Desiderio — Restaurant in Santiago del Teide

Today we were eating our dinner at this restaurant. First of all the dishes were not good- average at most. We ordered 2 desserts by the end of the meal. After half an hour waiting - I tried to reach the waiter in order to ask for the dessert. He came to me with the bill and there were 2 desserts charged on the bill. I said that we had not had our desserts yet. Once we realised he forgot (which he admitted) we asked to cancel the desserts and give us the bill anyway. We paid and left the restaurant- we did not want to wait another 10-20 minutes for desserts as we were already nervous and most importantly- there was a horrible smell of oil or something burnt from the kitchen. I think their ventilation system was not working. What is the worst is that once we got to our hotel i rechecked the bill and noticed that the waiter cancelled just 1 of 2 desserts. The other one was still there and we paid for it! As an evidence I attach a picture of the bill - the dessert is the last position. I do not recommend going there- average food, horrible service and potential fraud with charging...

The food and service was so good at Desiderio, we had to visit them twice on our holiday.

When you first walk in, you will see displays of wine, before walking in to the main restaurant, The decor is very traditional, and we were fortunate both times, that they had a table.

They can get quite busy, and the team working there work hard.

We were served on both occasions by Charlie, a young Italian guy who truly goes out of his way to make you feel looked after. When he is very busy, he gets some help clearing tables and serving food by the chef. The chef even comes out to say hi, ask how your food is, and just generally make you feel looked after. Between him and Charlie, they took care of a busy restaurant, and delivered some delicious food to our table!

The first time, we had beef carpaccio, and a caprese salad, followed by our pizzas, and the second time, we tried some other starters, including mussels followed by more delicious pizzas! The food is freshly prepared in the kitchen, and comes when ready.

One of the places I am looking forward to visiting again...

Had an early dinner, lots of empty tables. The interior and prices hint at a fine dining experience, but the chef seems to have come from a café background. Everything tries to look like haute cuisine, yet a small, overcooked tuna steak doesn’t taste any better just because someone grated a carrot over it. One defrosted prawn — falling apart on the outside but still raw inside. The white fish was decent, but they forgot to add salmon and brought it later on a separate plate — dry on the outside, raw inside. It all felt as if the dishes were made from frozen fish that had been burnt before it even cooked properly.

There was small salad leaves and grated veges though that didn’t help much with presentation. The fish with parmesan and aubergine was actually very good — didn’t look great, but delivered on flavour.

I wouldn’t say everything was terrible, but even considering how hungry we were, the food was barely worth a solid three out of five. Staff was really friendly and looked professional, but kitchen...