Fogo de Chão Brazilian Steakhouse — Restaurant in Pittsburgh

I was in Pittsburgh over the weekend with friends. Several of the group I was with wanted to go to Fogo de Chao so we walked in at 3pm on Saturday, May 12. We were a party of 6 adults and one child.

tl;dr - a walk-in party of 7 confused the whole staff and the food was delicious.

On to the story. To set the stage: the place was empty. Out of 20ish visible tables, 3 or 4 were sat. There was prep for a party of 20, but there were at least 15 tables available. It's 3pm on Saturday in downtown Pittsburgh; the hour of a late lunch/early dinner.

The hostess was utterly lost at the concept of a walk-in party. She had to check with the manager, who also seemed confounded people would walk in off the street for a meal. It took 30 minutes to push two tables together and wrangle together 7 chairs. Several times the same people (two hosts and the manager) asked if we had been helped.

Once we were sat, 3 wait staff came by to take our drink order; everyone was confused as to who was helping us. Finally we meet our waitress and it takes 10 minutes to get drinks and order the buffet.

Credit where credit is due: the food was fresh and delicious. I had never been to a Brazilian steakhouse and while it's not an experience I need again, I feel they did a solid job. The meat was piping hot and fresh and the market buffet was well stocked, well marked, and very clean. Two of my three stars go to the food itself. Delicious, well cooked, and service was knowledgeable about the meat they were serving.

After we meet our waitress when she takes our drink order, we don't see her again. For over an hour. Other staff are waiting on us so we're not left high and dry, one young man was incredibly attentive but I didn't catch his name or I'd call him out on outstanding service. When it comes time to pay the bill, we catch the attention of the attentive young man and ask for the bill. We assume he's our new waiter as he's the one who checked on us the most during our dining experience. He says he'll go get our waitress, leading to confusion on our part--hadn't she left and he took her place? Nope, our waitress went on break but didn't communicate that to our table.

I worked as a waitress at Bob Evans for 3 years in college and I've been $5/plate - $100+/plate restaurants throughout my life and one thing you do is tell your tables you're going on break and who will be attending to them. This is not only a courtesy to avoid being bothered on your break but also lets your tables know their service will continue uninterrupted. At $60/person for the buffet, this would seem standard. Apparently it is not.

Once our waitress came back, settling the bill was easy enough.

Of all the dining experiences I've had, this was the most expensive for the quality of the result. Yes, the food was delicious but the experience suffered due to the apparent confusion our...

UPDATE 3/15/24: Contacted the number provided by Fogo in reply to this review, and spoke with the GM; was told our critique was noted and adjustments were made, and was provided a $125 gift card in hopes that we would return. We accepted the offer, which was definitely an appreciated gesture, and we will leave another review based upon our follow-up experience.

We went to Fogo for a late Valentine's dinner on 2/18/24, and we were disappointed. We previously visited the location North of Detroit and were very impressed, however the Pittsburgh location was disappointing on two fronts.

First, the lesser issue: The market table/bar was only a single table and the offerings were not nearly as varied nor as well-stocked as the other location we visited. They would restock something, whereupon it would immediately be demolished, and they would not restock again for some time.

Second, the major issue: We ordered the Churrasco 'full experience' and were SEVERELY disappointed, in that almost nothing came to our table! There is a sort of 'main room' directly outside the kitchen, and that is where most of the meat headed immediately upon exiting the kitchen, but that room was only about half of the dining area, so that despite the fact that we were at the restaurant for a little over 2 hours, during that time they visited our table MAYBE 15 times (my girlfriend suggests it was more like 10!), most of it cheaper cuts like bacon-wrapped chicken or sausages. We got no pork and had to specifically ask for lamb shanks to be brought to us, because they kept being demolished by the 'main room' patrons! We only saw filet once, when we first arrived, and then never again; the only things that seemed to get to us were things that didn't get consumed by the main dining room patrons, so it was almost all cheap cuts and chicken. What did reach us on the beef front was all 'medium rare' - aka bloody as heck, basically raw - which is probably why it managed to get to us! I saw an older couple speaking Spanish to one of the meat-people, and they basically said it amounted to having to specifically request lamb, and then specifically request COOKED lamb, to get a basic medium+ piece of meat.

Frankly, for the price (~$60/person) it was rather insulting - the location we visited in Michigan had filet to our table almost as many times as we were visited by anything in Pittsburgh! To top it off, while our waiter was courteous and prompt, the folks delivering the meats were often rather surly! The atmosphere was alright, though the high-tempo music was very loud at times.

All things considered, based on my experience, I would not be likely to return to the Pittsburgh Fogo nor would I be much inclined to recommend it to others; certainly not when other locations with great atmosphere (LeMont) and great meat...

I wish I had better things to say about this experience because it really seems like all the potential is there. We went on a Monday which I feel like May have been part of the problem. As a server in the Industry Mondays are usually my day off and it can be difficult to find somewhere open that day here in Pittsburgh.

The restaurant is gorgeous! There was only a few other tables sat but I didn’t think this was a concern. We were eating kind of early because we were going to a movie later on. The server was friendly however not very informative? We did tell her we had never dined here before and was quite sure what the experience fully entails. She didn’t elaborate on the process really at all. We also never really saw her again after our initial drink order.

I will fully admit that we weren’t going to be big spenders by any means. We had never been before and we preferred to start basic before we started to any add ons. Also since we were early I ordered wine at the happy hour price. (I never make happy hour so I was kind excited) However, I also don’t think this excuses bad service from our server. Even though our actual server was elusive the support staff (or other servers idk) were fantastic.

As for the food, it was fine. The salad bar was interesting. It had lots of options? It wasn’t bad but nothing was incredible either. Except maybe the pineapple it was perfectly ripe. I personally had a lot of pickled onions cause I think they go great with all the meats. For the meats they were really stingy with the steak. And there were meats we hadn’t even been offered until we had been there for an hour. We got two pieces of steak and then no one ever returned with it. We were offered lamb kinda relentlessly and I can only endure so much lamb in one evening. I also didn’t want to sit around for hours waiting for meat to show up. I guess it would be fine if you had a whole evening to kill? The meats were generally under seasoned. Only one piece of steak I would say was perfect which I guess is good cause I only got two? The chicken was fairly bland and the parmesan pork was more bland then the chicken. Even the sausage wasn’t quite right. The mashed potatoes were absolutely delicious though! Oh and the cheese bread I could have ate a dozen of those.

We were never offered dessert I’m not even sure they have desserts? And our server never came around to offer a check we asked someone else. Over all it was a mediocre experience that felt overall disappointing. As a person in the industry i just don’t feel we were given the best experience the restaurant is capable of providing. Also I hope they operate with a tip pool cause it felt weird to tip 20% to a woman I barely interacted with. But again the other staff we engaged with...