ARDA — Restaurant in Mexico City

An aesthetic, open-concept restaurant, but the food, service, and overall experience were an overall disappointment and felt more like an overhype. As walk-ins on a Saturday, we were told that there was a wait and the hostess mentioned there were 170 guests on the waitlist (which I thought was exaggerated and was a way to deter our visit). As we insisted to wait, we were suggested we could go to Yamata, their sister restaurant, but at that point I got annoyed and just asked if we could wait. We were told we could have a drink at Yamata’s bar while we waited and were given an approximate wait time of about 15-20 minutes. We didn’t have the best experience at their sister restaurant, and along with the back-and-forth with trying to get on a waitlist, it was a foreshadowing of what was to come when we finally had a table at Arda.

Yamata’s staff came off as pushy, and Arda was no different. Once seated, we were asked if we had visited the restaurant before and were given more of a sales pitch than anything of substance about the concept. Since we ordered drinks at the other restaurant, we didn’t order anything else to drink, for which we didn’t get the best attitude from our server. While we were trying to decide what to order, we couldn’t help but notice how close the other tables were to each other. Although the restaurant was mostly open-concept with wind passing by, just being so close to other parties felt a bit cramped.

We started with the hummus ahumado, which was the only decent dish of our visit (8/10). For our mains, we ordered a brisket sandwich (Sandwich Arda) and the gnocchi. The gnocchi was such a disappointment, as the portion size was just laughable; it was way too small and barely had enough of either the duck or the pasta. The 30 grams that they advertise was no joke, but for the price, it seemed insane paying so much for so little (3/10). The brisket sandwich along with the side of fries was just okay, although the accompanying sauce that we asked on the side was decent but nothing out of this world (6/10).

The restaurant was super aesthetic, extending even into the WC, but the aesthetic didn’t do justice to the food, which was just average, if not a disappointment. The service throughout the rest of our visit was a bit distant and slow, especially when it came time to settle the bill. I absolutely loved the aesthetic of the restaurant, but everything else was a letdown and felt like a bit of a waste of time, especially regarding the “waitlist,” as the staff from Arda seemed to have forgotten about us and instead pushed us to consume more at their sister place beyond the...

This place is very nice with a great ambiance and most of the food is really good.

The Mussels XO are amazing, you must eat all the sauce in the pan with bread. The Scallops Tostada was the best I've ever tried. The Smoked Beet with greek yoghurt and honey, is OK normal, same flavor as in my house so I would skip it. The Smoked Bacon was very good. The Sweet potato was very good but it is a huge portion so share with at least 3 people. The Peruvian Ceviche is really good but you need to mix very well and make sure in every bite you get the corn and the sauce and everything. I've tried better peruvian ceviche in Peru. Wood Grilled Broccoli was not so great, it has a very mild flavour and was a little hard to chew. Colliflower with Manchamantel/miso was good. New York Prime meat was very bad, chewy and with tendons. Aarda Sandwich is very bad, the brisket was dry and chewy and if you've tried Texas brisket you are going to hate this dish. The gnocchis I tried two times and the first time were some of the best I've ever tried in a long time and the second time they were very tasty but not as delicious as the first time. The smoked Chicken is very delicious and it is a small portion. The Breaded Pork Chop was the juiciest I ever tried, Wow. The Catch of the Day FIsh is really really good I highly recommend it.

Negrete is a cocktail like Negroni but they change to tequila, not...

To cut to the chase - the reason for this one-star review is that our 1,400 peso beef short rib was served with a side of live, crawling bugs (!!). We noticed halfway through our meal that the lettuce that was brought over contained a lovely mix of different bugs, both dead and happily alive.

I want to be clear that our server, Karla, was excellent. She was warm, informative, and professional - no notes. She apologized profusely, and did everything in her power to make sure we were okay.

However, at the end of the day, serving a dish with live bugs is absolutely inexcusable, especially for a restaurant of this calibre. Moreover, the ARDA team did not offer any kind of compensation for their massive error beyond an apology. At this price point, we would frankly expect that the dish be taken off the bill, especially since we stopped eating after this happened.

Incredibly disappointing experience. Absolutely...