De Negen Vaten — Restaurant in Antwerp

The most terrible experience of my life. We booked the place one day in advance for the New Year’s Eve evening and surprisingly we got email confirmation that our reservation was successfully done. We got to the place on the night, but the manager did not have our reservation registered. Loads of excuses from his side, pointing at the situation as our fault instead of being sorry for their massive mistake and extremely disorganized booking system. Instead of helping my wife and I sorting out the issue caused by them, we’ve been basically kicked out of the place and found ourself without any place to go on the night of the New Year’s Eve in a foreign country. Thanks God after an hour going around, we managed to find a place that offered a table to us even though they were completely packed, “El Toro Negro”. We had our dinner and later watched the fireworks. I believe in good manners, respect and true. Well none of those characteristics belong to the people of De Negen Vaten. Very frustrating situation to be in a night which should represent joy and unity. Please get your own conclusions from our story....

A while ago, we went to eat there and it was great – this week, unfortunately, it was the complete opposite. The cocktails were delicious, but the food was simply bad. The Paella Valenciana had nothing to do with a Spanish Paella – no flavor, bad rice, and dried-out seafood. The calamari in both the paella and the tapas were so tough that they were inedible. The piece of lamb was completely dried out. I am the first to give compliments, but it also needs to be said when things are not good at all. This was reported to the waitress, who said she would inform the kitchen. There was no response. When we asked the waitress again, she said there was no feedback. When paying the full bill (even though we ate less than half), we were told, after asking for feedback again, that the chef and the boss tasted it and said it was as good as always. 288 euros poorer, still hungry and a bad birthday dinner for a sweet 16:-( Things can go wrong in the kitchen, but this was unfortunately the last time for us....

Starting off by the server having no idea what the menu items were or how to even pronounce them, I knew It was going to be a rough one. The only compliment I can find is the chorizo with the bread cubes was fine. Other than that, wow. The spareribs were dry, literally tasted like a day old, reheated food. The albondigas tasted like frozen cafeteria food. Tomatoe sauce at least had a decent flavor but it missed the regular amount of celery they usually added. The scampi was tasteless, very sad. The breaded jalapen̈os with cheddar "croquettes" were a joke. You could tell is also frozen. The pin̈a colada was a disgrace of a cocktail. The sangria had like 3 pieces of fruit in there. Come on 🤦🏾‍♂️. Either this place changed ownership or nobody cares anymore. That was a disgraceful service.

Edit : we have added pictures as proof of our meal with you this past weekend. Please give us a way to contact you so we can send you a copy of our invoice, since you said you would pay us back if...