Batik — Restaurant in Málaga

Very disappointed with my recent experience at this establishment. Firstly we ate at the restaurant for my friends birthday (she also reserved a table on the terrace upstairs where the bar is). Firstly the food was good. The general service wasn’t amazing.

Then we went to the bar. Sat at our table. The waitress who said she was the manager, was arguing with us the rate of the booked table eetc. i don’t want to go into the issue she had as it didn’t make any sense nor was it what they had said when booking (also to note we were British, Americans and spanish CLIENTS and we all speak perfect spanish and live in malaga so absolutely no language barrier), also there were no people queuing up for these seats, everyone in this area had a table or sofa (which we HAD booked), anyway this is beside the point. What was absolutely SHOCKING and the reason for the 1 star was the way the waitress was talking to my friend and us as a group, the tone, aggressiveness and lack of respect was despicable. NEVER have I experienced such rudeness or been spoken to like this as a customer. My friend simply and politely explained that she didn’t understand the issue and explained why she didn’t understand. The waitress replied in an argumentative, extremely improper and rude manner, we were all watching in shock. The waitress in the end backed down and we agreed on these very strange terms for the tables we HAD booked. The ONLY reason we stayed was because it’s was on a Saturday night and to late to find a table elsewhere.

One person from our group was due to book her very large hen night here and has decided on a different venue.

Also I have noticed that these reserved areas “VIP” aren’t really VIP. We had to go up to the bar 2-3 times to grab attention. Its just pre-paying your drinks and sitting at a table. lol. no table service. We got spoken to poorly. There wasn’t any music (I don’t know what time this was but I found it strange). I would suggest pehaps starting off with explaining what ViP service means to your staff.

My advice for this restaurant (and others) is to invest in proper profesional training for their staff, of course in doing this to would mean investing in regular staff (which can and is done in many places where the service is always amazing!).

This attitude of “ We don’t care, we have plenty of customers, we don’t need you” not only makes the business look very unprofessional but also not a great look...

The best thing about this restaurant is it’s location and view. I booked this place after seeing its rooftop from the Alcazaba. I went with two friends and we got the tasting menu with wine pairing.

The first course was the foie Micuit and apple tatin and paired with the D.O. Malaga - Pedro ximenez seco. My serving had a very long hair cooked into it which was quite disappointing as the dish was very tasty along with its pairing. However, the dish was replaced with an apology. The second course was chestnut and portobello mushroom cream with baby calamari with bornos frizzante. The frizzante was memorable. Third course was Grilled marinated octopus on fresh corn humita was nice. The fourth course: beef ribs were terrible. It was very difficult to cut through the meat due to it being very stringy and had very little flavour. The last course was a tiramisu and it was not tasty at all. no flavour and it didn’t taste or look like a tiramisu. The drink paired with this was a mix of a cava and a muscatel and it would have been better to just serve one of the other as the mix was a disappointment. Throughout dinner the staff would ask us if we were finished with our meals even when we were visibly still eating with knife and fork in our hands. Each time cutlery were set after a dish they had an appearance of being thrown on the table. The restaurant level we were on had one other table that was finishing up their meals and every other table was empty, so not busy to excuse the standard of service. At a restaurant that charges this much for tasting and pairing I expect a higher quality of customer experience.

Overall, for a restaurant that does a tasting menu with a wine pairing the standard was disappointing for food and service. I would...

One star and because it’s not possible to give less. A pretentious restaurant with the worst kitchen service ever and several uncomfortable chairs to eat sat down. The owner seems to be more worried about the design and decoration instead of thinking about the confort of clients.

After nearly two hours we only got a mini spring roll and a ridiculous plate of risotto. Everything is overpriced. We left the restaurant completely hungry (and angry). People around us had the same problems. Slow even to charge you...According to the waiters the reason of such a poor service was that the kitchen manager was on his paternity leave and a new one started working in the kitchen, however reading reviews you will find similar reviews to this one even 7 months ago!! Definitely the kitchen manager is a lucky guy with such a long break...

Will never come back.

P.S: The ridiculous bit of pork on the photo cost 19€!!!! And a glass of beer...