Deoro By The Bay — Restaurant in Melbourne

Booked for 6pm Saturday as it's a short stroll from our new place in Hastings. First appearances looked good. First sign we saw on window is they are short staffed. Went in and was seated next to the toilet. Asked could we move and was told tables are booked however on booking site there is no mention of specific table booking but we was moved to a table further away from the loo.

Ordered Champagne and cocktails ....sorry we don't have any but we have a local sparkling which is similar. We ordered that but it was only similar in the fact it was sparkling. It was quite sweet and not to my liking but my wife likes sweet wine so all good. Cocktails took a bit more time. Peach one tasted of cream and ice only. Pink lady for some reason was in a margarita glass dipped in coloured balls, the kind you decorate cakes with. This may look nice but if you happen to get some down the straw when you drink like I did and it made me choke not so nice. I thought ok I'll play it safe and order a bottle of grolsch. This tasted weird, very flat and on examining the bottle it passed its best before mid 2022!!! I pointed this out to the young lady serving who told me quite abruptly beer does not go off. That's is true to the point of it being safe to drink but it loses it's carbonation over time and the beer develops a stale taste. I'm a food technologist with an HND in food science and iv been a food consultant for 30 years. Did not want to make a scene so I just agreed with her.

Now to the food I had the jalapenos stuffed with cheese, the overwhelming taste was vinegar so I guess they were pickled, if this had been stated in menu I would have avoided. Wife had oysters which were fresh with lemon. Clean fresh and tasty.

Mains I had the rib eye which I asked for rare and came Medem well. Wife had the seafood hotpot what had scallops amongst other fish and also included the roe which is fine however this had not been prepared well and was very gritty. Also side portion of beer battered chips (frozen ones) tasted like McCain's

Best thing was the desserts, I had churros which were nice and fresh with cinnamon sugar but the chocolate dipping sauce was not, tasted like the stuff you get from Coles to put on ice cream. Wife had the baked cheese cake which tasted ok but was more like a flan than a cheese cake but it had the same cheap chocolate sauce drizzled over the top.

Attention to detail here was lacking, could be a great place. It is relatively cheap. The sweet taste of a cheap price is soon forgotten with the bitter taste of...

Absolutely gorgeous food priced pretty well. Unfortunately the biggest let down was the service.

With 2 or 3 floor staff, 3 kitchen staff and a few bar staff we figured we’d be set in for a easy night out.

Taking out our dad for Father’s Day the night before (3/9/22) my brother and I had to travel back into city on Father’s Day) we expected a good time. Our family has been here before and had a great time.

We were greeted and seated at our reserved table, asked by a waitress about drinks about 5mins after sitting down (pretty standard so far) we weren’t yet ready, flagged the waitress down when we were ordered mains, drinks and an entee.

With only 3 other full tables inside, we figured we wouldn’t be waiting very long. Entree took 20ish minutes to come out, drinks came just after (20+min wait on 2 glasses of wine, a cocktail and a Jack and coke), devoured the garlic bread instantly (it was very nice) and proceeded to wait another 40mins (at this point waiting over an hour for mains), during this time we seen staff standing over near the kitchen beside each other talking, we tried flagging staff multiple times to order more drinks and turn on the heater (we were freezing!) while we waited and got ignored until we we had to physically beckon them over twice. Which was quite an uncomfortable experience.

Ordered drinks (again another 25min wait on those, served just after mains). Main meals was flavoursome, presented well but warm (not hot by any means), raised this issue after a waitress came by and started clearing some glasses and asking if our food was okay, was informed she’d tell the chef our meals were lukewarm but heard nothing back after that, not an apology or anything which was disappointing.

I could see both my dad and his girlfriend becoming quite angry, and that behaviour had clearly affected the service between our table, there was clear tension. Which made myself quite uncomfortable.

Due to the slow service we finished our mains and drinks and left, picking up a drink from the bottlo for a much quicker and more enjoyable night.

Overall - incredibly disappointing service (considering some of the stellar reviews left here) but great food (amazing, had it been hot).

Would return for the food but not for...

Oh dear. Where do I start?

I've attended Marina Restaurant & Lounge Bar and loved the food, the atmosphere, the friendly service, and in particular - the hosts.

However, it's now Deoro By The Bay where ALL of that has disappeared.

Firstly, we had to remind them of our garlic bread order which seemed to be lost in transit.

Our Porterhouse steaks (at the best part of $40 each - pretty normal these days) were like a cheap pub meal.

Our waitress asked "How was your meal?" - and we told her calmly but honestly that we were disappointed - without making a big deal about it.

Our drinks arrived ok, but no-one came back to see if we wanted more.

Our horrid coffees were delivered by someone else and they also asked if we enjoyed our meal. The process was repeated.

Same again to a third person when I went up and paid.

I returned to my table and continued chatting with my dinner partner.

As we were about to leave, the manageress approached us and said "I believe you were not altogether happy with your meals?".

She was pleasant and apologetic. She offered us a free cup of coffee.

WOW‼ "Thanks - but no thanks"

"Please come back soon and try us again".

I felt like saying "Why would we?" but I refrained.

btw: I don't know what they've done with their transformation, but together with the flooring and wide open space, it's now very noisy.

Not...