Steak Ministry Bar & Grill — Restaurant in Melbourne

Tonight we had what was probably our worst dining experience ever.

We seated ourselves to our booked table outside that the manager pointed to. The table was half set. We then waited 25 minutes before someone came to our table when I had to flag him over to ask for water. The water then took another 10 minutes to arrive. The waiter was rude to us and still got the order wrong as will later be evident. As drinks, we only ordered 2 cokes which took till 50 mins in to arrive. We had been talking about leaving for a while at this point and I wish we had.

The entree then took another 15 mins to come. We got the kilpatricks, which were okay, the croquettes which we pretty flavourless and way overpriced, and the wagyu skewers which were cold and chewy. Not a good start.

While we were eating entrees we asked them to send mains because by this point we had been here for over an hour, and yet we still waited an additional 30 mins. Normally that would have been fine except for what they brought us after 30 was just not on. One steak was a porterhouse not a scotch, not how you confuse them. And the other was an eye fillet that they had decided to butterfly, without any consultation for some reason that looked like a grey mess. We send the eye back and cancelled it because $69 for a grey mess is just not on. They then brought out a scotch after 5 minutes which seemed a bit strange. Not sure you can cook a steak medium that quick, which makes sense when it was blue. At this point we just wanted something to eat so kept it. The rest of the sides were okay but not great. Shoestrings were cold, onion rings somehow tasted like donuts, broccolini salad and wagyu fat potatoes were reasonably good but maybe only because everything before was just so average. I had the beef ribs which were surprisingly okay, really not bad, but not good.

At this point we had been apologised to multiple times by our waiter who was obviously trying his best given the situation and really went above and beyond to try save our night. He offered us free drinks which we declined as we didn’t feel like more soft drink, but his manager obviously instructed him and they sent them anyway. Clearing the plates he told us they were bringing us a dessert which was nice but really not wanted. To top it off it was an Amaretto dessert that was obviously not suitable for my pregnant wife.

When I asked for the bill, given all the issues we had had over the last 2 hours we expected something to have been comped or discounted or at least an apology from the manager, but no, our $277 bill was brought over by the waiter. After asking the manager if he could kindly comp some of the food that was honestly trash, he almost seemed confused as to why I would be asking even though he had been staring at us every 10 minutes for the past hour. Eventually he took off 15% off the bill. As we were leaving the manager offered us a voucher, not sure I could make any use of that.

I could honestly keep going but I would be surprised if even the manager is reading this at this point.

We will never be coming back here again and do not suggest...

8 adults and 2 toddlers out for dinner spent $1,057 on a Thursday night at 6 pm.

Cons. highchairs weren't at the table when we arrived. Staff tried to squeeze them between our chairs until we asked them to just include the extra table they weren't using anyway due to lack of space. requested the birthday cheesecake be put in the fridge but don't think it was as by the time we requested it at the end of the meal it was overly sloppy and soft which was very disappointing (originally gave the cake to a manager) had to call over a waitor each time we wanted to get a drink as they weren't regularly checking our table -had to remind the waiters half a dozen times that we were waiting on drinks as they either forgot to put them through or we were waiting up to 15minutes (glass or wine or beer) -glad we double-checked our bill as we were charged for multiple things we didn't order. weren't given kids menus or explained to how everything worked regarding menus ordering, etc, if you're looking for your menu turn over the placement picture. They brought out somebody else's cake when we requested ours to be brought out Dry ice was brought out with our cake, which was a nice touch we didn't request, and we were charged for it.

Pros We had a waiter finally take over our table he said his name was MS. Unfortunately, he had to keep running into the bar to make the entire restaurant drinks The food was delicious slightly pricey on the kids' meals $30 for very basic small options cocktails were delicious, thank you, MS The atmosphere was nice -offering to take coats when we arrived -MS was as attentive as he could be, considering he seemed to be playing multiple rolls. The rest of the staff, including the manager, could really learn from him and up their game because they really let the restaurant down with their poor customer service

If I have any feedback, it would be to take the time to teach your staff good customer service as I've had better service at a pub bistro. The only reason I rated 2 stars for customer service was purely to our waitor MS. Unfortunately we won't be returning due to the...

Atrocious

When a restaurant makes big promises, it sparks a natural curiosity - "is it really that good?".

When a person walks into a restaurant making big promises (and charging for them) one's minimal expectation is great food, cooked well, accompanied by great service.

Steak Ministry did not meet expectations and was a very disappointing dining experience.

First, the steak. Talked up on the menu as taking 30 minutes to prepare due to the "special cooking methods" was quickly translated to "cooked in the sous vide and finished on the grill". Given this, one can imagine my surprise when the waiter offered "blue" and "rare" as an option for how I wanted the steak cooked. I chose rare, whilst my inner consciousness screamed in protest - this was not going to end well. When the steak came, a surprisingly short time later, it was what could only be described as dry, powdery and insipid. I now know that the urges of the waiter to order a sauce for the top was not for the $5 extra revenue but to mask the complete ineptitude with which the steak was over-cooked. When the steak first came out it had all the appearance and texture of well-done but after resting on my plate for five minutes, it settled down to medium-well. By now, of course, it was stone cold. Awful.

There was, however, some redemption in the warm broccolini salad. There was an interesting profile of flavours that, although I found unusual was not unpleasant. Of course in all of this, one had to disregard that the broccolini itself had the wilted, emaciated appearance that it had been found in the back of the fridge after a week.

Last up, the service. I can't really complain too much because pretty much every restaurant these days insists on clearing the table before the diners are finished. At least those other restaurants take the time to top up your table water when they are doing so. Finally, I wouldn't even be leaving this review if the waiter had bothered to ask how things were... maybe they know.

Overall, all I can say is that the only thing satisfied at this restaurant was...