O Espeta Restaurant

Friendly atmosphere, good service

Very poor service and management, if you have half a day to wait and want to die of hunger go here.

Went to this restaurant late August 2023 with my family. We are Portuguese and decided to go there to have a Francesinha. (We checked the menu before going and wanted to try their version, as it is a dish from where I am from in Portugal). Well we were told we could sit anywhere and noticed that the restaurant had most tables full, but not all. Within about 15-20 mins a basket of bread was dropped on the table by the waitress, (note we have not received any menus or drinks yet). About 30 mins later I finally flagged down the waitress (there was only 1 girl working running around) and asked her to bring us some drinks (we haven’t even got water yet) and mentioned that we have been waiting a while and that she hasn’t even given us menus. She apologized and said she would be back. She brought us drinks, but still no menu. I then noticed that she finally got menus from another table across the room and brought them to us about 15 mins later. We are now into 1 hour of being there by the time she took our order. (Honestly we were not in a hurry and I felt bad that she was running around or else I would have left) She finally comes to take our order and we say we both want Francesinhas. She quickly says they don’t have anymore and proceeds to tell me all the different items that the no longer have. (It’s about 6:30-6:45 and more than half the menu is no longer available) I finally decided to get cod fish (which they almost didn’t have either). Waited for our food which took a lot of time so I asked the waitress if we could have more bread my child was hungry and we ordered pasta for him and it was an hour later was still not out she said they don’t have anymore bread, which I was flabbergasted because they have a bakery next door. Finally everything came out and I thought finally, but then things went from really bad to worse if you can even imagine. I noticed another customer that had come in after us and he got bread at his table and he got a Francesinha!! I had enough I called the waitress over and asked her why does he (other customer) has bread and a Francesinha when we were told they don’t have anymore. I was even willing to pay for the extra bread. She proceeded to tell me that her “boss” some guy that was drinking with his buddies had gone to the meat shop and picked up more beef and other supplies. I COULD NOT BELIEVE IT, how DISGUSTING. That he was too busy drinking with his buddies instead of buying supplies. Finally more staff came in and we spoke to someone else that was “the new manager” and he wanted to offer us free desserts which we declined and he apologized for our experience. This was THE WORST experience I have ever had and it was a disgrace to know that they are representing our country and giving people bad experiences. We were there for about 3 hours in total, food was ok, but took forever and I have been to restaurants where they made food to order and they were better and faster than this place. FYI we were not the only ones that night that were having issues, there was another table that had 6 people and 2 people at that table did not receive their meals, the other 4 completely finished their dinner before the other 2 at their table were served. The owner needs to close down or FIRE all those people that are not pulling their weight, especially the guy that was drinking with his buddies. I saw him go behind the bar at least 4 times and he knew the waitress was on her own and didn’t help her with drinks, coffee nothing. He was just drinking and serving his friends beers. Don’t waste your time here, there are much better Portuguese restaurants around that won’t take 3 hours to feed you.

Food was excellent. Recommended.