Dos Santos Cantina — Restaurant in Medellín

To be fair let’s start with the pluses for Dos Santos, and most of it is related to the space. It’s a huge spacious place and we’ll decorated. It’s also in a great location close to the tip of La Provenza, my favorite area and where I always stay in Medellin. The cocktails are decent — at least by overall Medellin comparison. But from my two times visiting the place that’s where all the positives end.

Let’s walk through the experience of getting there, trying to get a table, the food, the service, and the atmosphere. You can’t book a reservation through their website, social media page or any other objective reliable way. If you call the restaurant, you’re likely to get someone who doesn’t speak English. That’s fair since the national language is Spanish not English. And if you go the restaurant to book a reservation, this is where the craziness starts. First, they have barricades preventing you from entering with a security guard manning the barricade. If you ask him or her if you can speak to the hostess to book a reservation, he told me I had to take his cellphone number to book a reservation and that he would not be able to confirm a reservation until the day of the requested reservation date. Because of some confusion, I asked him if could please speak to the hostess to book the reservation because we were not understanding each other. He asks the waitress on her way down the stairs and she responds her full that day and he didn’t even tell her the date I requested. Fine, you’re having a bad or some other reason. I had someone else book the reservation over the phone who spoke Spanish.

Reception was smooth, service was seamless up until we placed our orders. It took the food 45 mins and that’s the appetizers with another 30 mins for the main plates. We weren’t that hungry so we noticed but it didn’t bother us. Our waitress though did not come around much and when she did she kept forgetting to place our orders for drinks. It went further downhill from there. The food was greasy, slightly cold, and way too much salt. We started to tell our waitress but she seemed frustrated. People in the service industry, we understand your frustration when customers orders are not done well but you cannot take it out on the customers if they’re communicating that to you respectfully. They didn’t mess up the order, the restaurant did. Whether you like or not, you represent the restaurant as the waiter/waitress. Find a professional and productive to share that feed to your internal team don’t get an attitude with the customers for your restaurants poor performance. It’s basic but critical you grasp and practice this. In either case, I went along the first time because it was someone’s birthday and the second time because a few people here told me that place is really good all the way around. So I wanted to give them a chance because we all have a bad day. In the end, it’s the most arrogant restaurant I’ve ever been to. They told me they’re popular because they have the best food in Medellin. That could be further from the truth. They’re cooking style is what I call lazy cooking. Putting a lot of cheese, oil, fat and sugar in your dishes speaks to tastes people are familiar with but it takes no serious skill to make those dishes. Can you also tamper down on the Mexican stereotypes. It is not Dia de Los Muertes year round.

For better options, see:

Food - El Cielo, OCI, Carmen, XO Cocktails - OCI, Carmen, Abbiocco Live Mariachi...

We stopped at this place casually and we were told they had a 2 month wait list. We went by several times , as it is located in poblado next to many other restaurants, and never saw it busy. They have security and a rope to stop people from walking upstairs, and seeing the place. Finally, on a walk one evening at prime time 8pm, we were accepted because we were foreigners. We were 5 and were sat at a table located near the bathrooms. We asked if they had another table, and they said all other tables had a minimum consumption, and were not even told that number. We asked for Mezcal margaritas and regular margaritas . We received in the table 2 shakers, one with mezcal and one with regular. The mezcal people, didn't really think they were having mezcal, and asked that margaritas were soft. Waiter showed up with Don julio tequila and poured extra shots on the mezcal. Sounds not logical. We proceeded to have a guacamole Dos santos, which has nothing to do with Avocados. Dinner was mildly OK, and we could not exchange any words at all, since as many others have posted, noise was worst than in a night club, at which we were told, It is a cantina, so we ate, and asked for check to leave and speak outside. When the check arrived, we were shocked to see that the 8 margaritas were also being charged 6 extra shots from the 70yr old tequila at a cost of over 50usd. I guess they thought we were on a business account and could care less, but , being restaurateurs and world eaters, we know this was just abusive. Called a manager and asked for explanation. We were told, we NEVER had received mezcal margaritas, and that the waiter made a mistake and that we had ordered extra shots. That is not the case. Perhaps a greedy waiter on behalf of the owners? After a heated discussion, the manager blamed the waiter and took out the extra shots. Gladly paid and left. Moral of the story, this authentic cantina is not even mexican run, but Venezuelan owned/managed. Very sad tactics, that ruin the lovely "paisa" people restaurant experience. As in 28 meals we never encountered...

The interior it’s so beautiful but so what if their management doesn’t respect their clients, the food is bad and they waste your time?🤷‍♀️

They lied to me while making a reservation that I can only book the table for 7pm and NOT 9pm when the band started to play. When I asked why not I heard “it’s impossible, we can book for 7pm only”

Then for the whole 2 hours from 7pm I saw people arriving at different hours with their RESERVATIONS 😳

So basically they trick you to arrive 2 hours to early, waste your time and energy of course with the intention that you spend more money while waiting for hours for the band.

The food was extremely mediocre and of course OVERPRICED for this mediocre quality. Almost cold quesadilla with lobster that it was almost nowhere to be tasted! The pork quesadilla was super salty and just not tasty at all.

The band started to play with half an hour delay. So we basically were tricked to arrive at this restaurant 2 hours too early and wasted so much precious time

Then the band came. They sang 5 songs (no more than 25min) and the show was OVER 😳

2.5 hours of waiting for BAD FOOD and 25 mins of performance 😳

My recommendation to this restaurant: If you do something do it VERY WELL from start to finish and respect your clients, their time and money

I WILL DEFINITELY NOT RECOMMEND THIS...