Locale — Restaurant in Palermo

A nice ambience and atmosphere, and a trendy place. However we did not have a good experience due to the service. As a matter of fact, it was by far one of the worst hospitality experiences.

Service started off very friendly, but then a mistake was made by the staff during ordering (of starters) because of how busy they were. Of course, a mistake can happen. We informed the owner and ended up in a discussion on whose fault that was...which is rude and not a way to handle clients. Finally he took the dish away and responded that we could choose another starter, but however never returned to take our order....

The mains finally came in. I've had the beefcheeck, which was very tasty meat! However with barely anything on the side, it was not nearly enough quantity wise, and I was still hungry afterwards.

Then finally we received the bill, which contained a bottle of wine from the people who were previously sitting at this table. The owner took it off the bill, but however added a service charge on top of our bill. Obviously seen the issues with the service that evening we've ended up in an argument with the owner over it, which went on for another 5 minutes. I think it is good to have both sides of the story explained, but arguing with your Clients of who is wrong or right is really pittyful and does not follow any of the rules on hospitality.

We ended up paying the full amount, including the service charge to be done with this experience and the owner. If €50 is worth receiving a very bad review, I don't think they understand how to run a hospitality business, nor how to handle their Clients. I hope for future Clients that their service and...

Even though they look open. Have staff. Ask you if you want food or drink... They apparently are closed?! Person on the door "would you like food or drink? Me " probably both" Them "sorry the kitchen is closed" Me "oh OK, just a drink then" Then "oh sorry, we are actually closed"

5pm on a Saturday 😂

In response to their reply - their account is absolutely incorrect of what happened. Working for my whole life in hospitality I know a "cover up" reply when I see one! They made an error today and we're not expecting a bad review to come from it. The waiter said nothing about 10 minutes and certainly said the kitchen was closed. My account above is word for word about what happened. It's OK, I ended up going to some other brilliant places this evening which I'll be sure to leave excellent reviews for.

Also I'd like to add it is a shame they had a bad day today with their service cause the reviews generally look good and the place looked nice. They just didn't get it right for some reason today. The waiter on the door was actually quite pleasant but was taking orders from some guy sitting outside busy doing something else. I'll amend my review to 2 stars only for the man...

This place is very cute. I recommend to request a table in the interior terrace (the upstair floor is not as cute). The decoration with lights, plants, fountain makes it very charming.

We had some issues sometimes to make ourselves understood when ordering with our bad Italian & good English but the waiters were super kind and always tried to get our request (even if sometimes it meant bringing 2 additional waiters hahha)

I enjoyed my food a lot even more what was "fuori di carta" (the speciality of the day). One salad was amazing, the pasta was succulent. My friends had the squid pasta and they were not mind blown. The focaccia with sardines was also a bit disappointing.

We paid around 45€ each including tips (3 people) for starters, main, cocktail and a bottle of wine. I don't know if this might be pricey for Palermo and targeted to expats?

Overall we had an amazing experiences thanks to great atmosphere, good food with a lot to taste, great wine and very nice staff. I would...