulled all 4 pieces off the plate to keep the quesadilla from drowning. Here's a very simple solution: just ladle the pico into a small ramekin to keep the flour quesadilla tortilla from becoming waterlogged!
After long waits during the appetizers, not being asked if we wanted another drink, poor attitudes, and substandard food quality, we decided to skip dinner and call it a night. Oh, and another 10 minute wait to track down our waiter for the bill.
And by the way, we aren't the type of people looking to get something for nothing, but I mentioned to the waiter that we were celebrating my wife's birthday - - we didn't stay long enough to order a dessert...
Come on, Azul - you're better than that. You've had my business for 3+ years now and I sincerely hope this doesn't start a trend...