Oyster & Pearl Bar Restaurant — Restaurant in La Mesa

We were excited to try this place, as we had heard good things from some friends. However, after going last Saturday night, we'll never be returning.

Our main issue revolved around the service, or lack thereof.

While our waitress greeted us at our table relatively quickly, it ended up taking about 10 minutes to get our drinks. Not a huge deal, although the place wasn't full either and there were about 5 or 6 servers.

We ordered off of the restaurant week menu, which included an appetizer, main course and dessert. The appetizers arrived without issue, and the food itself was quite good. However, at this point it started to go downhill.

While we had finished our drinks, our waitress was nowhere to be found. All of the tables around us had their server visit 2-3 times before we saw our server again. So at this point, it took about 15 minutes of empty glasses for our server to ask if we wanted another drink.

We started to get very annoyed with how long it took between appetizer and main course. At about the 35 minute mark (after receiving the appetizers), and after not seeing out server for about 15 minutes, my wife went inside to ask someone if they could check on our order. Note that no one had cleared our plates during this time either. A minute later a different server, not our server, came out to tell us it'll be right out. Another 10 minutes goes by...nothing. So at the 50 minute mark, we finally go inside AGAIN to say if it's not out soon, we'd like to just pay for what we've eaten/drank and leave.

Only then does our main course come out. Again, the food was great! But at this point, our main course arrived over an hour after ordering it. Note that the restaurant was NOT full and multiple parties who arrived AFTER us were served their main courses BEFORE us.

Once again our server disappears, as we want to get our dessert to go rather than risk waiting another half hour. So we go inside to ask a different server to bring our dessert to go and our check.

Our waitress doesn't come to our table again, but we see her inside casually talking with the hostess.

While driving home, we call in order to leave some feedback with the manager. If I ran a business, I'd want to know what could be done to make the experience better. The food was great, the service terrible, and that's an easy fix in my mind. The manager wasn't in, but the hostess takes our info and says someone will return our call. Shockingly, we don't hear from anyone.

My wife posts on social media about our experience and allegedly an owner reached out to her to ask for contact details. We provide it via DM. Shockingly again, no one reached out.

This restaurant has good food, but the service is terrible and it's evident that management/ownership doesn't care enough to...

For a restaurant located within a small strip mall, I was quite impressed with the ambiance, quality of food, and the quality of service. It was not cheap however, as a salad, a seafood pasta entree, 6 oysters and a small piece of bread as an appetizer and two beverages cost me about $90. But what really turned me off was the fact that the restaurant charged me 4% extra for using my credit card to pay for my meal. So it made me feel like I was eating at a gas station, due to the 4% extra charge for using credit vs cash. Why should I the consumer be forced to pay that fee, when it's industry standard for the establishment to absolve that fee? I'd normally say the establishment could just raise their prices to help offset that fee, but based on looking at images of their recent menu compared to the menu that I was given the other night, I can see that they've already raised their prices as well. So they raise their prices, AND they're charging a 4% credit card fee. Needless to say, it down graded a potential 4-5 star rating to a 2 star rating. I won't be returning to this establishment. I don't blame this on our server though, she was pretty good. I blame it on the proprietors, most likely Steve Bahari, Samer Basim Alqas and Mark Alqes Hanna. So because they felt they had to pass that 4% fee onto me the consumer, I in turn passed it on to the waitress by deducting 4% from her tip. Sure, I feel like a jerk doing that, but perhaps the establishment will stop charging consumers this bogus fee. And in turn they will probably have more repeat customers, and be able to...

It was my first time coming here. I was invited by my friend Yoom. Clean ambiance and incredibly delightful, helpful staff. Options to sit inside or outside. I was very impressed with their menu selections and that they offered a plethora of seafood both raw as well as cooked. They offer 2 different seafood towers if you plan to share btwn 4-6 people. We ordered 6 dishes to share btwn the 2 of us: the giant shrimp, the Tuna Tartare mini tacos, the 12oz dry aged NY steak w/broccolini, dynamite scallops, charred octopus w/side of frisee & the charcuterie board of meats & cheeses. All was cooked to perfection especially the grilled steak, octopus, shrimp & dynamite scallops. Everything we ordered was well cooked and flavors evenly balanced, from the lemon vinegrette in the frisee that accompanied the octopus to the white caneloni beans in the dish with the grilled shrimp. When we finished eating, we only had a mini taco, a couple slices of steak, a stem of broccolini & portions from the large charcuterie board left to take in a to go box. The charcuterie on its own was spectacular for the quantities & varieties of options that were displayed on it. The bread it came with was delicious! We were so satisfied by the end of our meal, these dishes did not disappoint. Oyster & Pearl will definitely be a place to revisit and if you have a craving for beautifully balanced, flavorful seafood, this is definitely the place to satisfy your...