The Fat Fish — Restaurant in George

I started with 12 oysters plus a glass of Waterford Rose-Mary wine which was excellent, good service, the waitress brought two roses for me to taste. However, it was all downhill from there. The oysters were from Knysna, they only had 15 left I had 12, ranged from excellent and meaty to creamy. Not consistent in texture or taste, may have not been fresh despite Knysna, the source, being only 100 km away. Further update, they were bad and caused me intense diarrhea when I got back to my hotel room a few hours later. I was placed right next to a busy corridor, despite an empty restaurant, they would not move me as a single person would take up a table meant for 4 even though the restaurant was not at all busy and did not get 100% full for the whole evening I was there. No bread or an offer of bread unless one asks for it. Baguette plus butter given after asking about bread. Butter was in a small dish, brought straight from the refrigerator and so was cold, hard and difficult to spread. Bread was stale. No explanation of the menu which is quite complex. Server was pleasant, but did not know much about the wines or the menu. New glass for a different wine Bonnievale Shiraz 2015 - notes of chocolate and toffee, screwtop bottle, bright and lots of fruit tastes. No tannins. A very enjoyable wine. I then ordered another starter, the Black mushroom with mussels. This was a mussels and mushrooms in a white sauce with cheese on top baked in an oven very strange dish, floating in a thin white sauce with baked cheese on top and a black mushroom in the middles with mussels on the mushroom. Local mussels are a great ingredient, unfortunately this treatment does not do justice to either the mussels or the mushroom used as a base. Could not eat more than a few tastes. This dish is an insult to both the mussels and the mushrooms. A waste of good ingredients. I then proceeded to have the grilled line fish which was Yellowtail. It arrived overcooked with much too much butter and too much salt. In fact every dish I was served was over salted including the steamed vegetables. My last attempt at salvation was the coconut creme caramel. The creme caramel was broken, curdled, lumpy, not smooth and basically scrambled eggs. The caramel sauce was bitter and overcooked, almost burnt. Placed on top were two canned litchis. I could not eat more than a taste. All in all a disastrous meal. I don't understand why this restaurant has 4.5 stars. I give it no more than one star as nothing I had was well prepared or even any care taken to try and present something palatable apart from the wine which they could not screw up. The servers could not answer basic questions like, where the prawns were sourced from, if the kingklip was fresh or frozen and where it was sourced from etcetera, the waitress knew nothing about the wines or the varietals from which they were made. Not...

I was genuinely looking forward to dining here based on the promising menu, but unfortunately, my experience was very disappointing.

I ordered a dish that was advertised to come with caramelised basmati rice and garlic butter naan bread — both of which were key reasons I chose that particular item. However, when the food arrived, neither of these sides were included. Instead, completely different substitutes were placed on the plate without any explanation or prior notice.

What made this worse was that the staff made no effort to inform me about the change. No apology, no heads-up — just an unspoken switch. It felt dismissive and misleading. If a restaurant can’t provide what’s listed on the menu, the least they can do is communicate that to the customer before the food is served.

The replacement sides were unremarkable, and the overall dish suffered for it. Sadly, this lack of transparency and disregard for the customer’s expectations really overshadowed the meal. I left disappointed and...

Wow, wow, wow. Had dinner at the Fat Fish last night and I will be back. Probably as soon as possible. The location is cozy. The staff are awesome. The food is exceptional. Please do yourself a favor and go have a look for yourself. You will not be disappointed. I would personally recommend the dum sum (vegetarian) or bobotie spring rolls (sounds strange, but are absolutely morish) to start with. For mains, the fish and chips (they have a great lunch special running on that on Tuesdays and Thursdays FYI), the Burmese curry (a fish curry and, I would really recommend) or the fish and sesame crusted calamari (side note: order some fries, they're awesome). For dessert we had the banana malva (great!), the amaretto brulee (my personal favorite, perfect balance of flavour, texture and sweetness) and the Panna cotta. I could list a dozen more items that honestly delivered across the board. An impressive feat to accomplish both excellence and...