monai — Restaurant in Klaipėda

From the moment you walk in, you are surrounded with elegant farm house feel and warm ambience. The exquisite food includes grilled fish, poultry, meats and incredible pasta dishes at unbelievable prices. "On paper" service ticks all the boxes but it's not outstanding. Restaurant operates in a small space and waiter chit chat about their personal lives can be heard through out and it slightly makes it less special experience. Focal point in the restaurant is an open kitchen (tho dining area and kitchen is separated by glass wall), it's a lovely touch as you can witness all the magic happening in there. Sadly my personal big no, no is chefs wearing jeans and sneakers in the kitchen. As well you would expect waiters to look fresh and clean, and they do, until you see their dirty running shoes. Apart of couple small details and personal expectations MONAI restaurant is one of the best in Klaipeda and all Lithuania. If you are looking for delicious and well executed food, no need to look further. MONAI restaurant is the place to go.

P.S.

Desserts...

This restaurant visit started with promise but ended with a disappointment — mostly thanks to a waiter who seemed to think arrogance was part of the menu.

The concept is actually fun: at the beginning, you choose how much “presence” you’d like from the staff, from low-key service to full-on storytelling about the food. We picked the short telling about the food option, imagining a charming little narrative with our meal. What we got instead was a card explaining what should have happened… but didn’t.

When we asked the waiter to tell us about the dishes, he said (in flawless English) that he still needed time to “translate.” Translation: couldn’t be bothered. Knowing the menu is Hospitality — language skills clearly weren’t the problem, but attitude definitely was.

The food? Decent. Not bad, but not nearly good enough to forgive the service. The cocktails, however, were genuinely good.

P.S. The 10% tip we didn’t leave “Monai” found its way to the bartender at Faksas instead. She was everything the waiter wasn’t: professional, warm, and a...

we've been away on vacation for a month and a half and tonight we had our best meal since leaving home. we had prosciutto ham and home made bread with a home made butter sprinkled with small seeds ... it was delicious/1 then we had a baked scallop with caramelized cauliflower and a tasty salad dressing that was also delicious.

finally we had stuffed lamb rump with roasted vegetables, asparagus, carrots and so forth ... all was to kill for!

the service was perfect; there was no wait although 24 people in one group came in shortly after we had our appetizers followed by three beauty queens celebrating with the bride-to-be. we asked if we could take their picture and then they asked us to take one with their camera.

lots of fun in the old town tonight! we also drove through what we didn't realize was a barricaded area at the old town park where they were celebrating in style with a military parade. lots of canons and other major military might on the banks of the river. once more,...