Theresa M.
Yelp
I have been holding off on my review due to a couple of situations we encountered while dining at this location. I have given them and their corporate headquarters time to resolve the issues and now I'm ready to write my review.
A group of us dined at this location about a week ago. We arrived a bit early, around 420pm for a 515pm reservation. I read online they had a Happy Hour that started at 430pm. The hostess at the front (whom I did not get her name) was less than helpful. She insisted that that bar and restaurant opened at 5pm and that Happy Hour started at 5pm, too. I asked if we could sit in the bar and wait, since the bar area was open. She kept saying, it's not going to open till 5pm, but sure.
"Amazingly" at 430pm about 10 people arrived to the bar and sat at the counter. A bartender whom had been cleaning served everyone. At that point, I asked to speak with a manager. A man named Gabriel came over and spoke with me. Listened to my concerns, and the best he could come up with was, "Well, not to make excuses, but she is new." Really? You're "not making excuses, but you are." Fine, whatever, just wanted to let you know to possibly train your host staff better.
We were seated, at 5pm, which was nice. We went up to the salad bar to get our "first course." The food options were plentiful and everything looked fresh. There were several types of lettuce, cold cuts like salami and prosciutto, olives, cheeses, and a large assortment of other items. It was very bountiful and if not careful, one could fill up on salad and have no room for all the wonderful meat items.
If you've never been to a churrascaria, the meats should be "consistently" be offered to you through your meal while you have your paper or "wood" turned to green. If you turn it to "red" then the servers won't offer more food.
No worries of that happening, here. This place doesn't seem to serve you anything (at least not during our visit) unless you ask the server specifically for what you want (there's probably 20 types of meat). Actually, I must correct that statement. They will ask if you want chicken wings all night long. I'm sure because it's one of the cheapest meats they offer. Anything, else be prepared to ask repeatedly from your waiter.
Finally, when we'd had enough, I asked our server, "Is dessert included"? He responded, "Yes, I'll bring it over in a minute." He returned a bit later with a tray of yummy looking desserts and we all chose what we wanted." The desserts were all good. I ordered carrot cake. It was quite a large slice and could serve 2 with no problem, however my husband order the bananas foster. My friend ordered carrot cake and her husband got the key lime pie, I believe.
The bill arrived while we were in the middle of dessert. My jaw dropped. It was approximately $50 more than we expected because they charged us for dessert.
I called to speak to a manager. Lucky me, they sent over Gabriel to our table. Truly, a rock would have been more helpful. I went over the whole situation and he tells me that it's stated on their menu that desserts are extra. WHAT MENU?? No one offered or gave us a menu! I specifically asked the server if desserts were included and he said YES.
Does this useless excuse for a manager try to do ANYTHING to make things right? Nope, of course not. He actually made things WORSE!! He said he was not comping us for desserts because it's clearly noted on menu. Next, he said he is job is "to tell people the rules and enforce them." Next, I'm saying very loudly that I'll be contacting corporate. To which he replied, "I suggest you do that because they will be able to help you better than me." Really? I think my cat could help me better than you!!!
I reached out to corporate and they gave me the old, "Oh we're so sorry this happened, and we'll take it up with the appropriate people to assure this doesn't happen again, yada, yada, yada." But they didn't offer any kind of compensation. I had to write and SUGGEST they do something to make up for this poor treatment. Finally, they offered a $20 certificate to use in the future.
Honestly, I am hoping that it gets sent because right before this mess happened we bought their VIP card for nearly $70 in order to save 50% on 12 meals. Which is a deal considering their normal dinners run around $62 per person.
I am desperately hoping this was a one-off situation, and that in the future the service will be more along the lines of what I've experienced at other churrascarias, and I hope I won't have to interact with the same manager in the future for anything.