o Πλάτανος — Restaurant in Aristotle Municipality

We’ve never experienced what we experienced at O Platanos two days ago. We were offended, treated like idiots, and threatened. This will be a little long, and for that I apologize! Here we go…

A simple preface: we are both lovers of Greece, we come here twice or three times a year, I speak intermediate-level Greek, and we have family here.

We ordered a couple of dishes for lunch, specifically I chose the kontosouvli because they only make it on the weekends and was looking forward to that.

The dishes came, and unfortunately my meat was tough, rubbery, felt either overcooked and/or cooked the day before. There were three pieces and I ate the first one, then stopped. No problem, restaurants can make mistakes or a plate can come out wrong; it happens.

I called the waitress over and told her the problem politely. Until now, everything’s normal.

She sent another young man over to see what had happened. I repeated the problem calmly again, and he asked if I’d like to eat something else. Again, normal restaurant scenario.

Here’s where things got strange. We were told “unfortunately, you have to pay for that plate because you ordered it, it’s in the system, and we can’t give it to anyone else, you already ate some of it”.

To which I replied that I’m happy to pay for a different dish to replace this one, but I wouldn’t pay for the poor quality meal that I tasted and then sent back. As the conversation became more heated, the waiter insisted that we would have to pay for the plate that I sent back, that maybe I didn’t know what kontosouvli tastes like, that maybe “they do things differently where you come from, but in Greece this is how it is”, and insinuating that we were somehow the ones in the wrong because we didn’t want to pay for a kontosouvli that you could barely cut with a knife.

For my part, I was completely shocked that a very simple restaurant problem that can happen anywhere (i.e., a plate not cooked well, sent back, and problem fixed with substitute plate or deduction from the bill) had transformed into a shouting match in the middle of the restaurant.

As the man continued to insist aggressively that we had to pay for the terrible food, that “nobody has ever asked for this, and nobody has ever complained before, and that maybe you don’t like our kontosouvli but that’s your problem” my girlfriend got very upset and stated that if they forced us to pay for this inedible food (the plate cost 8.50…) that we wouldn’t pay for anything and would leave, and that they could call the police to resolve the matter.

We stood up, walked away, and the man brought out another woman who seemed to be the manager. Our argument continued in the town square, where (between Greek and English) I repeated the same problem the third time, stating “all restaurants have bad days, it’s not a problem, but a plate was bad, and we sent it back, and nobody would expect to pay for something like that. These are normal scenarios at restaurants and it can happen anywhere.”

Despite everyone being very upset (and the young man continuing to say silly things like ‘the police will take our side’ and insinuating that we don’t know “how things are in the world” (together we speak 6 languages, and have lived and travelled around the world), we finally arrived at some reason. The woman stated it was true that in restaurants a bad plate can come out and get replaced or resolved (obviously), and so they agreed to remove the bad kontosouvli from the bill if we returned and paid the rest.

We did. We paid. There was a mistake about the cost of the wine that came out at the beginning but got lost in the argument (a bottle of wine was said to be 18 but was 25 on the bill), and we had to bring that up a second time to get it resolved.

We have never had an experience like this anywhere. We spent the rest of the day shocked about the inexperience of the staff, their insinuations of us being entitled tourists, thieves, ignorant of “Greek ways” etc. We walked away upset,...

We had an amazing lunch here, we didn't know what to expect at first since there aren't a lot of places to eat in town, however what we found was a lovely taverna with some real nice traditional food and the staff was lovely and had a lot of patience to explain some dishes that were strange to us, always with a smile and pleasant attitude.

We ordered some traditional sausages, gyro and souvlaki and were so pleasantly surprised by the taste and quality of the food and it was definitely more than enough for two people, si portions sizes are generous.

This place is a great find tucked away in a...

Oh yes!

We were passing through and decided to stop at this village for a light snack at Platanos. Its in the centre surrounded with other eateries. The food was delicious. Large portions and very artisan in its presentation. Even the small details like the olive oil was on another level. Very quick service too. Daily specials of real home made food. We had Gyros with chips and a Greek salad with a good portion of aged feta, a large mineral water and extra grilled bread. All for €16.50. 10 out of 10,...