Pureocean Beachside Dining — Restaurant in Aruba

My family and I just had dinner at pureocean tonight to celebrate our last night in Aruba. We were lucky enough to get there early enough to take advantage of the beautiful view! The last two tables that were available on the beach were covered in ants. When we pointed this out to the hostess, she tried to smash them with her finger then eventually gave up and offered us a new table and a bottle of OFF bug spray which we happily doused ourselves, and probably anyone else within close proximity to us, with. I couldn't really enjoy much of dinner because I was constantly shifting around in my chair, trying my hardest to prevent the ants from crawling into my shoes. The wind also kept blowing sand in my eyes and mouth which was insanely annoying.

The service was painfully slow. We got there at around 6:30 pm and received our food and drinks at around 8:00 pm. The menu is quite small so I'm not entirely sure why it took so long for us to receive our food. My glass of water had an odd black and white grainy substance floating in it, as did my mom's when I asked if I could have hers. I assume that it was sand possibly but I'm not 100% sure since sand usually sink and whatever this was was floating. Our waiter also rarely came to check on us while we waited on our appetizers and entres. My moms lobster bisque soup only had one piece of lobster in it. The risotto appetizer was very good but definitely needed more sauce. I had the scallops which were very good and my dad had the grouper which he said was very good. My mom had the lobster macaroni and cheese which she said was a bit lacking and I have to agree. She said that there were about 4 pieces of shrimp inside, topped with one piece of lobster and a bunch of imitation crab meat.

The choices for dessert were quite plain. We were given the options of Mango cheesecake, regular cheesecake, chocoalte cake, or carrot cake. We ordered dessert, hoping that it wouldn't take as long but unfortunately, it took an additional 45 minutes to receive. The mango cheesecake was so-so, definitely not worth the additional wait. It didn't look anything like how it did on the website and mostly tasted like a piece of store-bought cheesecake with a sweet mango flavored syrup drizzled over it. If the service was a bit faster, I'd consider returning on our next trip to Aruba. Until then though, I'd suggest...

My mom, aunt and I decided to eat at this restaurant and I’ll start be saying the food was pretty solid and the atmosphere was romantic and peaceful. My issue was with our incredibly rude waiter who provided lack luster service and then had a temper tantrum when we didn’t understand the culture around gratuity. First, the service was very basic and we waited 30-45 mins for our food without any updates or explanations. Secondly, he was being super strict about our dessert coupon that we left in the room when the bar next door had them lying all over the table and the “free” cake was very small. Lastly, we noticed there was a 15% “service charge” and we assumed it was his automatically added tip… However, while checking out he pushed the card reader in my face and said, “Is there anything you want to give me?!” He then proceeded to get very aggressive when I said nothing additional. After noticing that he was upset we asked him to provide more information on the “service charge” and he provided a vague explanation and got frustrated when we asked why they wanted use to pay an additional fee. Instead of calming explaining their custom, he rudely said, “that’s what y’all do in America” but didn’t actually answer our questions. He snatched the reader from my mom and walked away and it was so abrupt that she didn’t even know what she paid for. Also in Europe ( this is a Dutch owned country from what I heard) they don’t tip at all… so how are we suppose to know? At the end of the day, do better, I’ve never felt so uncomfortable...

Sunset on the beach, a huge lobster tail in a margarita glass, and perfectly cooked pistachio encrusted sea bass. What else could you want? They had a live clarinet player, which was both delightful and unobtrusive. The Sea bass dish I ordered had delicious elements of roasted pistachios with rich ricotta cheese ravioli. My husband was in love with his light tomato sauce based pasta dish filled with mixed seafood. The ceviche was divine and the blackened ahi tuna tartar was on point. Our only complaint was that the restaurant was obviously understaffed. I only saw 1 waiter, ours, and he had told us he had only been there for a week. We had received excellent service until it was dessert and check out time. Multiple people had asked how our meal in progress was, cleaned our plates away in a timely manner, but no one would even look at us after we had ordered dessert. We waited, and waited, we contemplated everything from walking out to just leaving money on the table and forgetting our dessert trio. Finally I found a “server” at the bar and inquired. A few minutes later we had dessert, our waiter apologized, stating a large party had set the kitchen back. No biggie. We let him know we were ready for the check. We finished dessert and still we waited. Again, we grappled with our moral resolve to see the check get paid, somehow! We picked up our stuff and made our way to the bar again to find someone who could help us. We did get the check and all was well but they need a staffing adjustment...