Stasha — Restaurant in Lisbon

OK until it wasn’t. We went on Friday night. Service ground to a halt as the tables filled up. The food was ok, but would prefer to see more care in execution and less time decorating. The black rice seafood risotto was a little disappointing - the shrimp were overcooked and the one muscle was stone cold. In my opinion the passion fruit caviar balls were overpowering and didn’t complement the dish. When I got down to the rice it was under-seasoned and swimming in oil. When we were ready to leave it was impossible to attract a waiter’s attention, we must have been there 40 minutes trying to leave. FYI - cards aren’t accepted, only cash payment. I had to walk up to the cash register to try and pay and was told to sit down. When we finally got the bill it was dumped in front of us with no comment. I couldn’t read it as it was handwritten badly - given the time it took to get the bill we just had to trust it was correct. We left the money on the table and left without any acknowledgment from the staff. We really felt like an inconvenience, which is a shame because they did start the evening well. Not to mention a missed opportunity, as there were people waiting for a table outside and if they had just let us leave they could have got a second sitting in there no problem. I think when it got busy they just fell to pieces and spent most of the time arguing with each other instead of focusing on their patrons. Probably the worst part was that there was no running water to wash your hands in the bathroom, and not even any hand sanitiser made available - only a sign saying if you want to wash your hands you need to ask the boss. Really hope they fix the tap soon, looked like it had been out of action for a while and a post from a few weeks ago mentions it was broken then - not great during a pandemic. Others may have had a better experience but can’t recommend...

We found the place by accident and after a quick online check which showed great reviews and veggie options, we decided to try it out. The restaurant has a nice atmosphere (beautiful tile floor 😊) and everybody was friendly.

We had barely sat down and were 'asked' If we wanted bread and olives and before we could even answer, this was already on our table. When checking the menu, it showed the following: bread 2euros, olives 1,50euros.. we thought: fine, a little tourist trap..but fair enough. Then we realized we also had to pay 1 euro for a tablespoon of olive oil and 1.50 euros for a cup of butter...both which were placed next to the olives. So without a single drink or order, we were 6 or 7euros in already. I had seen two nice appetizers on the menu but didn't feel like ordering them anymore after this.

We ordered tuna and vegetarian lasagna. The dishes were served fast and looked nice. The taste was blend however. No salt/pepper on either of the dishes it seemed.. the lasagna had way too much ricotta and a sweet sauce on top which disregarded all other flavours.

The servers were hovering quite a lot and asked if we were finished when my husband was clearly still chewing with a half full plate.

All in all, the atmosphere was nice..the wine was tasty and the waiters friendly. But the bread and olive scam ruined our moods and the food lacks taste and refinement. We left slightly confused because of all the amazing reviews!

Lastly, only cash payments taken, handwritten receipt and we couldn't see a wine menu or drinks menu with prices. Which we asked to make sure they weren't going to get us the most expensive glass after the...

We ate dinner at this restaurant. At the beginning we got a starter - bread with oil and olives, although we did not order it. We got menu after the bread came so we didn’t even had a chance to order it. We considered it normal, like at a lot of restaurants do. So we started to wonder what we would order from menu. This is where the first problem comes. A lady waitress was very rude and acting very strange. As if she didn't want to serve us. We ordered salmon tartare and pork cheeks. The tartare was bad and had bones and scales. the pork cheeks were very good - that's why I give 2 stars not 1. When it came to the payment, it turned out that the bread we didn’t ordered is added to the bill and the musical performance also. Luckily the waiter removed the bread from the bill. He was probably very upset by this fact because when he brought us the bill to the table, he literally threw it in the middle and walked away. We wanted to pay by card, but the waitress told us in a mean way that we can't pay by card. There was no such information anywhere inside and out. I was in Portugal for 2 weeks and this is the only restaurant where we were treated that way. It's a pity because the pork cheeks were...