Andre Souza
Google
TLDR: Amazing food. Untrained staff. Mediocre service and poor management... We will certainly not go back, nor will we recommend to friends...
We were a group of 5 going out to celebrate by wife's birthday while in Lisbon... We had heard many positive things about this place, and booked a table approximately 2 and a half months ago. I must say that I was left disappointed, not by the food, but by the service and actions of some of the employees.
I'll start off with the food. The food was delicious, the chef truly knows what they are doing there ...
The service on the other hand did not meet the expectations based on the hype and price...
The waiter, although a very nice gentleman, did not seem to have been well trained or have knowledge of the menu. As we would order items (at times in English and at times in Portuguese), he would come around so that we could show him the item on the menu... Given that we were seated at the far back table at a corner, he at times needed to squeeze between us to see what we wanted... But that is all ok, not a problem at all... We put our orders through, and my wife ordered the Saltimbocca, specifically asking for it to be medium rare... When the food came, it was well done, and I proceeded to speak to the waiter about it. The waiter spoke to the manager, and came back and said that it was not possible to cook it medium rare as it was cooked slowly... If that is the case, he should have mentioned that when taking the order for a medium rare saltimbocca... No problem, we asked him to swap it out for the Tenderloin, which was done promptly... The waiter really tried hard, which I appreciate, however in the end the service expectations were certainly not met.
The staff seemed to always be "running around" likely because they had too many tables per employee... The guy who brought the bread would rush things and leave before we could actually finish a full sentence (he did that 3x)...
The water was slow to come, and as we were sitting at a corner that was quite warm, we were drinking a good amount of water... After having asked for more water for my wife, and waiting a few minutes, I decided to get up and simply grab the bottle (which was only about 2 metres from me)... At that point the manager, who was close by, runs over and gets the half empty bottle from my hands saying that he would like for us to feel at home, so we should not need to get up... But then he proceeds to look at the bottle and say that it was not enough for all of us, and that he would ask the waiter to bring a new bottle. He then took the half empty bottle away, and did not pour the water for any of us, leaving us thirsty and staring at a half empty bottle of water...
Another issue was related the so called sommelier... My wife was having a glass of Prosecco, and her glass was down to about half, and it had been sitting for about 45 minutes so it was warm... I ordered another glass, and the Sommelier simply tops her glass up with some more Prosecco!!! I asked to speak to him and asked him why he would do such thing... He said this is what he does because the glass is already cold... I proceeded to tell him that it was warm, as it had been sitting for a while, but also that simply adding cold Prosecco to the warm glass would not be sufficient, as we were paying for another glass but only getting a couple of ounces... He seemed bothered and rudely said that if we wanted a fresh new glass, he would get it for us (and that is what he did, and then disappeared to never show up again).
The gap between the end of the appetizer round and the serving of the main course was excessive to the point where my 2 daughters and my wife felt full after the long 45 min wait.
Despite these issues, I was surprised the manager never came to speak to us at all, as one would expect...
The bill came to about €100 per person, with an average of 1 alcoholic drink per person.
Yes, the food was excellent, but when going to a place like this, we expect an experience, not just good food... We can get good food for €10 in many places...