Morgan R.
Yelp
Minna is a new restaurant, and I wanted to give them the benefit of the doubt as they get up to speed, but there were problems.
The staff was friendly, and on each visit they provided a felafel on a fork to eat while waiting - the felafels are good, and this is a nice gesture. My first order was over the phone, and it was a frustrating experience - the person who answered the phone had trouble both understanding me and making himself understood - clearly English is not his first language. I'm sure that will improve over time.
The restaurant itself is largely focused on takeout orders - although there are some tables and chairs, the atmosphere is stark and unadorned - and most of the chairs were occupied by people waiting for their orders - it was not a place you'd want to sit and eat (though you could).
The ordering system in the restaurant is an ultra-modern computer interface with big touch screens and automated payment - clearly somewhere there is someone behind this restaurant with some money - compared to the computer for ordering, the behind the counter setup was minimalist and simple, just the bare bones needed to provide the food.
When I walked in and ordered lunch using the computer screen, the order was easy and the receipt was accurate - the gyro was pretty good - the beef/lamb gyro meat was tasty, the pita fresh. There was way too much salad, not enough tahini or tzatziki or whatever ... but on the whole, it was ok.
When we ordered dinner by phone, we ordered a felafel plate and a lamb shish kebab plate. The felafel balls were good and flavorful. They were accompanied with hummus, what appeared to be baba ghanoush, along with salad, pita, and a side of tahini. The hummus and baba ghanoush (if that's indeed what it was, perhaps it's something else similar?) were both bland and not very appealing, lacking in garlic or other flavor. There really wasn't enough pita to allow easy consumption of the hummus and baba ghanoush. The salad was pretty standard and bland (though it did include cucumbers) and the tahini could be used either on the felafel or the salad, but the salad didn't have it's own dressing, and neither of us finished our salads.
The lamb in the shish kebab plate was flavorful, but of middling quality - some fairly good, some quite chewy. The lamb came with rice, salad, pita, and some tahini on top of the lamb. Without any kind of salad dressing, the salad didn't really work.
And then there was the bill. I was given a receipt, which I didn't examine in the restaurant, but it was for someone else's dinner, a different order entirely. When I added up the costs of the food I ordered (and got) based on their menu on-line, the lamb kebab plate was $17.50, the felafel plate $13.00. That's a subtotal of $30.50 + 10.35% sales tax, would make it $33.66. I did leave a standard tip (as I recall, the choices on the payment screen were 18%, 20% and 22%?, but I could be wrong). Since my usual tip is 20%, and they take the percentage of the pre-tax amount, that would have been $6.10. That would have been a total of $39.76. But the charge that appeared on my credit card was $42.36. And not only was the amount wrong, but it didn't match the receipt I was given that was for someone else's food either.
Do you get a pattern here? Despite their fancy computer system, they didn't charge me for what I ordered and got, totally an amateur operation in that regard, including getting the wrong receipt, and the wrong total charge.
So sadly, as much as I wanted to like this new startup restaurant, I was disappointed. After two visits with similar experiences, I won't be going back. They will probably work the kinks out over time, and I want to support a small business getting started, but it's hard to recommend a place with so many issues - I hope they up their game soon.
