POLKA Restaurant — Restaurant in Munich

Wouldn't say this place is a restaurant. It is more really a place to drink where you may order some fancy snacks to eat while drinking. Not a place for kids/families or picky eaters.

The concept is advertised, and many other reviews mention it. The concept is great, but for a place to be good it needs much more than aesthetics.

Food: Around 5-6 options for dishes. Barely anyone was eating anyways, the locals seemed to prefer sharing appetizers. We got the spaghetti with vegetables (around 5 different vegetables ranging from zucchini to aubergine) and the buratta with pesto. The spaghetti was undercooked, even less than aldente, don't know if that was intentional. The vegetables with the spaghetti were also on the harder side. The spaghetti was not hand-made, by the way, it was very much store-bought. The pesto buratta had bread and cooked cherry tomatos around it, and all components of the dish were cold when it arrived. The spaghetti was also warm rather than hot. They tasted good but not as much as they cost. Along with a glass of pinot noir and large apple juice, we paid 44 euros. Considering the snack-like medium portions and unusual serving, it definitely was not worth it.

Service: I will start off by saying that we found hair in one of our dishes (definitely not from us). Better sanitation required. The tables were also low quality + unsanitary and had ants walking on it. The waiters were very friendly, and we had no issue speaking to them in English. Yet the menu was very complicated, and even with Google Translate, it could not be understood. The two dishes we bought were the recommendations from our waiter, which we had to ask for because we could not understand the menu. For mostly put-together dishes, our food took 30 minutes to arrive. Keep in mind that no one else was eating at the moment, just drinking (have to mention that one table that was eating dessert).

Atmosphere: Poor lighting on the inner-side tables. It almost felt like the ones on the outside were favored. Tables tightly distanced, everyone had to sit so close to each other. The chairs and tables were low quality, half of them are bench tables which do not provide back support (after a tiring day of traveling, sitting like that caused so much pain to my back).

Overall: Would not recommend visiting for lunch/dinner. Only for drinks/coffee+dessert it can work but even so I believe you could find better places...

I visited this past Saturday night and was really impressed with their food. I’ve had a lot of meat on this trip (obviously) so I went for the asparagus ravioli. It had a ton of shaved cheese, a great sauce, and some thinly sliced nuts plus some small greens on top. I can honestly say this is the BEST ravioli I have tasted in my life.

My waitress that night was very friendly, helped me with translation, and even chatted a bit about my trip despite them being very busy.

The only reason I subtracted 1 star was the other waitress who was the one who I met when I came in. She multiple times gave the impression that she didn’t like that she had to give me a (2 seat) table as only 1 person. They were very busy but I planned to spend plenty on my meal and was happy to wait the 15 minutes at the bar until a table was cleaned (already empty but still dirty). That was no problem but she didn’t offer me a drink and when she had to squeeze past me to move a chair she was rather… put out (small restaurant with not much space) that I was at the bar. By the way, that was my suggestion, she would have just let me leave and I requested to wait.

Overall a great experience and I’m still thinking about the ravioli. Maybe the one lady was having a bad day or doesn’t like travelers, not sure. But definitely still recommend, just be ready to wait a bit if it’s a busy time. Worth it

Oh and I really enjoyed...

I booked a reservation when I had seen the place. I knew I had to go. I was in Germany for a week and I waited 5 whole days to get here. The anticipation was building and by god, did it not disappoint.

The restaurant is very tiny. I suppose there is also a bar, and the person I was with thought the restaurant might be closed because online it said the bar was. Not to worry!

We walked in and we're instantly greeted and sat. The place was bumping. We sat next to a table of 6 who were having a great time. The energy was right, and the vibes were on. I spoke a little German and my guest only spoke English, and this wasn't a problem. We got a beer and a cocktail to start and I feel as though in my tipsy state I may have ordered the whole menu.

Everything was fantastic, and the one thing that really stood out to me...