Tap 42 Craft Kitchen & Bar - Coral Gables — Restaurant in Coral Gables

Do not come here if you look under 25 yo, because they will treat you terribly.

We came for a birthday dinner with a large party. We made the reservations in advance and were told there would be space for us, but when we arrived we were split into two tables that made it difficult for all of us to speak to each other. This would have been pretty minor, but it was only the beginning of one of the worst, most disrespectful dining experiences I have ever had.

When we arrived, we were given regular menus but were not given a drink menu. We had to go to the hostess stand and request them, and she only brought one for our party of 10 split between two tables. When the waitress came over, we all ordered drinks, and she asked for our IDs. She claimed that since some of the IDs were out of state, she would have to get them approved by a manager. She took all 10 of our IDs away. We waited for over 20 minutes to get our IDs back, at which point the manager came to our table and told us that we would not be served because our IDs were 'fake.' I asked if there were any particular ones that concerned him, and he said "all of them," while laughing at us. He then told us we would have to present a secondary form of ID to be served if we were so insistent that they were real (they were). I offered to show him a picture of my passport, but he said no pictures. Why in the world would I have my passport on me??? After some back and forth and us offering to call the police, they looked at our passport pictures and let us be served. They did not apologize. If it hadn't been a birthday dinner with such a large party, we would have left and gone elsewhere but we decided to stick it out (mistake).

They moved us to a 10 top. The drinks took 20 or more minutes to come out, and one never came and we had to later ask to take it off the bill. At this point we had been at the restaurant for over an hour and no one had taken our dinner orders. We repeatedly attempted to flag over a waiter but were not successful. After an hour and a half had passed, we got up and asked the hostess to please assign someone to our table. Finally, someone came to take our order. The food came out about a half hour later. The food was fine, maybe even good... but it was just so overshadowed by everything else. We paid our bill and left shortly after, having spent over two and a half hours in the restaurant.

I know this restaurant is close to UM, and that college kids probably come in all the time with fake IDs. But our IDs were real, and they need to have a better way to verify that. We were not being rowdy or disruptive -- we were talking across two tables because they had split up our reservation. We were repeatedly talked down to and scoffed at, with our waitress visibly rolling her eyes at us on multiple occasions. I always try to be on the side of the waitstaff in a situation like this -- serving is hard work, and people suck. But the way we were treated at Tap42 was just so incredibly disrespectful. I will not be returning here again, and will be encouraging my friends to...

Had lunch two Friday's in a row to celebrate my birthday.

I will start with the most annoying part of my experience. I made a reservation through Open Table for Miami Spice lunch. The email said it ends at 4pm. Just to be sure I called. First, I was told it ended at three. So, we changed the reservation to 2:30. Then, I called back and told them it says 4pm on the reservation so which is it...3pm or 4pm? 4pm was the answer.

I was running late and at 3:50pm we pull up. Just my daughter was getting Miami Spice. I was ordering off the menu a la carte. She knew exactly what she was getting for her appetizer and entree. I had time to drive down the street, park, pay for parking and walk into the restaurant with 5 minutes to spare and the manager is telling her she can't order Miami Spice. He said the system was closed and there was "no way to put in the order". I told him it's not even 4pm now and she's been in the restaurant for 5 minutes. Why couldn't she order when she arrived? No, he said. He had to be in well before 4pm. Finally, after a few more minutes I said to him if you just put in the order now it's before 4pm. He said "oh, you know what you want"? !!! We said that from the beginning. He put the order in and we were seated.

She got the salmon tostones. I think when I ordered them non Miami Spice we got more than two pieces. They were pretty good. She also got the Truffle Filet Steak Sandwich. The meat did not seem like Filet Mignon. I've had quite a few FM's before and none of them were ever fatty and gristly. I ordered the Short Rib Beef Sliders. You only get two, but they were very good. Decent size burger with Braised short rib on top. Extremely filling. Made it very difficult to eat my Ahi Tuna Poke Salad. That was okay. I asked for no tomatoes which the server or waitress overlooked.

I also got takeout for five from Tap42 the week prior to the Miami Spice incident. We ordered a variety of items: Fried calamari, Prime Chimichurri skirt steak, salad with chicken, truffle mac & cheese, truffle street corn guac and the Prohibition burger. The food was good, but not great. None of the fried food traveled well. It was cold and rather greasy. Truffle mac & cheese was okay. Grilled chicken avocado salad was bland.

One thing I noticed whether it was dining in or takeout. The fried foods tasted a bit rancid and were overcooked. My husband much to my dismay loves to fry food. I mean he fries at least three or four times a week. For fried food to taste great you need fresh, clean oil that is not overheated or it smokes. Tap 42s fried food (tostones, fried calamari and french fries) tasted like it was fried with old not clean oil.

Last comment. We got three drinks: Tito's Mule, Blueberry Margarita and Watermelon Spritz. All three of them tasted like they came out of a machine. They had an overly blended taste. When we make cocktails fresh at home it's almost like you can taste the individual ingredients. Their cocktails reminded me of Koolaid...

Unprofessional Manager and terrible experience at coral gables location

 We had been customers. of tap42 for about 3 years and recently we had a very bad situation at the Coral Gables location.

Last Thursday, my best friend and I went to the night special for free bubbles. We have done this 2 times before and it has been great! - This past Thursday, after my friend and I went again to Coral Gables, we arrived around 9 pm, the bartender approached us and asked us right away if we had been drinking, without saying Welcome or Hello, nothing! and with a straight face; we responded Yes, I had a glass of wine with my food in another restaurant & my friend just came straight from work.

We then ordered the special for Thursday free bubbles for ladys and He walked away!! After that nobody came to attend us or asked for anything. After waiting for a long time, we decided to ask another bartender but they just looked at us and ignored us.

It was around 15 minutes waiting and my friend decided to go closer and ask for service; then a lady saying she is the Manager finally brought us the drinks & said "We won’t bring any more because they are not supposed to be serving that to all the people and is very limited", which is okay, but they never took the food order until we got the attention of another employee probably not even a bartender and we asked what is wrong?? That person was nicer and he took the order , finally!! He seems not to know how to get in the computer and the bartenders didn’t help him , We started feeling very uncomfortable!!, with the feeling something is wrong with us or some kind of discrimination!, like they don’t want to serve us anything!! Everything was so weird the Manager and another bartender were gossiping and staring at us.

My friend went to the entrance of the bar to look for the Manager and the bartender ignored her so the Manager came to us, we asked what the situation was here? ,she never didn’t give us an answer that makes sense or an apology; instead she was supporting the actions of the bartenders , telling us they don’t have to serve much drink , but we asked for food too!!

They took a long time for the food and we rejected it when it came since the Manager was very rude to be honest .

We are thinking what we did wrong , we have never been so embarrassed in any other place or at tap 42 , we always bring a lot of friends and we have good memories having food and drinks , we always tip well, etc.

They probably confuse us with other people , we don’t know , but for sure we are very disappointed at the service and the lack of professionalism of the Manager, a person that was rude and honestly showing no respect for us as customers and persons.

Sadly we don’t know if we should want to come back even when it is in our neighborhood - Somebody here needs to take action on this matter so it doesn't happen again to...