Thanos Taverna — Restaurant in Vienna

I am sincerely sad that I have to write this comment. After being disappointed by many Greek taverns in Vienna as a Greek searching for authentic Greek food, I had high hopes for Thanos Taverna. Unfortunately, not only did it not pass the test, but it also managed to rank first in the worst food quality category. There’s literally nothing Greek about the food and neither is the owner.

The place itself looks promising and inviting. The Greek waiter is friendly and helpful. However, the food quality utterly destroyed the overall experience. The food is horrendous. I briefly mourned the amount of money I spent there, as the prices are unexplainably high (27€ for a mixed grill plate for one person is unjustified!) The fries were prefrozen and tasted like McDonald’s. The Greek salad contained lettuce and vinegar, which is a complete sin in Greece. There was no sign of good Greek olive oil, Greek olives or quality feta. Instead, I got five tiny cubes of feta which felt almost insulting. And then there was the meat… Oh, the meat. It was an absolute disaster. It tasted like it had never seen an actual grill. It was bland, dry and strangely textured. Almost as if it had been microwaved. But the real horror show was the lemon chicken. Instead of the tender dish you’d expect, it arrived covered in a jelly-like sauce that looked like something out of a Lidl-inspired horror movie. In fact, many things tasted like they were precooked. The sight alone was already disturbin, but the taste was just as bad.

To summarize, I had truly hoped to finally find a good Greek restaurant in Vienna but once again, I was deeply disappointed. It’s just one more...

OVERBOOKED Reserved at 8. We arrived at 8 sharp. The restaurant was full. They said "sorry we messed up the reservation. Could you wait a bit outside? "

That was fine but it is March and therefore it's no more than 7 degrees outside. We waited for more than 15 minutes and I will say they brought us a courtesy glass of ouzo which was appreciated. However they returned and asked what we would eventually want to order once we were seated inside.

We told them and in less than 5 minutes we found ourselves eating cold food in even colder temperatures. So the option of eating inside was taken away without even discussing it. They made us eat outside (without discussing it with us) despite having made us wait for a place inside!

We ate cold food outside, paying full price. Probably because the "owner" thinks that making jokes and playing his guitar allows him to treat the guests terribly. Or maybe he thought we were tourists since we are not Austrian. Well, we live two roads from the place, so...

This place is well below the standards of decency.

EDIT Seen the restaurant answer, I have to state that their recount of the events is inaccurate at the very least (ask yourself who would want to eat outside when there are just 8 degrees and a table inside is offered). It's annoying to be labelled as liar but it happens when you write an honest and unflattering review. Speaking of reviews, whoever checks my reviews on google can see how I tend to leave positive reviews, I don't enjoy to be nasty. So if I leave a bad one is because something really went wrong. I leave here the message I received yesterday from the restaurant. I think it...

We stopped by one evening and it looked quite busy. We didnt have a reservation so wanted to ask how long we could expect to wait for a table. We were prepared to wait up to 30-40 mins. The owner made eye contact with us as we waited outside and did a hand gesture signally for us to go away. I kept waiting for him to come talk to us but he kept just gesturing from afar for us to go away. Didnt even have the decency to talk to us. If it was too busy to accommodate us I would have accepted that and left, just come and communicate that to us instead of waving your hand away at us. No respect.

Our greek friends recommended this place to us and they were extremely disappointed when we told them about...