L'Escale — Restaurant in La Rochelle

Avoid at all costs, the staff spend more time saying hello to their friends passing by than taking care of any of the customers who pay their wages. They thinks it's funny laughing and joking with each other when everything around them is dreadful. The food we had this evening was dreadful, the steak wasn't rested and blood covering the rest of the over cooked chips, the chicken burger my wife had was a disaster .. the chicken was grey !!! 😳 and so was my wife's face after uncovering it. I'm pretty sure the chef is just one of their many friends who has no idea on how to cook and was just passing by. The toilets had no soap or toilet roll (in either of the 2) and were filthy. If I was the owner of this place I'd sack the entire work force and start over. Too much interaction with fellow restaurant workers next door and passersby and nowhere near enough attention given to the "Customers" who they've conned into coming into their establishment.

You don't have to be Gordon Ramsey to see poor quality service and food, yours is a perfect example of this hence the review, I do review lots of Resturants all over Europe hence my 3million reviews, I tell individuals how it is.. If I was looking at going to that area for food I always looks at the reviews and base my design to eat there on this, hence my review of your establishment. As a business owner I would take it on the chin and take note of my comments if you want your business to improve and actually put the focus back on no.1 the customer...

If you are here you are already in the right place. Look at the rest of the reviews - the owners mock the comments but the negative reviews reflect our experience. Genuinely the worst food and service we've had in France. Ordered calamari as a starter, steak for main with a bacon burger for my wife. It all arrived at once. The calamari was straight out of the freezer - I realise most is but it was so over cooked it wasn't great. The chips accompanying both meals were also straight out of the freezer. My steak - we had some discussion around how I wanted it cooked - I was offered medium, I asked for a little bit pink, this checked with someone and confirmed. It was barely edible - please don't think I'm being overly picky here but as I'd changed how it was going to be cooked I didn't think I could complain. Not that anybody checked if the food was OK. The dogs chomped it down no problem. The burger was "ok". The only stand out moment was the server offered or dogs some water for which we are very grateful. Chose a bottle of wine for €29 - only to find it in the supermarket for €4.39. It's all about location and maximising profit at your expense. No water, no condiments no checking -...

The service was fast and this restaurant was in a good location, but the quality of the food was abysmal. Firstly, it came out of the kitchen within a few minutes of being ordered, which was already a warning sign. I ordered the Fish and Chips which appeared to be precooked well in advance and probably kept warm under a heat lamp, resulting in a stale and unappetizing texture. Two others had a Chicken Caesar salad and which was also rather poor in taste.

In general, for a restaurant in this beautiful location in France there is no excuse for the food to be so bad. Clearly, it is intended to relieve unaware tourists of their money and maximize profit for the...