Restaurante La Reserva 12 — Restaurant in Málaga

I'm going to write this one in English, because, though I do speak Spanish...I just can't describe our experience here outside of my native tongue😂. Wow! This was such a bad dining experience in every way....it has become a long running joke in my family. It was just me and my partner looking to find some dining spots in our new city. We know the risks of just going somewhere without a recommendation, but we had to eat, so we decided on reserva 12 because of the location and the menu looked good. Pros: beautiful location

Cons: the service was the weirdest I have ever seen. There appeared to be enough servers, and the restaurant wasn't full (red flag), but they were so rushed and stressed I think it triggered my own fight or flight response.... unfortunately, we decided to stay and fight through this experience.

The servers wouldn't even look at us when we ordered, or when they delivered food. At one point, my partner ordered another glass of white wine and the server just poured a glass of red...directly into the same glass...and then ran away.

The food...Thank God we didn't order too much. We ordered clams, fried shrimp, and salmonetes. The clams weren't off or anything like that, but they were just not good. Flavorless and not prepared or presented well. It was a small portion and we didn't finish. To be honest, the fried shrimp were a mistake, we wanted the whole shrimp grilled, but one way or another we ended up with fried (i think it was our error). We were presented with a bowl of tiny tiny fried things. It was the least appetizing thing I have ever seen. It looked like a gigantic bowl of fried bugs. We took our error in stride and decided to try to eat some of it. We didn't enjoy it and it was taken away practically untouched. Finally the salmonetes. These were not bad and we were happy to have something we could stomach.

I went inside to use the aseos and was not surprised to see a bucket of disgusting water, caught from the freezer in the dining room. If I had seen this before making the reservation I wouldn't have made it. I don't remember the state of the bathrooms, so that is probably a good sign.

Clearly we didn't stick around for an after dinner drink or dessert. It was a horrible dining experience, but was it worth it to have an ongoing joke that we can laugh about for years to come? I think so.

There are some excellent restaurants in Málaga and a whole lot of Reserva 12s. Sometimes you find a gem and other times, the risk doesn't quite pan out in your favor. We won't be recommending...

This was an especially disappointing experience. When I went before, the food was okay and service was nice. This second time I went, the experience was bad enough to wipe my mind of the prior memories I had with this restaurant.

First, the food took an extremely long time to one out—one of our dishes took over an entire hour. When we tried to cancel this order because by then we were tired of waiting for the dish, the waitress cuts us off, spews out a list of Spanish, and ignores our requests, yet suspiciously being able to communicate in English before.

The waitress was one of the rudest waitresses I’ve ever encountered. She takes advantage of non-Spanish speakers and tourists to pad up their bill. If you really wanted more money, you could just earn it in a honest way.

I don’t recommend anyone coming here; I don’t see any positives to the food or service. It was really disappointing because I was looking forward to Malaga, yet thankfully my experience at different restaurants were the polar opposite of the time I had here. So, I would advise others to look into other restaurants that are on this same street which have higher quality food and kind,...

A red flag as soon as we sat down, when I saw the rest of the clientele around us were pensioners. I immediately realised the food was going to be bland and boring, and my suspicions were correct. Not even with heaps of salt and pepper could I finish my meal. That combined with the fact we were constantly hassled by street vendors as we sat at a terrace table trying to have a quiet lunch, made it one of the worst dining experiences we've ever had in Malaga. Not even the service could save the day - the waiter was nice and friendly until he saw I'd hardly touched my food, then he seemed to get angry about it, and his tone completely changed. He clearly wanted us to move on and leave the table free for the next poor suckers...