Cafe Del Mar — Restaurant in Fort Lauderdale

So as a 25 year veteran of So Flo and an 8 year (former) resident of beach living in Oakland Park - now living in Coral Springs, and soon to be back to the beach, I usually have a good handle on where to go for dinner/drinks from A1A Las Olas to Deerfield Beach. The general rule has almost always been to stay away from the A1A Beach from Las Olas to Sunrise when it comes to restaurants. They have a long history of being dirty with poor service and crappy food. From bad attitude millennial wait staffs of local HS dropout kids to absentee wanna be rich guy owners makes for fly by night operations: Here today gone tomorrow. That being said I took a spin down A1A from Pompano last night hoping to go to the SeaWatch which is always one of the few homeruns but at 6 pm on Friday every obnoxious TriStater, as LD says, from the condo-city called Lauderdale by the Sea was hogging up space in the parking lot so I passed by anticipating/dreading a conversation on the waiting bench with some grey haired old NY lady yelling: "For Gawd's sake when aw we gonna get a table". I kept driving, why I don't know. Expecting the worst I parked in Beach Place parking lot - which by the way was the greatest thing to happen to the FLL Beach since the Elbow Room opened in the 1938; the parking lot that is, not the actual Beach Place. Anyways I walked up A1A looked at a few menus and stopped at Café Del Mar. Again expecting the worst having had my credit card number ripped off by a snarky aforementioned millennial waiter 5 years ago two doors up, expectations were low.

Surprise. Surprise. We were greeted and seated by some rockin' looking 40 something lady with an accent, right in front on the street by the entrance with "urgency". Again as I sat I cringed waiting for the madness. But again I was hugely surprised as a snappy "can't figure what nationality he is" (Kinda like Fez on That 70's show) waiter handed us menus, took our drink order and promptly served us our drinks in less than 3 minutes. He takes our order 3 minutes after that and promptly brings the Calamari out to my " Grumpy -cuz- she's- hungry" but very hot Cuban wife (It's her 45th B-day and she warned me not to tell the wait staff, and I didn't) Its then that the coolest of cats named Alex Fox (Dude's got a Wikipedia page) gets up and starts Jammin' the Argentinian/Spanish Guitar in the front corner of the outdoor part of the patio. This guy is an insanely talented acoustic string guitar player which is perfect for this setting as CDM has a kick A$ Bose sound system with the volume at the perfect level. Fox with his sorta Michael Bolton appearance and Carolos Santana charisma jams song after song getting almost standing O's after every song. Meanwhile I see the reason its so good: an equally cool cat, 71 year old Arturo the GM with shoulder length grey hair and a deep purple colored shirt and silky tie is plucking cigarette butts off the sidewalk with one of those old people "grab the can off the shelf" devices the aforementioned NY lady at the SeaWatch uses in her 35th floor condo. At the same time as he plucks he is whistling to his front door staff to seat someone who was waiting and holds court with anyone who walks by about the doings of CDM. I get easily impressed by that stuff. After a great Dinner- son had Filet Mignon (9 year old with a big appetite and skinny like me)- I had Grouper and the previously grumpy, now getting happier with versions of songs she recognizes wife had Ravioli. After dinner I have to engage this Arturo dude and tell him how surprised I was and how good the whole vibe was. He of course is from NY (Technically CT) but its all the same. I say you want to find a good restaurant in SOFlo? find the ones run by native NYers. They know how to get it done. By the way we went next door to the ice cream place and our man Arturo chased down my wife and gave her CD of Alex Fox and thanked us again for dining. Kudos and 5 Stars to Alex Fox for jamming down and Arturo the GM for running a tight show in a tough area and making it...

Terrible Service, Food, Atmosphere, & Employees! I went here with a friend on a Friday afternoon and had such a horrible experience I had to review. The worst part was our slow server and the employees doing construction around the cafe, and completely disregarding the current guests that were eating lunch. I ordered the buffalo wings, they were disgusting. The sauce was thin and the way they fried the chicken it was tough with what seemed as hair was still on the skin. I could not finish the chicken I lost my appetite. These were HOT spicy wings...I already drank all my sweet tea when she handed me the wings, and did not even get me a refill. I had to wait until she came all the way back and then ask her to please bring me a refill. After my friend had finished her food we checked the time at 3:02 and at around 3:20ish we finally we're done paying and signing the check. Between this time was the worst...the server was in the back talking to coworkers not even worrying that we were sitting starring at her for her to bring us the check. The crew was changing tables outside, and literally asked us if we could get up so they could move our table...How Rude! We said, " don't worry we are trying to leave we have just been waiting on the check..." & then the guy said oh ok. Not 2 minutes later he came with the check saying...okay here is your check...Oh Finally!! The only good thing about this place was the fries...will recommend everyone steer clear. It does not matter if your restaurant is under construction, has a big party in the next hour, has a crew changing tables, you do not neglect the guests who have chosen to eat at the restaurant at the current time....

Good location, terrible service. I ordered the buffalo chicken wings, which turned out to be plain ol chicken wings with a side of hot sauce. Obviously not buffalo chicken but ok. My sister ordered a salad which was $13, and added chicken. When the bill came they had charged us $8 to add chicken which we felt was an unreasonable price for the amount recieved. The entire time we were eating, not once did our server come to check on us or refill our drinks. Finally when it was time to leave we asked for 2 to go boxes, we were told they had none and would wrap our food in foil (mind you one of the to go items was a salad). I then told them we need boxes as foil is not going to work for our meals. Our server went next door to another restaurant to get to go boxes. Finally the bill came and there was a $10 gratuity charge on a $32 bill. I requested to have it taken off as we would be paying the bill with a card and leaving the tip in cash. He brought the check back and then stood there while we were still talking and was waiting for about 5 minutes for us to pay. This is the longest he paid attention to us the entire time we were dining. After we paid he brought the receipt back to sign and stood and waited again. On the receipt i noted "tip on table". He took the check and walked off then immediately came back to the table and said "are you going to leave me a tip?". Do not eat here. They are extremely rude, unprofessional, and...