Garlic 'n lemon bistro — Restaurant in Panglao

‼️DON’T EVEN BOTHER TRYING THIS PLACE!!‼️

Google brought us to this place because of good reviews! BIGGEST MISTAKE!!! We should have checked the low reviews before going and went somewhere else. A LOT OF THE REVIEWS WERE BOUGHT FOR SURE!!

We eat out A LOT and have never had tasteless, terrible food at a restaurant EVER.

My husband ordered the “famous” garlic butter shrimp and just tasted super bland. I had the breaded pork with rice - not seasoned at all!! I saw Mang Tomas (lechon sauce) at the counter and had to use it to make the food taste like something. 🤣Even the veggies on the side looked tasty but really felt like I’m eating hospital food!!

The place is very weirdly decorated. Felt like I was at my hoarder relative’s house. So many random decor (from old Barbie dolls, Starbucks cups to even Cebu Pacific’s stuffed toy) and you can tell maybe the owner’s favourite drink is Jack Daniel’s.

I also overheard the owner talking rudely to his waiters/waitresses because they had to move the owner’s cigarette, gaming chair and other Knick knacks from one of the table so they can sit a couple of customers. He was very mean to them. How can you run a business like this?! He’s like a little boy throwing a tantrum.

I had to talk my husband out of talking to the owner about the google reviews, quality of the food and how incredibly rude he is.

When we asked for the bill, the waiter had to go to the back as I don’t think the owner trust his workers to handle money. We got the clue that this owner is not only the cook, he’s also the only cashier at this place. 🤣 He didn’t even hand the bill to us - threw it on the table and waited for the money to be handed to him. After he got the cash, he checked the bill and threw it right back on the table for us to take. How rude!!

The owner/rude chef gives away free Tequila shots in exchange for good google reviews. So beware!! He also did not give us an official receipt which all businesses in the Philippines are legally supposed to do.

5 star for the servers. The food and owner? READ MY REVIEW ALL OVER AGAIN.

EDIT: My husband and I woke up in the middle of the night with...

Come for the atmosphere; stay for the delicious food prepared and served with love and deserving pride. Five stars.

The bistro is small and intimate. Any flat surface has been decorated with the most interesting variety of nicknacks. Extraordinary Attorney Woo (KD on Netflix) would love this place, especially the ceiling.

I am pretty sure the owner is the genius of the kitchen, but he also appears at the front to chat with his guests. He helped us out of a difficult situation, and we appreciated that.

We ordered the Caesar Salad (375 PHP) as a starter, it arrived after the mains and had enough chicken added to feed two people. For the mains we ordered the Chicken Parmigiana with Spaghetti (445) and the house specialty, the Spicy Lemon Chicken (375) which also had Spaghetti. Everything was most pleasing to the palate.

We had a house wine - an Australian Cabernet Shiraz (850). They apologized for it not being chilled (shudder the thought)! Wish there had been a chilled white available: the food is all so good it deserves to be complemented with an assortment of wines.

I recommend this restaurant fully. So good! Do try the Spicy Lemon Chicken.

Cash only.

A common plea to Tawala area restaurants: Start to accept credit cards! As Philippines moves towards contactless credit card payments, at the very least these local restaurants catering almost exclusively to tourists who will pay 400 per entrée owe their patrons the convenience of credit card payments. Carrying wads of 1K PHP notes is really...

We decided to go here because the place had such good ratings on Google and TripAdvisor. Mistake.

There were just so many strange things going on, starting with the chef/owner being all over the place. I don't know why he comes from kitchen to do everything when there are waitresses as well. He was friendly, but overly and hyper actively so, which made us feel uncomfortable. We're not sure but it looks like he has his own table right at the entrance with cigarettes, sodas etc, like what? We were guided to the table by a waitress but the owner decided take over from there.

The second thing that was strange was the food. Pasta Carbonara had a very mild seafood taste to it but the sauce was something I've never seen before. There was so much of it that it made eating the actual pasta very difficult. I mean you could learn to swim on it (see the picture after the pasta was eaten). Spent the following day in the bathroom.

The big red flag and the reason why I don't give two but only one star was how they dealt with the payment. We asked for the check and were given a calculator with the total sum on it. We checked that it was somewhat correct and paid believing that maybe we'll get the receipt with the change. Well no. No receipt at all. Very fishy.

This is not a 4,5 star place. This is not the no. 1 place of the town. Don't go with high expectations. Sorry to say so, as the place looked...