pigslywink

Reviews

Restaurants, Modern Australian, BYO, Has Bar, Licensed

Overall 7.6 65

3.3 Below Average

Food 4 Ambience 4 Service 1 Value 4

My review relates to tonights experience. We have had many a great night at Linda's but won't be going back after tonight. Although I made a booking on DIMMI and had the booking confirmed we turned up only to find that they had no record of my booking.

I showed the Host my emailed "confirmed booking" only to be told "I told those guys to leave me alone and I wasn't using them anymore for bookings". We were so disappointed and the whole thing was so unprofessional!

As the host was checking his list another couple came in after us, luckily for them, been a cancellation so he seated them without a problem.

I said to the guy "but you just seated those guys without a reservation who actually came in after us and I had a reservation". He basically blamed the entire thing on DIMMI which according to him he hadn't used for ages.

We have actually been to Linda's many times and always used DIMMI for our bookings. I was more disappointed that his attitude was that he couldn't have care a less, no apology and no sympathy for two regulars who turn up with an email confirmed reservation.

We've basically just had a ruined evening thanks to the management at Lindas.

Jan 14, 2012

La Boheme Restaurant & Coffee Shop, Balmain

Restaurants, Belgian, European, German, Vegetarian

Overall 7.5 133

3 Below Average

Food 1 Ambience 7 Service 3 Value 1

I booked this restaurant for a few friends and had been looking forward to this for weeks prior. I didn't have outstanding expectations of the food but I at least thought it would be "nice". The restaurants itself had a nice atmosphere, the service was attentive, although majorly let down by the food which was way below average, if not inedible for most of our dishes!

Our starter was some pretzels which were totally encrusted with salt crystals and the herbed camembert with two tiny slices of fruit bread barely big enough for even One person. Again, it came with a portion of herbed butter that was so salty you just couldn't eat it (not that I don't like salty food!). What I really do wonder is whether the kitchen staff actually tastes his food before sending it out to customers?

For the mains one of us had the schnitzel which looked quite nice although the sauerkraut was very poor and wondered if it had been out of a tin (again Salt was the let down).

I, myself, had the Bavarian feast which was basically a meat platter served also with sauerkraut. Every piece of the meat on the platter was dried out and it was such a shame! You could barely even taste the nice flavours of the meat. I guess I would have really enjoyed it if it hadn't been so overcooked to the point where you couldn't even cut it!

The 3rd person at our table ordered the mussels and the sauce was so salty that you simply couldn't eat it.

Being that we felt so let down, we mentioned this to the waitress and she went and mentioned it to the kitchen staff to "see what she could do". Apparently the kitchen staff had told her that this was just the natural seawater which had overly salted the dish and it was "meant to be like that".

Each one of us has eaten this dish at other restaurants many times and never had anything that disappointing before. It was a poor excuse for a badly cooked dish....made us wonder whether the kitchen staff thought we were stupid enough to believe the reason for it.

Most people when cooking seafood do actually wash them first and the mussels themselves Aren't that potent with sea salt! The girl wasn't apologetic. She just told us as it was and that was it......so we decided to leave there without desserts and without a tip, being that we were so disappointed by our experience!

I guess if I owned a restaurant I would make sure that everything I serve tasted nice before it was sent out and at the very least, responded to a complaint in the kitchen if someone had sent a dish back. We were there right at the beginning of the night so I would hate to think how dried out the meat would have been later on! Again, kitchen staff let the place down!

No one at our table had anything against salty food or is that precious they can't handle a bit of salt but this was just beyond a joke!

Hope you'll think twice before visiting this place. There are alot of German places around which serve so much nicer food that I'd not bother with La Boheme (unless it's only the atmosphere you're after).

Jan 08, 2012

Corn Exchange Restaurant, Sydney

Restaurants, International, Seafood, Family Dining, Air Conditioning

Overall 7.2 45

2.3 Not Recommended

Food 2 Ambience 4 Service 2 Value 1

Seems to be a while since anyone has reviewed this restaurant and after reading so many positive comments I was eager to come here. We were deeply disappointed.

I read below about sushi and balmain bugs and even lobster but tonight those items didn't exist. A simple very limited buffet with prawns, oysters which hadn't been shucked properly and full of shell and some very average mussels. The hot food contained only 3 dishes. I just couldn't believe that we had waited so long to come here only to find something this mediocre!

We had the 8.30 pm seating and the place was virtually empty. A handful of people with many reserved tables set up and not occupied! Very very average, staff very eager to take plates and cutlery away and not replace them and a wine list with bottles starting from $45. I expected so much more for $80 a head, at the least I expected to have some variety and the type of seafood listed in the reviews below, what happened to this place? It "was one of the apparent "best in Sydney".

Certainly far from that now. I wish we'd stuck to the casino.

Sep 11, 2010