Kartika — Restaurant in Amsterdam

Just look at how they have responded to other customers who wrote negative reviews, and then decide if this is the kind of management you want to give your business to. Definitely the most immature, unprofessional and discriminatory responses by any restaurant I've seen on Google. They have actually made personal attacks on previous customers ("don't wear cheap fake eyelashes", "looked like you were exploding because you ate so much" etc.).

Now onto our own experience.

My partner and I were the second set of guests to enter the restaurant upon opening at 5 pm, and were immediately told that we have until 6:30 pm to eat. Everyone else was as well, so that's fine. We appreciated that they were trying to set expectations clearly.

We ordered the rijsttafel (their set menu, or 'rice table'), which consisted of 10 dishes, all explained by the waiter. We wanted coconut water to drink but chose against it when we realized that it's canned and not fresh.

Those who ordered drinks of any kind were given complimentary garlic and cassava chips with dips. Fair enough, we thought.

Since we've had authentic Indonesian food in Indonesia on multiple visits before, we found the food here quite average. Nothing worth remembering but nothing to genuinely dislike either.

We noticed that as everyone around us finished their meals, they were served complimentary desserts as well. We weren't, and on being asked, the waiter claimed rather condescendingly, that both the chips and desserts are only for patrons who ordered drinks as well.

Is that fair? Chips probably, since they're consumed with drinks but desserts too, when we spent 50+ euros, just a few euros less than other patrons besides us? The difference in our bills would've been in single digits!

We felt discriminated against and won't return. On the food alone, we wouldn't have recommended this place anyway (there are many better ones if you want to try a rijsttafel) but while the service itself was otherwise polite- until it wasn't, it was quite clear that we were discriminated against. The experience left a very sour taste in our mouths.

Mind you, we're undemanding and non-fussy patrons and didn't give them any "reason" to treat us this way. For a restaurant which was forthright in telling us how much time we had to finish our meal, it's surprising that they weren't more transparent about their 'criteria' as well.

Save your money and give your business to a restaurant with better food and a bigger heart.

UPDATE: The response from the restaurant owner practically confirms my allegations of discrimination and lays bare their mindset. I hesitated to mention in my original review that we may have been discriminated against because of our ethnicity, but their response leaves nothing in doubt. Sample these words:

"while Mr. Tanay mentioned about discrimination, from now on we will be extra careful accepting indian guests like Mr. Tanay. so thank you Mr. Tanay for your one star!"

Also, they went out of their way to call someone who paid 50+ euros for their distinctly mediocre food a "cheap customer" repeatedly just because they didn't have the drink we wanted and we chose not to opt for any other drinks? So their logic is that a customer who pays 50+ euros is cheap, but if they spend just 5-10 euros more on drinks (served in the narrowest of glasses!), they are not? Very sound...

Good food, with what can only be described as openly hostile and aggressive service from one of the waiters. Most of the other one-star reviews have also complained about the same person.

Disclaimer: We were about 5 minutes late for our reservation. The staff called us 2 minutes after the reservation to confirm that we were still coming, and we let them know that we would be there within the next few minutes.

Based on a previous good experience from a few years ago, I called to reserve a table a week before arriving in Amsterdam. The person who answered my call thought that I was someone who had reserved a table a few weeks ago and then not showed up. I was clear on the phone that I was not the same person, and they took my reservation. But I feel they were not convinced, because that’s the only possible explanation for what happened when we showed up for dinner.

Every question we had was answered by this waiter with unprovoked ridicule, sarcasm and hostility. For example, we decided not to order a whole extra portion of rice because only one out of six people wanted a few more spoons. An entire extra portion would have been wasted. The waiter responded by asking “if we were for real” and that he “could not understand why we would not order an extra portion of rice when we were spending 26 euros per person on our meals.”

We came here to celebrate one of our friends’ birthdays. While we never asked for special attention, and didn’t even expect overly polite service to begin with, this waiter was extraordinary rude and unprofessional, which led to one of the people breaking down in tears before the evening was over. Even when this happened, his “apologies” were heavily sarcastic and mocking.

I don’t think this person is particularly satisfied with working in the service industry, and chooses to take it out on the guests instead of dealing with his issues, as evidenced from the other...

The food was okay, but our experience in this restaurant was absolutely terrible.

The waiter, from the very beginning, was completely condescending, rude, and seemed very motivated to make us feel uncomfortable and seemed to be out to get us for no reason. I'm not sure if this was just blatant racism or this was his form of entertainment. He kept making weird comments every time he spoke to us, like asking us if we were on a budget when we just enquired about the items that came with the platter. His continued bad behavior totally killed our appetite and we just wanted to leave, but he still kept up with his snide comments till the end, which resulted in one our friends breaking down crying, and even then, his "apology" seemed to only be token words, which still seemed like he was gaslighting us into thinking he did nothing wrong.

The other guests there noticed what happened at our table too and they were visibly put off and surprised by the behavior of this guy.

I've never been to a restaurant that's treated people this way, and it's surprising that such a restaurant even exists and is allowed to do business in a city that's as multicultural and open as Amsterdam.

It doesn't matter how good the menu is, or how big the fame is, but in the end, if you're not comfortable eating at the restaurant (especially with snide remarks), then the food absolutely tastes like trash.

I wouldn't recommend going to this restaurant, you definitely run the risk of ruining your evening here.

Adding a picture of the guy that ruined our evening. Looking at some of the other 1 star reviews, it seems like it's the same guy that ruined their evenings too.

To the guy: If you're reading this, you seriously need help, or at least a basic education on how to interact...