Mar Belo Portuguese Restaurant/Lounge — Restaurant in Long Branch

Excellent food AND service! Their curbside pickup was was incredibly well done and I applaud the servers & manager for such a great dining experience. The 4 of us loved it so much we all agreed we would order the exact same things again!! It would be a great pleasure to come back again!!!! Thank you, thank you, thank you Mar Belo! Here are the details..........:

1. Food - We got Paella, skirt steak, and filet mignon, and Spanish potatoes (like potato chips but way better). All dishes were prepared exactly as ordered, fresh, and flavorful. Steaks were tender & juicy and so good we didn’t need to season them. THAT’S a sign of excellent quality. Seafood was delicate & not rubbery at all as is the case with so many paella dishes we’ve had. Spanish potatoes were a real treat..think thickly-sliced, very fresh, not too crispy potato chips, with very very light seasoning. Red sangria was cold, refreshing, not too sweet, and medium bodied. And flan, the flan!! Gosh, it was creamy, cool, smooth, and topped with a gorgeously light tasting, bronze, not too sweet, caramel sauce that complemented the flan rather than overpowered it. I’m telling you it was more an experience than food, it was THAT good.
2. Service - we did curbside pickup and called in the order and prepaid in card. The experience was outstanding because the food was ready at the time promised, it was hot & fresh, and the servers put it in the back of the car (no contact necessary). Food was neatly packed & boxed for takeout in a way that didn’t make it all be a sloppy takeout mess. But here is the best part of the whole experience... those servers were so proud & happy to serve their food, you just don’t get that sort of thing at most restaurants anymore!! Go there, you won’t be...

I'll start by saying the food was decent. As several have noted before me, what made the experience such a disaster was the awful service. We came on "steak night" which IS a great deal, but were treated like an inconvenience from the very start. I originally ordered the ribeye -- our waitress left the table and went inside to put the order in. As soon as she came out (it must have only been 2 minutes) I called her back before she could go to another table and asked to switch to the filet mignon. She was very combative and told us she likely couldn't accommodate. She went inside to check with the kitchen and returned to tell us they had already started prepping the steak so they couldn't do it. We told her we understood but politely asked her to check just one more time since only a minute or two had passed and we hadn't even ordered our appetizer yet. This was the last time we spoke to our waitress. She stormed inside ripping off her mask and came back out to attend to her other tables but did not come back to our table for the rest of the night (until of course she delivered our check.) Did not even look in our direction. Our meals were served without one of the sides they were supposed to come with, the sauces were both wrong, we had to continually ask for water and bread and no waiters would look us in the eye or approach the table. They were clearly trying to turn over the tables as quickly as possible, which I completely understand, but the hovering and constant trying to clear our plates when we had half a meal left to eat (??) made us very uncomfortable. It was a disappointing experience to say the least. They could do so...

This has always been our choice for a special (expensive ) meal but they have some serious problems if our recent visit is any indication. Three stars is too generous for the “hit and miss” evening we experienced.

On Saturday night, I brought the family here for a special birthday dinner which ended poorly. The celebrant requested the vegetarian paella and requested it be made without dairy due to a food allergy. What she got was overcooked, mushy broccoli, peas and carrots mixed with buttery rice. She ate a little and the result was to make her sick all night. The appetizer of mussels showed up after the entrees came out and were so sandy as to be inedible, and we sent them back. Although other entrees were fine-roasted fish, skirt steak, duck - the meal was ruined by poor timing and coordination by the kitchen as well as a poorly executed meal by the kitchen for the honored guest. The waiter was impossible to flag down and studiously ignored us when we tried to get his attention, although the other waitstaff were attentive and friendly. The appetizer was taken off the bill but we received no apology for the mistakes, only sad disappointment that we wanted no coffee or dessert (we had to leave quickly because of the allergy).

The atmosphere was extremely noisy. On the w at out we saw a second room which was much quieter, and wished we had been seated there. One of us was a senior who could not hear any of us speaking above the noise level. Definitely affected our enjoyment of the occasion despite the very attractive dining area and pleasant decor. Oh, and the sangria is excellent.

In the end I don’t think we will...