Loetje Houten — Restaurant in Houten

Loetje has quite a reputation for its steaks and atmosphere .. but this was disappointing.

The restaurant is wide and open and feels like a quick in and out place. The menu is limited, even for steaks there are only 4 variations, not for stake type but for the additional toppings ( onion, bacon etc.) They all come in gravy, no sauce options. Everything on the side has to be ordered separately.

Service was friendly but very slow.. we waited at least 10 mins for drink orders and after another 15 for food orders. It took at least 30 mins for food was served. After we asked a waiter we got the side salad to share ( from the fridge, clearly prepped before ) and had to wait another 10 mins for the mains.

My sole ( 🐟 ) was okay .. i got 2 medium sized fishes. The Steaks that my friends ordered were overkilled with toppings.. just too much. We were told all steaks are served medium rare unless asked differently. We did not ask differently but steaks were pretty rare (not medium! )

The experience felt like a road side restaurant diner and did not meet my expectations of Loetje at all.

As for price .. 2 drinks - main only - coffee = 48 euro ...

I came to this Loetje branch 5 times already and they were always very busy. Despite this, the service had always been quite fast. They took our orders promptly and they came shortly after. However, they made some mistakes with the drinks and charging us items that were out of stock (always check your receipt!!). But they were fast in refunding us the item.

We ordered: Avocado-fries (€7.50): Our favorite hapje. It's so underrated! They were crispy on the outside and soft on the inside. The sriracha mayo went very well with the avocado. We always order this as an appetizer.

Beef tenderloin garlic (€27.50): The medium-rare was more like a medium compared to the other branches. Personally I would order rare, which was more like a medium-rare. Still, it was very tender and delicious. The garlic gravy is tastier than the original one.

Ice cream (€2.75/scoop): It was bigger than the ice cream that came with the appeltaart. So take this into account before ordering the ice cream! I had the strawberry and chocolate. The strawberry flavour was more like a sorbet than ice cream. Still, they...

We came here for the 80th birthday of my grandmother and when we arrived we were all quite hungry because of the activities we did throughout the day. When we arrived and were seated at the table a young waitress started asking if we'd like something to drink even before everyone properly sat down. Next to that there was no menu for the drinks on the table which I had to ask for, she got the menu for me but then walked away to get the drinks everyone had ordered without the menu leaving me as the only one without a drink. Some more unusual things happened with this waitress untill my aunt had enough and asked for another waitress. After this issue was resolved we got another waitress who made up for the prior mistakes by her amazing hospitality.

Next to the weird service there is nothing to complain about the veriety of food, the quality of the dishes and drinks and the pace of the courses.

Would've been 4 stars if we hadn't been treated so rude in the beginning of...