BiBo Dani García — Restaurant in Madrid

Very good price for quality food (~50€/person with wine)... And the fun starts with the secret door passing through the kitchen leading to the cocktail bar with the most fun cocktail makers. The restaurant itself is quite nice looking with a good atmosphere. Even the toilets look cool. However the main waiter we had was quite nonchalant and the music kept on changing style (from traditional Andalusian music up to pop and everything in the middle). For food we shared 7 salty dishes and 2 desserts between 4 and a bottle of wine. We were quite satisfied with that quantity. Overall the good is good but not exceptional.

The most fun part started when going to the cocktail bar upstairs with the waiter bringing you through the kitchen. The bar area is small, beautiful and relaxing. For 16€ per cocktail you can discover the many talents of the bar tenders that create all the flavours themselves in the kitchen laboratory including alembic and an ultrasonic bath. There is at least 9h work behind each cocktail and a long list of ingredients. The cocktail are really not strong in alcohol and if it is not to your taste, the waiter will be very happy to fix it for you with drops of sweet, sour, bitter drops of their making. We had literally 2h of laugh with the super friendly and funny waiter. Just for that, you should experience the cocktail bar!

More about the food: The brioche with oxtail (rabo de toro) was served with it seems a light mushroom cream that fitted the dish. The milhojas of cheese and foie gras came with a thin crunchy caramel layer and thin toast to lay down the foie without overpowering it's delicate taste. The cheese was probably there to get a texture rather than taste as it did not appear. The guacamole made in front of you is not too spicy, get some crunch with beans and seeds. It came with coriandre leaves that was appreciated by most but not all. It's apparently a genetic trait of people. The tuna tartare served with a yolk had a soya and sesame sauce balanced with herbs. Quite nice but the tuna deserved to be marinated in the mix longer. The ceviche also could have be infused with flavours longer but it was fresh and came with butternut and tarragon that give plenty of flavours. You find the Peruvian/South American style with the white corn in the dish. The tempura did not impress. The solomillo was the most disappointing for all of us. Very similar to many places. The chocolate mousse came in large quantity and definitely filled us up. It had a both light milk chocolate mousse covered with a thinner white chocolate mousse layer with vanilla seeds and somehow giving a light coconut taste. It was very nice. The cheesecake came without the cake. It is the mascarpone mix in a glass pot with a bit too sweet red fruits layer. It came with pieces of cheese (payoyo) that you can easily remove if not...

We had a very disappointing experience. For starters we ordered the russian salad, guacamole, shrimps and basil (which were nice) and a cesar salad that was supposed to be made at the table (was not). The cesar salad should frankly not be called that with deep fried chicken and no anchovies in the dressing. Going onto the mains, two of us ordered tuna tartars that were uneatable! They had pieces of joint and the sauce was so sour it burned your tongue.

As we thought that was it from the bad experience, we got the bill. After speaking with the manager the tartars were taken off the bill, but we realized we were charged 4 euros PER PERSON for bread we got with the main dishes (half a slice per person!!!, 16€ for two full slices). On top of that you can see they try to make you pay more. We ordered one bottle of water, we received two. We were offered an off menu snack prior to starters, we received tiny skewers of olives and anchovies that were 3 euros each! We were not informed of any of the prices of water or snacks. We also never got the wine list and the waiter tried to encourage us very hard to order a bottle that is much more expensive.

Last but not least, the service. Asking for anything requires you waving at the waiter for 20 mins. We had to refill all the drinks ourselves. Once we begged out extra nachos to eat the remaining guacamole (20 mins later) we saw the kitchen staff pull out a giant store bought bag of nacho and throw it on the plate.

To be frank, if you would like to have a nice dinner in Madrid, avoid that place, save your night and money for something nicer.

Edit: it was lovely to notice our “local special” starters that are 3€ per piece!!! While grocery shopping at el...

I found this restaurant via the Amex Centurion restaurant guide, and whilst I really enjoyed the food, I found the service and overall experience to be very poor, largely due to the constricted amount of time that the restaurant allocates for each reservation which is 2 hours (this was not mentioned on my confirmation email or the second email about my reservation).

Because of the 2 hour limit, the entire experience felt rushed. By the time we arrived, dropped off coats, sat down, and got drinks, our waiter told us we had 1:40 minutes left to eat. And he constantly reminded us of the countdown.

One specific example of how poor the service was is that they delivered the dessert QR code menu during our main course, started clearing our main course plates whilst one person in our table was eating her last bite, and then immediately asked us what we wanted for dessert as there was "only 15 minutes left" as the waiter said. In a restaurant of this quality, this was the poorest display of service that I have seen in a long time. Why should I be looking at the dessert menu during my main course and order immediately after taking my last bite of the main?

After complaining to the manager, she told me that it was the policy for the entire group - for a chef that has Michelin Stars - you are really letting customers down on focusing on the quickest table turns instead of the best experience.

What I liked: -Overall the food was great (we had 5 courses) -Fun and lively atmosphere

What I didn't like: -Poor service made it feel like eating in a McDonalds -the Cheesecake is not a New York cheesecake

Recommendations: -Tell your customers ahead of time about the 2 hour cap or extend this...