Isalos — Restaurant in Argostoli Municipality

We have been visiting Spartia now for 10 years. We often try places to eat in other parts of the island but Isalos is very near where we rent an apartment. Initially we only visited once or twice early on and found the service and food average. This has changed remarkably over the last 2 years. Danae (the owner) seems to have upped her game in hiring new, younger and attentive staff. Food wise things have really improved to the point I would say this is now the best place to eat in and around Spartia (and we have visited them all!). We have had many meals here now but tonight we have the Sausage and the grilled sardines for starters. The local sausage is a speciality, other places do it well and Isalos very well. Crisp skin that bursts on contact and a very rich deep heavy flavour of meat. Sardines are hard to get wrong, but they serve these in a very nice olive oil based sauce. For mains I had the lamb chops. These were succulent, tenders and the right level of crispy burntness outside. A previous evening I had the grilled pork steak which was just as moist inside but burnt crispiness outside. Obviously someone is grilling very well in the kitchen. My partner had the fried calamarie which was soft, tasty and well cooked (but not chewy). By the way the chips where are AMAZING and always a danger of making you over eat. We skipped dessert as the portions are generous (as Isalos is with the free digestives at the end of every meal). If you are staying anywhere near Spartia (or even Argostali) you need to come here. Prices around £30 per head...

Went twice once on our first night which was abit of a rush and very thankful they got us a table so big thankyou for that pork steaks big and tasty kids chicken strips was a good big portion and kids loved them 2nd night not as good but still OK had bread starter and my partner had the crispy feta (big portion wow) bread and olives could've done with some oil and vinegar with it or at least oil and a few more olives kids spaghetti bol was abit dry looking and could've done with more sauce chicken strips goy an extra one so 5 fillets this time one though had a bone in and was abit browner looking inside maybe leg meat but son left that one anyway pork souvlaki was a big portion slightly abit charcoaly on flavour flat bread alittle black on one side swordfish was nice and you could see the fresh pice in the chiller which was good to see sides with it not to my partners taste and didn't look that appetising staff are really nice and polite and friendly it's worth going and the setting is beautiful and some nights there is entertainment...

We stumbled on this taverna having literally just arrived from the UK. There are 10 of us including 4 children - we were starving! A very friendly man said we could be accommodated once he cleared a table for us and he even offered us a drink while we wait. Such a wonderful welcome but unfortunately it went downhill from there. Absolutely terrible service from then on. Impossible to get noticed and when the wait staff finally stopped at our table they took an age to serve what we ordered. Very difficult to keep the kids from being grumpy amd by the time we got our food (a couple of hours!!) we were all fed up and couldn't eat much. Portions were huge too..it was a shame because the food was very tasty and the setting was beautiful. We have eaten out every night and this restaurant has missed out on our business simply due to such...