Picanha na Brasa Albufeira — Restaurant in Albufeira

Was sold a lie. We went as a party of 18 whilst on holiday and at first all seemed great. The waiter told us he was the only person who spoke English and to go to him with anything we needed. We weren’t given any menu’s and were told it was all you can eat and shortly after loads of garlic bread started arriving at the table (without request) We then had to ask to order drinks which turned out to be particularly difficult and seemed to come out one at a time for some reason. The food was cooked well and meats arrive at the table on a stick which they carve for you. Worth noting that if you like to go out for an enjoyable meal and socialise whilst doing so then this isn’t the place for you as every 2 minutes you have someone over your shoulder with there meat stick carving it on to your plate. (It’s incredibly rushed) I can’t fault the food as it was tasty however the service a little bizarre and takes the enjoyment away from it as you don’t have time to know what your eating before another person is over your shoulder again. We finished the meal and requested the bill which to our surprise was charged at around 30 euros a head even though our local Uber driver who recommended it said it usually costs them around 16 euros each. We had been charged for a ridiculous amount of garlic bread that we hadn’t even asked for. Drinks were charged at 10 euros each for a single spirit and coke so the bill had come to way above what we had anticipated. Having said all of that, we never asked the prices before hand so slightly our fault I guess however it was all shadowed from us as we were not given any menus nor does it say anywhere what the all you can eat costs. We decided to find a menu and could then see that we had been charged for the most expensive food option as there were three different price options (small, medium or large I guess?) again, nothing was ever explained or asked. We decided to take it for what it was and pay up. We asked to split our bills and pay per family given how many of us there were to which we were met with hostility and anger and told we couldn’t do this.

The whole experience was totally ruined by the service we received and whilst there was a language barrier, I find it hard to believe that they haven’t had many English families there before given the location and all the surrounding restaurants never had any issues with this.

I have no choice but to rate this place 1 star for the sour feeling of being robbed/ taken advantage of and would recommend that anyone thinking of going proceeds...

The barkeeper saved the evening. The Caipirinha was really good and strong.

Beyond that unfortunately I wasn't convinced. The waiters we had to tell twice we needed Ketschup, twice that we had ordered the Caipirinha, twice that we wanted to pay and twice that the Picanha needed fixing, before something happened.

That isn't though my major critic. My issue is the Picanha and what they did to it. The meat was certainly ok, nothing fancy, but fair for the location and price. Yet the cook really didn't know what to do with it. First the Picanha was served unsalted, with a wobbly fat layer. Sorry, but that is an insult to Brazilian food and the meat itself. Positive about it was though that it was medium rare.

After a long while and two attempts, the remaining (I was hungry, so I still ate half of it) Picanha was replaced with one that at least saw an attempt to crisp the fat and it was salted (not much, but enough to say that it's a fair compromise that considers people who don't like strongly salted meat and the rest I was able to help myself). Yet unfortunately this one was a rather lazy attempt still. Clearly it was prepared with a gas flamer, so the fat was only crisp on the most outer layer, there where parts where the flame was held to close to the meat so it had gas aroma and half of the meat was so raw that it was still cold in the inside.

Pictures attached for proof for anyone that knows a thing or two about preparing proper Picanha. One image shows the wobbly fat of v1, the other two the literally raw meat of v2 and the fat that saw only a very short period of rendering crisp.

Btw.: I like meat rare, but it should at least be warm. Added note for the expert: the meat wasn't propperly brined, so the salt was only at the outer layer and the middle of the meat was thus mostly...

DO NOT COME TO THIS RESTAURANT if I could give no stars I would Party of 10, 1 baby, 1 7 yr old, a disabled man & lady of 70 a large family only after been married in this country the day before that have holidayed here on a number of occasions .... On arrival we where given french menus so we asked for English menus and we got an English speaking waiter. I told him that we only like WELL cooked meat and that we would order separate meals, he insisted that we got the skewered meat, that it was well done and cut very thinly. I ordered salmon my mother ordered chicken. Every meat offered to us was raw and red, and we turned away and refused most that was offered to us, I asked for red Sangria & got white, the rest of the party asked for cokes and a jameson for my dad and beer for my hubby. After 1.5 hours I still had no Salmon my mother had no chicken or even salt, i asked for salt right away & we didnt even get that. we tried to leave while paying for our drinks that we drank. Apparently this is against the law. So we stayed, got the police who informed us that we HAVE TO PAY and fill out a complaint book. We paid €255 for a meal that we DID NOT EAT. the English speaking waiter left us with the Portuguese owner who laughed at us with the police. One of the police men start pushing around my 16yr old son cause he was recording the owners and I had to step in between them. He was ignorant & kept telling us we where in his country. It was a horrible situation from...