Bamboo Place — Restaurant in Panglao

We were looking forward to a few drinks in this bar as it had a good vibe and feel to it.

Unfortunately whilst waiting for our first drink I was watching the bar staff pour local gin into a Bombay Sapphire gin bottle using a funnel. Now whilst I expect this practice goes on a fair amount it seems pretty daft to do it where the cliental can see you.

I appreciate there may have been a perfectly legitimate reason to poor local gin into a branded gin bottle and my review is entirely unfair although I am struggling to think what that reason would be.

edit : the owner has given an extensive response to my review. In response to him I can only call it as I see it. This was my final day of 2 weeks in the Philippines with my Wife and we both observed the same refilling. The local Gin bottle is pretty obvious but even more so is a Bombay Sapphire Gin bottle being coloured blue. I hope there is a genuine reason to be refilling, such as recycling as suggested but this made little sense filling from one glass bottle to another glass bottle. I rarely feel the need to give a poor review as we check other peoples reviews before going or staying anywhere so it rarely comes up. Certainly all my other reviews from our stay in the Philippines have been positive as we found the people and customer service exceeded our expectations.

I'll leave my review score as it is but please read the owners response also...

UPDATED: Great atmosphere, music but...!

Someone who does not drink and strives not to have too much sugar, this place is a bliss for me. Great music is a plus in this place! Though the DJ I tend to like normally on Sat. They close on Tue. The downside is they do not serve non-alcoholic drinks after 22:00 which is disappointing. Asking for a filtered service water is quite a nightmare. They are quite under staff and lack of organisation at the bar!

I ordered food Pork Bugat for main, Salad to start and mango shake. I had to wait 1 hr to get my food. They serve my main first and my salad was nowhere to find after all the wait. I had to cancel the salad. Though, they gave me freemango shake to compensate for the wait but the challenge, if you are hungry it is annoying. The kitchen had 18 orders in the queue excluding mine! Maria my waiter, did a good job for what she could do.

The other downside is they only had 2 loo for that men and women can share. They have dogs that can be aggressive if you are not careful. They tend to unleash the dog when they close so when you visit the place, it is not that bad!

Oh, I love their straw, they use BAMBOO - no surprise there! The owner is very pleasant and hospitable!

The place can get crowded too especially on bank holidays like Christmas and New Year!

Overall, not a bad...

Quite a disappointing evening. Food okey, crap service.

First of all, we got a menu to share, and before we even had managed to get through the first two pages, a waitress asked if we were ready to order. We kindly asked for a couple of more minutes, which she seemed to understand. Sadly, within 30 seconds, a new waitress came up to us and asked if we were ready. We were still NOT READY TO ORDER YET, and even asked for a second menu to make the decision time a bit shorter.

Secondly, we ordered two of the four cheese sauce burgers, which were okey. One of the burgers had a lack of cheese sauce, while the other one had enough. I ordered wedges one the side, and got five of them. Yes, you heard right, I got FIVE SLICED POTATO BOATS. They tasted good, but to chop and split one small potato and calling it wedges, that’s a scam.

Third, but not least, when I put the last bit of burger in my mouth and was ready to chew, the same first waitress popped by and collected my plate, and asked if I was done ordering. I was so surprised, due to the fact that I still had food in my mouth.

All in all, the waitresses acted if they were in a rush, and that really effected our appetite and restaurant experience.

Would...