Kita Koguta — Restaurant in Warsaw

It was our first time visiting and probably our last.

We went on a Friday night, peak time. The venue was very busy as you'd expect. Nice background music and a lively atmosphere. We were able to quickly find a seating space for two. If you're visiting in a large group then you'd definitely have to book in advance.

It was not clear to us that there was table service only, so I went the bar and it was only after waiting for awhile that a staff member noticed me and told me about the table service.

The waitress told us there is no menu. This was a bit of a red flag for us. Personally, I like to read through a menu and possibly discover something new or see an ingredient I am familiar with. The waitress just asked what flavours we were interested in. I said peach and sweet and the waitress seemed a bit confused. I don't know if it was possibly a language barrier or an unusual request.

My partner placed her order for an non-alcoholic drink.

Our drinks were served in a reasonable time, but we brought over by a different person than the person that took our drink order. They placed one drink in front of me and one in front of my partner. My partner took one slip and claimed her drink was the one that had alcohol in it. She is pregnant and even a slight slip can upset her stomach and make her feel bad. I tried both of the drinks and couldn't work it out, so I had to stand up and find the original waitress to confirm for us which drink was which. If I would have had a menu it would have been easier for me to work it out. Even to this day I have no idea what I drunk and its ingredients.

We asked for the bill and it was brought quickly. It came to 51zl. We were not on budget, but it's not a very comfortable feeling ordering something that you have no idea about the price. If they told us it was 200zl what could have we have done? Nothing.

I found the bill quite strange (see picture). My partner paid 17zl for a drink and there was a 10zl extra for 'doplata skladnik bezalkoholowy' (non-alcoholic ingredient surcharge). So, that drink went from 17zl to 27zl with no clear explanation. What was that magic ingredient? A syrup? The ice? A juice? I still don't know. Potentially they could just be adding anything to your bill and you can't question it afterwards. It put a negative spin on our experience. I am not saying I was cheated, but something didn't sit right with me.

The drinks...

Fantastic place!!! Great atmosphere (decorations, fellow patrons, attractive, gregarious servers). Great service--if you show up without a reservation and they don't have a table for you, they give you free hot beverages while you wait, and in order to make sure that you can enjoy as many of their wonderful cocktails as possible without getting too tipsy, they provide you with unlimited water and popcorn, without prompting. But a trendy atmosphere and good service will only get you so far. The cocktails are the real star of the show, as they should be. Your waiter will suggest something for you based on your preferences, or you can order one of their unique signature drinks. I had my server suggest something the first time and wound up with a delicious concoction of red currant juice and rum. The Blood and Sand which I ordered next was even better--complicated but smooth, sweet without overpowering the scotch, the flavors blended together perfectly. I don't even particularly like scotch, but I loved this drink! I highly recommend Kita Koguta. It's just an all around fantastic experience. In fact, it's almost redefined what I think upscale cocktails should be--I'm going back in my mind and revising my opinion of my former...

The decor and atmosphere is quirky and tiki-like. It seems like a great mainstream bar for an easy-going night, but we wouldn't recommend for cocktail connoisseurs.

They seemed to have a menu for groups, but we assume because we were just 2 people someone sat with us and asked what we like. The language caused a little confusion though. For example, we said we like rum with a 'strong Jamaica punch', meaning a punch-in-the-face of strength and flavourful character. And we hoped they would be good at making a strong rum-forward cocktail given the tiki-vibe of the bar. But his drink was more like a tropical fruit punch, hiding any rum within it. They offered to fix it and brought us new drinks. They were better, but still...