Seabra's Marisqueira — Restaurant in Newark

I had a pretty mediocre experience here, and I wouldn't recommend it. The service was pretty quick in the beginning and got us seated and our drinks fairly quickly. They didn't ask if we wanted bottled water when we asked for water for the table and brought us tiny bottled water that we only found out after, were 4 dollars a pop.

They brought out a main course to one of our guests first, then about fifteen minutes later they brought out 2 other main courses- but they were both the wrong order so- they took them back. Then about fifteen minutes later, they brought out an appetizer we ordered. About fifteen minutes after that- they brought out the correct orders for the two mistaken entrees. The food was ok, and the portions were large. The seafood that came out to the table was all nicely sauced and seasoned- but the beef was completely dry and didn't even have salt on it. The chorizo was pretty good, and the rice was lukewarm.

So- from the time that the first entree hit the table, it was at least a half hour before we all got our food. Throughout the whole time we were there, they never asked if we wanted more drinks or if we needed anything.

When we got the bill, I was surprised to see a few oddities: first they rounded up the prices to the nearest dollar. So if something was 16.95 on the menu- they charged 17.00 on the bill. Then they added a service charge (for a table for 4) of more than 20%. In my opinion, this charge was slightly hidden on the bill as it was literally a scribble when everything else was legible. I don't know how they arrived at this service charge either, but it was approximately 21.5% of the bill.

After all this I decided to ask for a manager- something I do not take lightly as an experienced server. The manager came out and I asked what the charges were, and explained our displeasure with getting the wrong orders then having to wait an extra half hour to get the correct items. He offered no sympathy and seemed like he didn't even want to talk to me. I asked simply if he could at least give us water or soda to make up for it and he said no, they didn't do that. He said they offered us coffee (they didn't) then asked if we wanted hot coffee (after sitting out there in the sun waiting for them for well over an hour). I politely declined and paid the bill because I just wanted to leave after all that waiting.

Overall it was a really bizarre experience to be honest. They seem like a reputable and trusted family restaurant - yet they still feel the need to nickel and dime where they think they can get away with it.

Bottom line: They have absolutely no issue charging you a mandatory service fee and then giving you very...

Let me begin by saying that despite a few bumps, we had a wonderful dinner with amazing food, and very much enjoyed our experience here. We were in town on business for one day, and an executive at the bank recommended this place for authentic Portuguese seafood. I will say the food was delicious! The menu is expansive, covering several pages, and my friend ordered a special, salt cod with pasta, and I ordered a seafood dish translated to "dry soup'. We also ordered a first course of the daily vegetable soup, but somehow this was overlooked and we never received it. After we saw the size of the entrees, we were relieved the first course never came; we both ended up with leftovers for 2 days as the servings were enough to feed 2-3 people each! Soon after you're seated, they bring your hot, fresh portuguese rolls with butter. We tried to restrain ourselves to save them for the soup, but the aroma was too tempting! These crusty rolls are SOO good! I ordered an espresso while we were waiting, and they can make a very authentic espresso! The entrees took quite a long time to arrive-- to be fair, about 6 other tables came in shortly after we did, and being a weeknight the two waiters and 2 cooks seemed a bit overwhelmed. However, we hadn't eaten all day, and when two tables who came in after we did were served and nearly finished with their food and we still hadn't received anything but rolls and our coffee, we tried to get our waiter's attention. He avoided eye contact several times. We thought we had offended the staff by arriving without a reservation, or somehow made a cultural gaffe, and so my partner went up to speak with the manager. We discovered that the staff working that night did not speak very much English, and thus they thought they misheard us when we ordered soup for a first course and soups for a main course-- our bad, we don't speak much Portuguese and had misread the menu. After this, the manager served us, and went out of his way to be kind and gracious. The waiter also apologized and stated he had limited english, and assured us we had done nothing wrong, but the kitchen was very busy and the dishes we had ordered were made fresh and took extra time. We were both stuffed but the staff insisted we have a dessert, and so we shared a limoncello champagne flute parfait. Wow! Even stuffed, we managed to finish this off and 'fought' over the last spoonful. I saw several amazing dishes that were presented in a way that they appeared to be more art than food, and I would go out of my way to travel to New Jersey to enjoy a...

We drove an hour to come to this restaurant due to great recommendations from a friend (who also dined in with us last night). I was excited to try this place out from all the great things he said. I ordered the Salmon and shrimp in a lemon garlic sauce. I have never once ate salmon at a restaurant that serves it with the bones in it. The first bite was great, it tasted good. The second bite I bit into something hard. I pulled out a salmon bone. I started to look through the salmon and all the bones (including the pin bones) were in there. My boyfriend has been a chef for over 16 years and tried deboning it for me but without the proper tools it was impossible. I sent the dish back, I NEVER send food back at restaurants. Our friend who is Portuguese heard the server cursing me out for sending it back, he let me know what he was saying. I got the short rib as the second dish and I was hoping for a better outcome but it was tough to even cut through. I’m not sure if this was intentional by the staff or not since they made it clear how angry they were for something that was their mistake. I wrapped it to go and took it home. When the serve wrapped my short ribs they only gave me one back instead of the two that were there, which clearly still had meat on it.

Now let’s get to the bill. My boyfriend and our friend are looking it over, we were way overcharged for one of the entrees we got compared to the price on the menu. With thoroughly looking it over, the person who rang our bill in scammed us but adding extra to an entree dish to pay for the salmon that was sent back, again due to the restaurants mistake.

The only thing I had that was good were the crab cakes. Between my boyfriend and I both working in the restaurant industry ourselves for long enough, we have never seen a place charge for something that was their fault. No manager came to the table to check in, instead we got nasty looks from the servers.

We will not be coming here again, absolutely no professionalism at all. All they care about is taking your money when they screw up. Our friend that formerly came to this restaurant all the time will no longer be coming here either.

Below I attached a photo of the salmon entree I got. It looked so good I had to snap a photo, even in the photo you can see the bones piercing out. Glad I...