La Tabla — Restaurant in The Hague

Poor customer service, chaotic orders and aggressive owner. We came to the restaurant to celebrate a birthday with 18 people. The evening started messy with having waiters and waitresses bring dishes to the table and later taking them away again because they belonged to another table. The staff had very little control over the orders, it was chaotic and seemed unprofessional. After placing our order we had to wait 1-1,5 hours for the food to come. We had ordered sharing plates for 8 people to start with but when we went to ask for the bill, they billed us the double. The staff agreed they had screwed up, but they said they had to follow their boss that wanted the complete amount billed without compromise. The owner showed up aggressively and wanted to only talk to my friend 1-one-1. The situation felt uncomfortable. In the end we paid the full amount to get out of the situation but at the same time we had to say goodbye to Argentinian dishes in The Hague as we'll never want to visit this...

We found La Tabla on a cold day during the lockdown, noticed they were open and had take out. A quick chat with the smiling and fun restaurant manager, made us order 4 type of empanadas and two sandwiches. The fillet sandwich was in a burger type bun and the ribeye was in a ciabatta. Standing in the cold, we thoroughly enjoyed it, perfect medium steaks and very aromatic empanadas.

Back for more last week, with a proper table inside. Same energetic manager and every caring other staff members. Another set of empanadas (as good so consistent outcome). Main attraction was my Lomo 300 grammes steak, cooked to medium ( I told them medium well so that I would get medium, this trick always works). Of I compare to Gauchos, the fact that La Tabla includes vegetables and potatoes and grilled jalapeño on the big plate as a side makes it also a winner on the cost/quality. I have to pay a lot for the Gauchos side plates.

The team speaks Dutch, Italian, Spanish and perfect English.

Will try the...

Very disappointing food and overall experience, especially for the price. Everything looked and tasted like it was prepared and plated in advance, then warmed up wholesale. Even the fresh salad was just as hot as the rest of the food. One of our (wooden) plates was so wobbly and warped that it was really difficult to eat off it - I suppose that's what happens when you put the entire plate in the oven to warm it up. There was almost no flavour at all to the garlic shrimps we got as appetizers, and everything tasted very bland in general. The shrimps, chorizos, and schnitzel were all overcooked, tough and dry. During our meal, the (presumably) owner had a long and extremely loud conversation with a large and equally loud group of his friends standing right next to our table, which made the atmosphere quite awkward for us. I'm genuinely surprised by this experience considering the other positive reviews - I expected...