Casa Pollastro — Restaurant in Dallas

The concept of getting a diverse meal with lots of tasting options for a set fee was exciting at first, but the poor service, hit and miss dishes, and comical drink servings topped with an automatic gratuity for two couples with a kid made this a "will not return" experience.

As we waited for our friends to arrive, we asked the gentleman who brought us water and bread if he could explain how the experience worked. He nodded "Yes, one moment" as he poured water into shot sized glasses. Then he wandered away, never saying another word.

The bread and spreads were tasty.

Finally a waitress arrived and explained the set fee brought out everything on the menu in small portions so you could sample and then order refills of favorites. How exciting!

Soon after, our friends arrive, our waitress takes drink orders and we wait for the soup course to arrive.

Meanwhile, water carafes are placed on the table for our shot glasses. There is no iced tea. The first selected wine option is later revealed as only available as a bottle not by the glass. When a different wine option is brought out, the server does not pour the wine into the brought tasting glass, but rather just dumped into the wine glass immediately. Our child is served a can of sprite with a normal sized glass. Soon our two water carafes, slightly larger than a normal glass, were empty.

20 minutes later, the soup course appears. It was tasty. The option to order more was not given.

Salad and appetizers arrive. These were tasty and welcome. Some dishes arrive without serving utensils.

Finally, chicken and pasta arrive in a grand parade of dishes! We were all delighted, even when the server dropped a serving spoon on the floor. A replacement is never supplied.

Unfortunately, the pasta was very hit and miss. The best pasta dish was the re-microwaved baked ziti. The raviolis came in large, flat, uncut chunks. One pasta was a strange grainy texture.

The chicken was the star of the show and was very tasty. Our favorite was the herb blend. It was moist and flavorful. The parmesan chicken was ok - it's skin being the highlight. The piri-piri chicken was so spicy that it lacked true flavor. No one wanted more.

We enjoyed desert - the flan and chocolate mouse being the top favorites. The passion fruit cream dish was and ok tart. The red fruit dish had been over boozed.

Finally, the check came to find we had been charged $3 for a can of sprite. Then again for a refill. And that a 20%+ gratuity had been automatically added, to a party of 4 adults and child. We saw no reason to leave a further tip as was suggested.

We all agreed, that next time, we'd rather spend our money at...

This is a such a cool concept. The idea is that you go in, pay $35/person for a multicourse meal. You never really have to order anything unless you want that dish repeated, they just keep bringing the courses to your table. Again, loved the concept. I will say the service here was pretty good! Our server was attentive, informative, and always smiling which was awesome. We also got visited by who I believe was the manager a few times. He was also very friendly and informative. I would give the service a 4 out 5 stars. Only reason I'm taking away a star is because the bus girl(I hope that's the correct name for the girl who removed dishes from our table as we finished) she was a little rude. Maybe it's not her job to talk to us or say you're welcome when someone says thank you, but we were very turned off by the fact that she never acknowledged that we thanked her the multitude of times she came to remove dishes from our table. No smile, no eye contact, no nothing. We did enjoy the ambience and the restaurant overall was quaint but cute. Unfortunately if I were just rating the food, I would give this a 1 star. I went with a friend and it did not satisfy our palettes at all. I'm aware different people prefer different flavor combinations, this was just not good. We received probably over 15 different foods to try. The 2 things we actually enjoyed were the fresh bread and the passion fruit dessert. At one point I tried what tasted like a ravioli in pumpkin puree and a thick spaghetti in what tasted like a tomatillo salsa. Again, different strokes for different folks, just not for me. By the time we left we were both still hungry and I was nauseous from the strange flavor combinations. Had we enjoyed the food, this would have been a much more enjoyable experience. Unfortunately for us, most of our food was untouched or sent back without finishing it so we felt like we wasted our money because we were still hungry when we left. Few things to note: 1. Even though a lot of food comes out, it's very small portions. 1 dish had 1 ravioli in it. 2. They say you can request more of what you like, but when we requested more fresh bread and butter(in an attempt to fill ourselves up) it took 3 requests before we got it. 3. Again, very different flavor combinations. Careful if you have a sensitive stomach.

Again, great concept...but a waste of...

we get there for our 730 and they’re running behind about 20 minutes no big deal so we wait the waiter comes first with bread and ask if we want drinks we order 2 mixed drinks a few minutes come buy and they bring the soup and salad And then maybe 5 minutes after that they stick the chicken down as well and then 5 more minutes they add pasta when they add the pasta I ask for our drinks Another 20 minutes go by I ask for our drinks again and this time for water as well since the chicken was dry and it was hot we were thirsty Another 15 minutes go by I ask for our drinks a 3rd time and the water and they bring it to us 15 minute later At this point I mention to my date we’ve only gotten 3/5 salad course items so only the potato salad and salad and we were not given the peri peri chicken and 4 of the ten pasta dishes. She’s over it and ready to leave the parm chicken appeared under cooked and the regular chicken dry. The potato salad came out warm. she gets her drink and I guess there was too much pulp making the straws useless. We would have left by now if we had cash but we didn’t so I ask for the dessert course and the check as were both hungry and annoyed it takes maybe 20 minutes to bring those out and then I spend maybe another 20-30 minutes after that to flag down the waiter so he can take my card and we can leave. The poor girl bussing the tables and bringing out water was trying to give us customer service because she could tell we were unhappy. Was the best part of the customer experience there. the table across from us flagged down the manager to mention the lack of polentas and the peri peri chicken brave of them because I was just ready to go it wasn’t worth the effort for us to explain that we hadn’t gotten half of our food. I was surprised the waiter charged us for our drinks because we literally went 75% of the night with out them and we had to ask for it 3 times. At first our sentiment was well come back when they’re less busy to we’re not coming back at all. I’m sure it could be good but honestly $100 for two people with two drinks isn’t worth it if we don’t get what we paid for. Next time your kitchen is struggling that hard I would try to push the liquor because we’d probably be willing to give it another try if we weren’t held hostage with out drinks for 75% of the night or water for...