La Originale Velázquez — Restaurant in Madrid

Right, so my experience here wasn't great, I'm surprised by all the 5 star reviews and wonder if I just had bad luck with my meal here yesterday.

Tldr; nice decor and friendly staff, however understaffed so it's difficult to get their attention, pinza was good but pasta wasn't a good experience. Would not recommend unless in a rush maybe.

The place is small but well decorated and cozy, I liked the atmosphere and the staff were really kind and friendly. However, I went at lunch time and they were evidently understaffed, if you needed anything you had to go by the bar, they wouldn't notice you or check on you again after taking your order. My fork was dirty, it happens, they changed it no problem. We ordered a drink from the menu, they had run out of it...Our food arrived, a Pinza and Pasta...the pinza was good honestly, but the pasta was very sad. It was supposed to be with a cheese and guanciale sauce, but it had absolutely no flavor, it just tasted flat and like milk. It needed salt desperately. I eventually got some salt from the bar, and that made it more palatable, but it wasn’t a good experience. There was no seasoning or flavor, not even pepper in that sauce. It didn't taste of the guanciale either, it just had some sprinkled on top (in fact I think it was just bacon not really guanciale). I know I'm being nitpicky now but the consistency of my pasta and sauce felt like it had been re-heated, it was burning hot when it arrived so I couldnt eat right away but as soon as it started cooling the sauce and pasta texture became very dry and like rubbery, it wasn't pleasant. Again, the pinza was good, my partner enjoyed it, but my experience was so underwhelming that I can't really recommend the food here.

Please hire more staff so the guests can get the right service, please pay attention to the salt and seasoning point of your dishes. One of the staff members admitted that its a common problem that the pasta is usually too...

Rudeness and unprofessionalism is all I can say about this place. We knew it would be hard to get into a restaurant in that area without a reservation but the place looked empty and after talking to one of the waiter we were hopeful that they could find some space to acomódate us. That until he commented the situation with another waiter and and this one started rolling his eyes, looking at us sideways and whispering to his coworker right in front of us. Right after that he told us that because we did not have a reservation they did not have a table for us. We went outside pretty upset with the unprofessionalism and made right there and then an online reservation for 10 min later and showed it to him. He was visibly mad and to make us uncomfortable (because we had a stroller with a baby) told us the only table he had available was a little high top on the main hallway right next to the bar, which was a very obvious lie. It was in that moment when my husband told me to just go they obviously don’t want to serve us. I will never know why they would think they are too good for our money, I would hope it was not racism because the rude waiter looked pretty Latin himself, maybe is just laziness or lack of incentive in taking one more table. The fact is that if I was the owner of this place I would be pretty mad at this behavior, things like this will get this...

I am done! Seriously. What the heck is going on with restaurants in Madrid lately? So, it appears that the new “trend” of restaurants is to tell you (after you are sitting down at the table) that you only have a certain amount of time to eat and then you have got to leave!! WHAT?😮 Since when is this acceptable? I swear, this keeps happening and I am done. Saluterria Velazquez just did that to our party today for lunch. On top of that, they insisted that our reservation was for half an hour “before” the actual time it was for, thus shortening even more the time we were “allowed” to stay at the table! Unreal and very sad. Who can enjoy anything with this anguish? Can you all believe that when we were about to order the entree the waitress told us that she couldn’t take our order because we would have to leave before the dishes would be done? Nope, I am not making this up. Wow 😮! This seems to be a worldwide trend among restaurants owners and it needs to STOP 🛑. I will not be bullied into eating fast any meals at the rate of speed that suits the monthly financials of XYZ restaurant so their intake is substantial enough. I don’t understand where this is coming from but as far as I am concerned, I will NEVER go back to any restaurant that has the nerve to treat their customers like this....