The Steakhouse — Restaurant in Sal

Absolutely shocking for RIU I have to say. We have been at RIU Cabo Verde for a week now and everything has been flawless. We have been to the Gastro and Italian restaurants and they have been excellent. Tonight we experienced the steak house, when we arrived at 20.55 for our 21.00 slot, staff ignored us not even a smile ( only one other couple in the restaurant) We understand staff are busy and we were eventually given a smile and a glass of sparkling wine, then shown to our seats. Small plate with a beautiful bread roll, no knife and no butter ... asked and told there was no butter ??? To order you have to use your smartphone to scan the QR code at the table .. but then strangely have to give your order to staff later? The appetisers were Grilled Chicken Caesar salad with Parmesan, and trio of sea food to share, Grouper Ceviche, Shrimp in spicy aquqchile, chopped octopus with onions l, tomatoes and peppers. Sounded amazing, however delivery of expectations was very low. Caesar salad was disappointing, croutons were soggy, tiny pieces of shredded chicken, lettuce was good, but barely any cheese of any kind. To top it off it was spicy !! Some sort of sauce had been added maybe chilli? Trio of seafood next, firstly is was a duo no explanation just two dishes containing "seafood" first I believe was grouper .. tiny pieces of some fish unsure ... with peppers and onion, personally it was not nice, my partner said it was ok. Second was the shrimp, I love shrimp so was quite looking forward to this, shrimp looked very sad in a watery broth with some peppers and onion, I took one and it immediately felt rubbery, even on the fork. Upon trying to cut it open it had not been prepared properly at all and the "vein" was still in, I removed this and thought simple mistake... all were the same. The shrimp were rubbery and had obviously been in the lime juice for way too long, to make matters worse, when going through the dish a prawn was obviously brown and completely off, see pictures. This was a huge red flag for me, Cape Verde is known for its seafood. So onto mains, I had ordered the Veal Steak medium rare. When it arrived I can honestly say it's the worst steak I have ever seen, please see pictures if you're not to squeamish. Huge amount of fat surrounded the steak, I filled the side dish with it. The few mouthfuls of actual steak I got were flavourful but overcooked, def medium to well done. The broccoli on the plate was undercooked and crunchy.. not Al dente by any means. Sweet corn was on the cob and nice, did not touch the tomato. Skin on wedges were dry and had no flavour at all. A total and utter disaster as a main goes. My partner had the grilled salmon, she said this was quite nice and presentation looked good also ... however we offered some after the meal to a local stray cat ( very thin ) and it smelt it and ran off !! Very worrying indeed. Dessert was a selection of pastries but to be honest we had already had enough...

Most important advice: if you want medium rare, order rare etc etc. I ordered medium rare but it got well-done. The taste of the meat was good though. The service was so rushed that I had the feeling we were being processed as fast as possible through the meal. The wine performance was well in terms of quality, but poor in terms of quality. Part of it was spilled on the table while the service is being rushed. The staff wasn't particularly friendly either, but I think their workload was too high. Overall, I found it a disappointment and below my expectations for a...

This "specialty restaurant", in allegedly 5-star, £400-a-night holiday resort run by internationally-recognised RIU hotel brand, is a thing straight out of a dark comedy. One can only ponder at the level of unchecked, amok-running mismanagement and incompetence that can result in the food being THIS bad. Please kindly see the attached picture of a "beef burger" that was served as my main course. This was, by a long shot, the worst burger I've been served in my whole life. Can't say it was the worst I've ever eaten though - as I could...