Otto's Hungarian Import Store & Deli — Restaurant in Burbank

The owner is nice. I kind of felt awkward because he was kind of circling me so I asked him why he is doing that. Then he was like oh I'm just trying to see what you are recording and I was totally confused...it made me uncomfortable. I was not recording anything. I took one picture of a funny sign in hungarian....I guess people go there to record stuff cuz 90% of their stuff expired years ago. Anyway I continued looking around. Then he sent one his employees to follow me around. Like I know they dont know me and have to make sure I wont steal but still I wanted to continue shopping but the way he was following me around made me feel uncomfortable. So I didnt check their other stuff but it was probably also expired so didnt even bother. I mainly went there to buy some túrórudi...but didnt have any. He kindly took my info mentioned that he will contact me if they get some so I'm just waiting for that. Unless you know the stuff is arriving fresh I wouldnt buy anything without a clear expiration date. I was looking for the expiration date on most things. Some I could find that hasn't expired yet...I purchased it and tasted good. Other items didnt have expiration dates or it was smudged on purpose or covered up with a sticker. Usually chocolate still lasts after expiration date so I didnt mind things that expired within the last year but I found things that expired in 2010 and 2015 and so on. I found one chocolate that I really wanted. All the boxes were dirty and dusty. It looked really old but didnt have a date so I thought I would give it a shot. Immediately after purchasing I wanted to try incase it's not good and it wasnt good. It was old, dry and discolored so I asked him if I can exchange it to something of same value and of course he let me so that was nice. I just got another one of the same chocolate that I knew was good. I also picked up something that expired in 2018. It's a really good brand chocolate so I still wanted it even tho it expired a year ago. The expiration date on this one was a removable sticker...so it makes me think it might have expired even before. Anyway I was wondering how much he would charge me for it...if he was gonna charge me a lot I was gonna mention even though its expired? But he ended up giving it to me for free. Which kind of shocked me....and made me doubt that it only expired a year ago. So I took it and thanked him...of course I was curious so as soon as I got to sit down I opened them and they looked super old. They smell bad and tried biting into one of them but it was super hard. Thankfully I didn't pay for it but I feel like he knew it wouldnt be edible so he couldnt have charged me for it. So it makes me think it expired years before.....at least I have one that expires in 2020 and it tasted good and have 2 others that I'm not sure what the date is but the taste is only a little expired and tasted edible. I feel like it wouldnt be a bad store if they had products that are not expired, it would be much easier to shop in there. I feel that its stuff that didnt sell over the years and they dont wanna toss it because that's losing money....it will just continue giving them a bad reputation because while I was in there he was getting orders...for fresh produce so i feel like if you pre order during the holidays you might get lucky and get stuff that's fresh. I hope they realise eventually that they should throw away all the expired stuff. For now I wouldnt like to go back because I'm scared to buy anything without a date and there aren't a lot of options and this is just for chocolate...I dont want to imagine their meat or canned or jars or other stuff they have. I am not a picky person for sure and I dont get scared easily but that store scares me....its like playing Russian roulette...dont know what you get until you buy it and open it.....other than that the owner...

I used to shop in this store since I was a child with my parents. I now live in WA so I don't make it there that often. This year, we wanted to surprise my brother-in-law for his birthday which we celebrate on Thanksgiving every year, with Dobosh torts. I tried several times to reach someone on the phone to place the order as we were approaching the day very quickly. I first initially called to find out the shipping rates which was the same price as the cake itself, so close to $100 total. I was willing to do it but I still had to run it by my sister. Most people won't spend $100 on a cake and shipping. As I said above I tried for several days to reach someone. I finally did on Tuesday of this week. The same person answered the phone as I could recognize the voice, when I told him what I needed and when, he said "Your telling me that I have from now until 3pm to get this order to the post office"? Very rudely I might add, in fact my initial call, he was rude then too. He says "I have 400 orders to get out" I will try my best, I guess we will give you VIP treatment! I told him, then maybe you should answer your phones more often! Clear the VM more often, do a better option of online ordering, hire more people if you have 400 orders?? They have an option to send an email but what guarantees me that they check that if there VM is full all the time? They also tell you to print the order form and FAX it over... who does fax anymore?? I could go on but it just angers me more. We waited all the way until 5pm on Thanksgiving hoping for the cake to arrive. Not only did it NOT arrive but they didn't even have the decency to call me and tell me that they were not able to make the order on time so I could go to the store and get a cake of some sort. It was humiliating when the family realized that I didn't have the cake and for that matter no cake at all. I am extremely disappointed. I had planned to order some more items before the holidays but I changed my mind now. They are extremely over priced as well. I will be placing my order with Bende instead for the items we will need. I am not sure if Otto's son is whom is running the shop now, I knew him when we were both kids but I know that his father never would have spoken to a customer like that.

After reading that response it just verifies to me how much care went into assisting us. If you had trouble with my credit card information, why was I not telephoned? There was absolutely nothing wrong with my credit card! Its an excuse. And if COVID 19 is your reasoning for lack of customer service, you should have them said to me that there is no way unfortunately that we could fulfill this order for the following reasons. I would have accepted that then take all my information and wait for the cake never to show updated! From what it looks like, your store and its conduct needs a lot of attention. There are not too many good reviews for your store anymore....

About 9 months ago I purchased the poppy seed grinder from this site for $67.50 (shipping included) which came to over $100 in Canada. The ad is not accurate. The brand is not given, the grinder is reportedly made in the Czech republic, and is supposedly a quality grinder. Turns out it is a Weston model 77-0001W which you can buy elsewhere on line for $20 (plus shipping) and at that time was available at Wal-mart for $20 (though that appears to no longer be the case). The grinder is NOT made in the Czech republic, it is made in China. As for quality, it is NOT good. The grinder was so poorly cast, that it could not be turned a full revolution without totally binding. Under warranty, through Weston, a replacement arrived within two days. That grinder did not work either. However, by taking pieces from the two I did manage to get a working model. Grinding poppy seed (the only thing we attempted) was very slow and the seed had to be forced by finger. I must say, the quality of the grind was excellent - very pasty. To grind the 6 cups we required took almost 3 hours.

We ultimately purchased a German made Westmark locally for $60 Canadian. The quality of the device was immediately apparent. The rotation is smooth and consistent and the spring on the shaft provides even pressure. Though the grind is not as pasty, it is plenty adequate. The poppy seed feeds nicely without any applied finger pressure and I can grind the six cups in less than 30 minutes.

I notified Otto's of the issues with their ad and they said they were in the process of revising their information. However, 9 months later the information has not...