Kokkalo — Restaurant in Municipality of Thira

To be fair, this is a 3.5 star review. Since I cannot give 3.5, and they absolutely do not deserve a 4, be here we are with a 3.

The images from the menu and reviews spoke to the carnivore in me, so we tried to eat here our first night in Santorini. We were turned away since we didn't have a reservation. Walked down to Triana Tavern instead and made a reservation for the next evening.

We arrived at 8pm sharp for our reservation and were seated promptly. Our party of three was offered two menus as they "didn't have enough" despite the restaurant being maybe 3/4 full. Whatever, no big. We were also told at this time that " we have no seafood and we are out of anything with the price blanked out"...really, not a great start.

Then, we were promptly ignored for nearly 20 minutes. No water. No drink order. Nothing. We determined we'd just leave at the 20 minute mark and go back to Triana Tavern. At about 8:18, a server finally showed up. Acted as though we'd just arrived (she had also seated us there) until we grumbled about the wait. She was very apologetic and did seem to try and make the experience better, but sort of ended up making it feel rushed. (We departed the restaurant at 9:15...).

As to the food, we ordered:

Appetizer: -Tomato Balls

Entrees: -Grilled Chicken with Gruyere sauce -Braised Lamb Shank -Pork "Pancetta" (roasted crispy pork belly) with honey mustard

Tomato Balls, * probably the second best we had on the island. Good flavor, but a tad soft and a bit greasy.

Grilled Chicken * well prepared, moist, but not very flavorful. Main comment from the person who ordered it was "I don't see the point of the sauce, it has practically no flavor"

Braised Lamb Shank ** well prepared add a good sauce, though a bit sweeer than I'd have liked. I didn't eat the mashed potatoes because, like the afforementioned sauce, they really didn't have much flavor.

Pork "Pancetta". * Ok, this one actually made me a bit angry. I cooked professionally for many years, and still cook very often. The pork belly itself was exceptionally prepared. Fork tender and crispy outside. The potatoes it was served with were also excellent. However, as the pork was seasoned only with salt, one assumes that the mustard sauce was supposed to be an important flavor component. Folks, this honey mustard was something you'd expect with a kid's chicken strips and fries. Mostly mayonnaise and a hint of mustard. Let that sink in. A fatty chunk of pork belly you're supposed to dip it in fatty MAYO? With a simple mustard sauce, this is a five star knockout dish. As is, it's just a plain old crispy pork belly.

By the end of the meal, we were just ready to leave and get on with our evening. Our server insisted that we wait so she could offer us dessert wine and ice cream to "make up" for the issues at the start of the evening. Given that nearly every restaurant offered gratis after dinner drinks and about half had offered gratis dessert, the gesture came off a little empty. I will say, I think the ice cream was delightful and perhaps the best of everything I tasted that evening.

I honestly can't understand how this restaurant has garnered a 4.7 rating on over 1K reviews given this experience, and the fact that their menu has clearly decided to not embrace the flavors of Greece, is quite a bit away from the center of Fira, and fails to execute on whatever it is they're actually trying to do.

If you want a great Greek meal in Santorini, and want to be treated like family, skip this place...

I’ll start off with a plus. They had plenty of tables available and took me in 45 minutes ahead of my reservation time. Early in the dinner they were attentive and may have been overbearingly so as they were not busy and would pace around our tables to check on you but never interacted or asked if anything was needed.

I ordered the pork tomahawk and it was good, although there were some red portions that appeared like it wasn’t cooked properly. Pork is supposed to be cooked thoroughly to ensure it’s not raw.

While the tables were never filled to capacity, things started to turn bad once they got busier. When I asked if there were any complimentary dessert items at the close of dinner (even showing them the good Google reviews as a reason why I chose this restaurant) and why I wasn’t offered the deal, the server got very defensive and said it “depends on the customer”. When pressed what qualifies for the courtesy offering, she could not answer it directly but reluctantly brought me a small shot of dessert wine.

Flash forward to asking for the bill, it took reaching out to that same server twice and another server to bring me the bill and the credit card reader. That was a 20 minute wait where I was ignored. And then their machine errored out and it took another 5 minutes to get a receipt. All of this with a simple apology that “it took so long”. Even the couple sitting next to me was sympathetic about the situation and also scratching their heads as to why.

I really want to like this restaurant but frankly the service I got was poor. I am a solo Asian visitor. It appeared there were many other locals or tourists in the restaurant (all non-solo diners) received full attention. I can forgive technology issues but customer service is trainable and should not be an issue at a restaurant. They seem to be selective on which customer gets the free offering and took almost 30 minutes to wrap up a bill with a customer, which is unacceptable. There should not be any preferential treatment of any customer. I suggest that solo diners avoid this place, especially if you don’t blend in...

Booked a table here for an evening meal at 7:30pm on a Thursday which was fairly quiet when we arrived and was worried there wasn’t enough staff. But even with minimal staff the service was fantastic. (It got busier later and more staff were on hand).

We were welcomed with 2x shot of Raki before we even ordered starters. When we did order our 2x starters (cheese balls and meat grill bowl) both were out quickly and tasted amazing.

I ordered the pork shank and my partner ordered the lamb shank as our mains. Was told the crispy pork shank would take 50mins to cook, which was fine and they made both meals to arrive at our table at the same time. When they arrived, they were delicious!

We also had a dessert and a bottle of red wine to go with our dinner. We also had 2x bottles of water. The whole meal was fantastic the service was great too. We were also give a Negroni after we finished our dessert.

The total cost for 2x starters, 2x mains 2x waters and 1x bottle of red wine and a dessert came to €93 (service charge not included) which is incredibly well priced for a fantastic meal with great service.

The view is of the sea and you won’t be able to see the sun set on this side of the island but you’ll still be able to see the horizon disappear and watch the rest of Santorini light up as the night life becomes alive which is still pretty cool.

Would defo recommend Kokkalo...