Restaurant Le Bottleneck, Val d'Isère — Restaurant in Albertville

Where to start. Let’s start by saying, do not bother going here and wasting your money.

Firstly lets start by saying that we were told that the restaurant was full, but was able to book online. In hindsight, maybe the girl that told us it was full was trying to do us a favour!

We were seated at 8.35pm. At 8.45pm I stopped someone to ask for a menu. That was a good start. After having been there 30 minutes, we finally managed to order a drink and some nibbles. Cocktails and guacamole were nice. Service was an absolute nightmare. I’ve never actually known a restaurant to have such harassing and chaotic service yet so slow at the same time. The head waiter looked to be doing the job of about 10 people while the rest of the staff seemed to just be bringing food out of the kitchen and then going back in there to wait until the next course was ready. 1 person cannot run an entire restaurant. As a side note, there are little things apart from generally being acknowledged, that a restaurant at this level should be a given, like empty glasses being left on the table when fresh drinks arrived. This was the least of our worries though honestly. Anyway, at 10.15 we still had not eaten anything else.. we finally managed to get some ceviche which was really good, amongst the clattering dishes and dropping of cutlery as we were seated next to the waiters station/kitchen in the midst of the chaos. Then came the mains which were honestly, BAD. The cod was inedible. So sweet and salty, just grim, and the lomo was just ok. Just about edible but really not very nice. We sent the cod back and my husband ate the lomo because he was still hungry. By this time it was after 11pm - 2.5hrs later, i just wanted to leave, we finally managed to get the bill and the waiter told us he had taken the guacamole and 1 glass of wine off the bill. So he had taken the price of the cod off (that we didnt eat). There was no recompense for the service being so bad. £200 later, it’s a ridiculous amount of money for the level of food and service we experienced.

The 1 star is for the ceviche...

Summary: Style over substance with unbelievably poor service and food that doesn’t live up to the price point

The problems began right from the outset. We went through to the cocktail bar and nobody seemed interested in taking our order. When we finally managed to order our drinks (3 expresso martinis and 2 glasses of champagne), we were still waiting 25mins later. In the end we gave up on the idea of a drink in the bar and went through to the restaurant (they eventually brought our drinks through there). The barman said they were busy, but they only had 3 or 4 tables in the bar and 3 bar staff.

Then in the restaurant the same poor service continued. Menus didn’t arrive so we had to ask for them. We we had to top up our own wines throughout the meal, and even when we complained about this, the situation didn’t improve. The staff simply didn’t seem to care.

Onto the food. It was a bit of a mixed bag to be honest. The guacamole was fantastic, the scallops were nice. However, the fish that came with the lobster was overcooked and, for the price point there is no way the meal could be described as anything other than poor value. €160 a head is Michelin star pricing, the food didn’t get close to this.

In the end the staff offered to take one bottle of wine (€80) off the bill of over €1500 is hard to even describe as a token effort. It’s insulting. The staff and the manager simply didn’t...

Very beautiful restaurant. Unfortunately that first impression was the end of a promising experience.

Music selection was all over the place, and quite hit or miss.

The meal started with an average complimentary guacamole. Four different types of chips were served, though none of them a standout.

Lamb tacos. They were edible.

Langoustine roll. A sub par take on a classic lobster roll.

Classic ceviche. It was fine and true to its origin, though unmemorable.

Potato roll with crab. Not a good innovation. There was no texture to the dish with the exception of overlooked crab shell.

Patatas bravas. Five different types of potatoes! None of them cooked well.

The mains are when the meal went downhill. Our ribeye was cooked perfectly. The problem was, it wasn’t a ribeye. We were served a cut of striploin, and an end cut at that, with a nice line of sinew running through the best part. When this was brought to the attention of the service staff they were in fairness apologetic. We asked for the bill and they comped a glass of wine and an appetiser. However they still charged us for the wrong steak which we did not...