Sontuosa — Restaurant in Lower Merion Township

This place is incredibly...mediocre. There's no way I would return. I'll start by saying that the service was good and the atmosphere decent (although tables are close together in the main dining room and the place was loud). The food ranged from bad to good, with nothing being exceptional. And if you factor in the prices, I feel like I got ripped off badly. We were a party of 8 gathered for my mom's 80th bday. Between all of us we ordered a variety of dishes so we got to sample a wide range of the menu.

The chicken piccata was made with a chicken quarter instead of boneless breasts or medallions. There was literally no sauce to speak of, it was a baked chicken leg basically. The mashed potatoes were drowned in butter and salt. The broccoli was pathetic - it was plain, steamed broccoli with no seasoning, like you would get at a school cafeteria or on a "vegetarian" plate at a cheap wedding. The mussels were sitting in a red sauce that tasted like it was straight out of a can, eww! Which was too bad because the mussels themselves were decent. So disappointing and unappetizing.

The lobster ravioli was decent, my mom enjoyed it. The beet salad was tasty although skimpy on the beets, with a nice bright dressing. The salmon was fine, but nothing to write home about. The caesar salad was a plate of whole romaine leaves laid next to each other. Maybe this is a thing, but I have never seen it. It looked like a joke. The lamb chops special - the chops themselves were good, well-seasoned and almost well cooked (our medium rare was more on the rare side). But again we had terrible sides - the green beans were straight up boiled and unseasoned, the polenta discs were soggy and bland. My daughter got the Aubergine, which was poorly seasoned (way too much cinnamon) but otherwise OK.

Dessert was mixed. The Tres Leches cake was yummy and light. The blueberry crumble was not a crumble at all - it was like someone took blueberry muffin mix and cooked it into a low cake. No crumble to be found. The vanilla ice cream on top was very good though. The food is a 2.5 star affair, but I bump to 3 because the other aspects of the...

I was solo and in the area and love to try local places. The reviews seemed pretty good so I made a reservation online. It was a Tuesday so I’m not surprised they weren’t busy but when I walked in not only was I the only one in the restaurant I wasn’t greeted immediately and awkwardly had to walk almost halfway back before I was greeted. (The owner I’m assuming was pleasant and I think he was hoping his staff would do what they are supposed to do and provide customer service). I was seated and my waitress was sweet and very helpful. *i wouldn’t give as much time to the clients in between seating and menu looking, I was sitting there for about 10 minutes after reviewing the menu to actually placing my order.

Now for the food, I was soooo excited to try this place because the photos and reviews looked good. I ordered the gnocchi as an app and that was pleasantly good but the mushrooms tasted like they were jarred or over brined. I wanted to eat the mushrooms with the gnocchi but it was so salty. I thought it might be a fluke. (Yes I ordered two pasta dishes but the gnocchi had two sizes but even the small was a filling portion for gnocchi) I ordered the brisket with ricotta and Marsala white wine. Upon it being delivered to the table I was disappointed. It didn’t look like what I thought was that dish online. It was all mixed it and while it was creamy it was sooooo salty. As I was eating the brisket I was wondering how they kept it and prepared the dish because it definitely wasn’t tender. The texture was very much as if it had been reheated. Which I understand things like that are done in the restaurant industry but I would maybe suggest a different approach. Dessert is usually my favorite part when dining out but I was disappointed with the dishes at this point and didn’t want to feel like I...

Myself and three other friends came here for dinner to catch up and enjoy a relaxing evening out. Our reservation was at 7:45 and after our experience last night, I am now well aware the kitchen closes at 9. Having said that, two of the four guests were there on time and the other two made it by 8pm. Our server told myself and the other guest (even though the other two hadn’t arrived) that we should definitely start ordering because the kitchen closes at 9. Ok, so here we are, rushed right from the beginning. Why allow a reservation at 7:45 if servers will then rush us and tell guests what time the kitchen is closing? Maybe stop reservations at 7pm then?

Next, we were all sharing pasta dishes so we ordered quite a few and when they were brought out to us, my Asian friend said you can just set them anywhere, we are all sharing. The man who brought them out said “this isn’t a Chinese restaurant, we don’t do share”. Maybe he was trying to be humorous but we were completely taken aback by that comment. It was completely inappropriate.

Dessert didn’t make it’s way to our table because we never ordered any as we were told again we better get our order in because the kitchen is closing at 9. RUSHED!

Lastly, there isn’t a hook or a little table to hang or set your handbag on in the restroom. You either hold it or it goes on the floor.

My husband, an executive chef who has been in the restaurant industry for 16 years has given me knowledge throughout the years as to how service and timing of reservations in the industry typically works. He was very shocked to hear that I knew exactly what time the kitchen closed and how far ahead from the kitchen closing time we were being told to get orders in.

We will not...