Wasfi's — Restaurant in Houston

We visited Houston for a medical appointment and after a 3-hour drive and finishing our check-up, we decided to have lunch in the city. A friend recommended Wasfie’s Grill, a Middle Eastern restaurant he had tried before.

It was our first time there. The restaurant was spacious with multiple seating areas. We sat down and found the menu already on the table. About five minutes later, a waitress came to take our order, but we asked for more time to decide. Her attitude was somewhat dry and not very welcoming.

When she returned after around 10 minutes, I asked if they had Mansaf, as I had seen it on the menu, but she informed me that it’s only served after 1:00 PM — and it was around 12:00 noon at the time. So, we ended up ordering a mixed grill platter that included chicken tikka, kebab, and lamb tikka, along with rice and drinks. She suggested increasing the order size since we were three people. The first platter cost $45 and the second about $20.

However, no recommendations were made for daily specials or signature dishes, which is something we usually expect from the staff to help enhance the experience.

The food was tasty, especially the chicken and meat. After the meal, I went to the restroom, and when I returned, I requested the bill to pay for my friends as a surprise. I was shocked when the total came to $105, including a pre-added tip without any prior notice or consent. This automatic tipping felt a bit unfair.

Overall Thoughts: The food was good, and the place was clean and spacious. However, the service needs improvement — especially in terms of friendliness and communication. Also, customers should be clearly informed if a tip is going to be added automatically...

We recently chose Wasfi’s in Houston this past Saturday to celebrate my mother’s birthday. While the food itself was good and enjoyable, our experience was unfortunately overshadowed by a combination of service issues and cleanliness concerns.

Throughout the evening, it was evident that the staff lacked proper training and attentiveness. Tables were not cleared before new trays of food arrived, leaving us to handle the clearing ourselves in order to make space. We also had to repeatedly seek out waitstaff for simple requests like drinks, as no one routinely checked on our table.

During the cake-cutting portion of the celebration, my wife had to step in to organize the process because the staff were standing by without offering assistance. To make matters worse, when the singer began singing “Happy Birthday,” the candles on the cake had not yet been lit, which made the moment feel poorly coordinated and awkward. It wasn’t until the owner intervened that employees were instructed to help.

Most concerning was that we noticed cockroaches—one on our table and another on the floor. This understandably added to our discomfort and disappointment with the evening.

In summary, although the food was good, the lack of training, inattentive service, and cleanliness issues at Wasfi’s left us disappointed on what should have been a special occasion. We hope management will take these concerns seriously to ensure a better experience for...

Are you kidding me, the owner of this place is really rude and has no manners because he added a tip without the customer's permission to be added to the bill, and they never asked for my permission, and I also have to pay ten dollars to park my car, what special services do you provide that others do not, does the customer go up to the sky to eat there and then come back from inside the restaurant to add these bills that have no meaning, there are definitely better places than this place whose owner has a greedy Arab mentality, they came to America with their dirty morals in swindling people, I have never seen anyone do that in my life, he wants to deduct his employees' salaries from the tips so that the profits are completely his, really a dirty policy from the owner of the shop, and I will not return to him no matter what and I hope that everyone who reads my comment does not go there because if he respected his customers he would have put a paper on the table explaining the restaurant's policies in deducting the tip from the customer, but this is theft, and he is also the one who rents the parking spaces to benefit from his customers and in this way he expels them, really a dirty person Greed, I ask God not...