Georgian Bread — Restaurant in Philadelphia

Several things.

What was good: i really liked interior. quiet music, nothing disturbing despite being a pretty small place

What was not good: dishware were not polished and left dirty impression. one waitress is not enough for restaurant that size. although she was very kind and tried her best.

Food: if you want to try Georgian cuisine for the first time to get the impression of culture, this is not the place. But if you tried dishes before, miss them and want to remember the taste, i guess its okay. I had Tone bread, Khinkali, Mushroom & Cheese in a terracotta plate, Chicken Tabaka, Megrelian Khachapuri, Tkemali Dressing.

Tone bread: 5/10. Texture not really of a tone bread but the taste was there and was soft.

Khinkali: 7/10. Dough was good. Lots of juice inside, was moderately flavourful. Although could feel a sharp taste of parsley, either had parsley stems or Italian curly sharp parsley.

Mushroom & Cheese: 3/10. taste was not that bad but this was not that dish. Classically this dish must have chanpignon heads turned over and filled with dressing topped with cheese, but what I got was chopped mushroom fried on a pan topped with cheese, although was brought with Keci (terracotta plate), Keci was cold and dish itself was warm and tasted like reheated leftower dish as well. not suggest at all.

Tabaka Chicken: 3/10. it was not made with Tabaka press. if its not made with press its just a pan fried chicken, not different than anything that you can buy in a regular deli. must not be called Tabaka. plus was dry. but would not have been with press.

Megrelian Khachapuri: 8/10. not bad at all. nothing much to say, cheese tasted like more or less Georgian sulguni.

Tkemali Dressing: 5/10. regular store bought...

OK food, absolute awful service and additional charges on the final bill.

The service in this place is pretty much non-existent. You have to ask staff several times for the same thing over and over again to get something brought over and at the end it takes them 20 minutes to do so.

Food presentation is pretty bad too. Our banquet table had small salad portions (quantity recommended by the chief himself) pretty much just smashed across the plate to make it look full. Brought obvious pork kebab when we ordered Veal and the waitress was arguing that it wasn't pork. The actual veal kebab had both lamb and veal on the same skewer even though we didn't order lamb kebab (it's like some one just randomly puts the meat on and brings it out).

We had a fairly large group and for desert ordered 2 pitchers of tea for our party. Waitress brought over only 1 pitcher instead of 2 ten minutes after she brought the actual desert, which wasn't even close to being enough for everyone. When asked for the second pitcher, she was surprised by the second pitcher order and took another 10-15 minutes to get a simple pitcher of tea. The time it takes to bring out simple tea, it fills like they use sunlight to boil the water out there.

The "icing on the cake" was when we got a final bill and there was a random charge of 10% from the total bill, to which waitress quickly replied and emphasized that this is NOT a tip, but instead a restaurant charge for dishes, silverware, etc.... REALLY??? What the heck is that?

I was enough frustrated as it was and just didn't want to deal with it.

It will be the first and the last time anyone at our table would ever go there to eat. I really hope that the owner of that place sees this...

SCAM ALERT Although there’s a scam going on there, I’ll start with the food. We ordered a lot so I get some ideas about the food there. The two good things on the menu are the khachapuri Adjaruli and the whole roasted chicken (of course it is not mentioned it was Cornish hen). We ordered 2 kebabs (skewers) one with chicken and the other lamb, the chicken was huge pieces of breast, extremely dry and tough. Could slice it with lunch meat slicer for sandwiches. The lambs was the same, super hard and over cooked or maybe it was a piece that doesn’t fit the grill. The fried mushrooms were ok, the veal was also just ok, the fried potatoes we ordered never made it to the table so I don’t know, the “fresh salad was tomato quarters and big thick slices of cucumber and onion, not much of a salad. Now, to the scam… when we got the check, I noticed that all prices are higher than the prices on the menu, not an online menu, not a menu on Yelp, a printed menu given us by the waitress. When I asked her about it she said “yes, all prices went up 20% as mentioned on the front page of the menu” in addition, the added $15 service fee, not sure what that was but I took it as a tip. Now, you’re too lazy or cheap to print new menus, ok, no problem, make sure the waiters TELL YOUR CUSTOMERS THE PRICES ARE 20% HIGHER THAN INDICATED, don’t add a little note on the front page of the menu. This is a dirty scam and a filthy way to treat your customers, I’ve been to many Georgian restaurants, one of my favorite food, I’ll never coming back to this place nor I’ll ever recommend...