Alida Restaurant at Penny Royal — Restaurant in Launceston

A disappointing and unmemorable experience. I never leave bad reviews unless I find it absolutely unbearable and necessary to do so.

We arrived in Launceston late in the evening (16th of April) and decided to try our luck at Alida to see if they had a table available (after browsing through all their good reviews on Google). Luckily, they did have a table for our party of 3 and sat us down quickly, however what happened after that was not so acceptable.

We were already starving when heading over to Alida so we were ready to order within 5 minutes of being seated. When we tried to order the first time, the young waitress politely told us that she would come back to us in a few minutes to order and offered us drinks and table water.

About another 5-10 minutes later, we attempted to order again however wasn't able to get anyone's attention for a while. But when we did get someone to come over and asked to order, the gentleman (whom I am guessing to be the manager as he is well-groomed, suited up and with no apron) simply just refused to order for us and stated in a concieted tone "We need to take care of our bookings first." And as a customer who has already been seated, I told him something along the lines of "We at least expect some service/attention", which then he rebutted in an arrogant tone "But you guys don't have a reservation." and simply walked away, leaving us hanging. It was AT LEAST a 20-25 minute wait from the time we decided what we were ordering until someone final came to take our order.

I also work in the hospitality field, so I could see that the floor was understaffed (including 1 staff in the bar) and to some extent I do understand that you would need to prioritze your booking guests first. However, EITHER some prior warning at the door about the service/ordering time would have been appropriate instead of ushering us inside to sit and left waiting OR just simply to reject walk-in guests to keep up the standard of service. Furthermore, the manager showed ZERO attentiveness for our needs and talked in such a disdainful tone, it really did spoil our mood for the evening and let alone the high expectation we had when we came in.

In term of food, we each ordered the $70 two-course meal. The entrées were beautifully plated, but taste-wise it was nothing special. It would be generous of me even to say that the mains were average. The lamb rump itself was nice, but neither the sauce or side contributed to the flavour and depth to the dish. Grilled loin of beef was overcooked and definately wasn't fresh. Despite being slow cooked, I probably could have said that the pork scotch was leftover dregs from my mother's cantonese soups, and the burnt bitter taste from the side definately didn't help it to go down.

This was a $210 bill which left my party of 3 both angry and unsatisfied at the same time! I cannot possibly justify this bill and hence the 1-star review.

Maybe the service is better when the restaurant is not understaffed and food also a better quality when the kitchen is not rushed? But from my experience, I would not recommend coming to this restaurant under any circumstance. Better value for...

11/11/21 Me and my husband fly to TAS for reunion and meet some friends there. So friend live in Trevallyn book Alida to welcome us back. Everything was good until I saw menu have calamari carbonara , ( because I’m a huge fan of carbonara so every time I went restaurant if I saw they offer carbonara I’ll order it definitely) I realized it’s in hot plates category so when I order that, staff came ask me because it’s entrée size , and kitchen would makes me as main dish if I ok with add bit of more price, and I said ok, but who knows when dish is coming, the size just 2 bites small plate and gonna costs me $38 bucks, everyone is shocked and we mean chat but if loud but staffs didn’t come ask what happened?! So I finished my dish probably in 10 mins. Didn’t taste much and my beautiful night is all gone. So at the end, when I go to pay the bill, staff ask me everything is ok? I told her everything is fine just have bit of concern about the carbonara dish size, she just told me I should told her earlier and she can ask chef to give me maximum bowl?! What’s this? So we have to tell staff is wrong at beginning then we can get maximum provided food?! That’s ridiculous. I try to be nice and don’t want feel bad. When I left restaurant, my friends have to drive me to Macca’s to get another two burger then I won’t feel hungry that night! The whole dinner cost me $300 bucks and I just can this service and experience.

I’m not really angry or upset just can’t believe that will be the correct main dish size for you guys told me when offer me that main course service.

I’ll try again when I go to TAS again because I still like carbonara and even dish is small but taste is fabulous.

I would like to visit restaurant again if manager can tell me what exactly if carbonara make as main course...

I am sorry to say that I was severely disappointed by my dinner here earlier this week. I had the salmon, which was recommended to me by the waitress. It was very much over cooked and tasteless. It was accompanied by a strange pie containing some odd rice vermicelli and vegetables that tasted off. The food did not seem to correlate with the menu’s description, either!

For dessert we were recommended a ‘cheesecake’. However, what came was a fatty creamy spongy concoction with no taste, topped off with too much tasteless full cream. The saving grace was the raspberry sorbet and fresh raspberries, which were very good (although the sorbet was melting) and we were not even told they would be part of the dessert.

Sorry to say that the staff did not seem knowledgeable at all. And I think the two items I mentioned should be taken off the menu as being barely edible. The cook did a terrible job on them and I don’t understand why, especially since the restaurant was pretty much empty.

I hope that this feedback helps the venue up its game.

The saving grace for the night was the truffle oil gnocchi which my friend had, which was very flavoursome. Otherwise I would have given this place less stars. I paid top price for very disappointing food. The following night we had dinner in a bistro which was fantastic and I give kudos...