Kadarka Wine Bar — Restaurant in Budapest

I have tried a few wine bars in Hungary and have been impressed, however I went to kadarka recently and did not have a very good experience.

First the good. Impressive list of wines, fair prices, and nice outdoor seating area. Normally this would be all I need to enjoy a excellent evening.

We started off asking for a recommendation for a dry wine which the waiter responded “all the wines are dry”. Seems odd but okay maybe it’s their specialty here. Both my partner and I describe a bit more what we are looking for in wines and he recommends the same wine to both of us. Seems a bit odd as there is 160 wines in house, however the wine came and was good.

We were then both ignored for the next 45 minutes even with empty glasses and trying to make eye contact with him inside. I asked for a dessert wine and another white and chips/dip. He pours a small sample of the dessert wine which tastes off to me so I reach over to try the other white that was poured when without any confirmation or question pours the full glass and walks away from the table without comment or question. The wine had clearly been opened for several days and tasted very bad.

20 minutes again goes by with no one attending our table so we ask to cancel the chips and for the bill as we want to leave with the waiter just walking past with no more than a “yup”.

5 minutes later he brought the chips which were nothing more than what I am 99% sure was just the end of a cool ranch Doritos bag.

I didn’t take any more than 3 sips of my wine as it has gone bad and we finally went inside to request our bill again and pay. I brought with me my full glass of wine and asked how long it had been open for which they said a few days then he tried some and said it was totally fine.

We received very poor service, no explanation on wines, had no offer of compensation for spoiled wine, paid 1000 huf for cool ranch Doritos that we tried to cancel, and still we were charged a “service charge” on our bill.

I am sure you could have a very nice time here but unfortunately the attitude and poor service from the staff...

We sat down because my girlfriend's foot was hurting. Ordered wine, which was fine. I noticed the "casual" attitude of the waiter already. After the second round of drinks we could literally have to stare to get them to serve us. When we asked for a drink what they did not do, the answer was simply a "No" with the attitude of "why are you even asking me this?". When asking for Palinka recommendation the waiter pointed to almost the most expensive one, so ignored recommendation and went with something really nice anyway. When ordering the second round asking if we can have the same, we were asked what was it. To be honest when I worked in customer service I just used to go to the till and check. The palinka was so warm, it was actually unpleasant. Sadly had to put a bit of ice in it, which partly ruined the taste. When we ordered coffee the waiter did not understand what a long coffee with an extra shot is, said double espresso twice while walking away then brought the wrong coffee. Not like any of them cared anyway. The only lovely staff was the girl who was working behind the bar inside really really hard. She was very kind and helpful. The two boys very just full of attitude. The experience was ruined by the customer service. Definitely not coming back or suggest...

What a mixed bag this place is. The wine menu is enormous. But they don't have it all. And it's different from what is posted online so you can't totally research ahead of time. It's so great to taste the wines of Hungary, but you have to know what you are looking and asking for because the menu doesn't really describe anything. I did a ton of research ahead of time so I enjoyed it. We went twice, the second time with friends, and overall had about 16 different small tastes (70ml). The first night's waiter was a little surprised we ordered 4 tastes at once but then he was nice and cool. The second night's waiter was a jerk the entire time during our three rounds. He tried to get us to just buy a bottle and then he was rude about what he did or didn't have. He brought substitutions we didn't ask for and then was annoyed when we said we didn't want them. We suffered through his service and still had delicious wines (Hungarian wine is really interesting!) but wow it helps to be prepared if you want to have a good time here. Our quiet and friendly dog was allowed in without any issues,...