Galpão Gaucho Brazilian Steakhouse — Restaurant in San Antonio

On September 17, 2023, a family of 6 of us had 5:45 P.M. dinner at this location. Throughout the meal, we were required to continue discarding our dirty plates on the table behind us. As a table, even after extensive waiting, and waiting, we were only served with the option of half of the menu. We were not provided with an opportunity to be served (pork ribs, beef ribs, sausage, chicken wings, lamb leg, pineapple, or cheese), nor were we asked what else could be brought to us). There were times when literally the severs would go into the back and disappear for up to 10 minutes at time while we waited to eat. There was NO management or supervision presence.

A meat carver splattered the juice from the meat when carving all over my wife’s shirt and likely ruined her shirt, and then acknowledged he did it with NO apologies.

Our friend at the table received the most deplorable service. It took her longer to consume her salad and once complete put up her card green, and a few others of us did too. We told the server that she had NOT been served meat yet and the server went to ignore her empty plate literally skipped her to serve me, then I redirected her to serve our friend, the server then served her and it happened to be the last bit of meat on the sword. Next, another came back to serve her and only came to her with two other meat choices. She was provided with only 3 choices for her entire meal.

Poor thing, when the strawberry frozen dessert came, the server accidentally dropped her entire strawberry dessert into her nice homemade purse which ruined it of course. She was apologetic. But the problem was that instead of the restaurant providing maybe some money refunded or even only one dessert refunded (after she waited 10 minutes for them to make her another one), the restaurant actually charged our table for one extra dessert. When the spill event happened, my spoon fell off of the table onto the floor, I picked it up and kindly asked for a clean spoon so that I can eat my desert, while observing servers in the center of the restaurant conversing together,

We had two older children at the table with us and four females in total and the service towards females and children was far worse than towards the males. However, the entire meal went by and only one time was one person offered a refill on a drink. Generally, females and children go first as it is the year 2023.

During the end of the meal, my wife was working on paying the bill and literally the female server grabbed it out of her hand to hand it to our male friend sitting across from her. It was like a yank out of her hand. He just handed it back to her. In aftermath, the meal had repercussions.

The food was subpar and very salty. My wife, daughter, and I all had lower tummy problems within a couple to few hours after eating. My wife and I were up all night long with digestive issues, and my daughter with a pre-existing autoimmune disorder could not make it to school today because of extreme nausea in which she required medication to help relieve her symptoms. My wife had swollen intestines and we think too it could be from excessive MSG. We kept being served the outer portions of the meats without considerations where it would be excessively seasoned. My daughter asked for medium and they served her bloody rare.

And this restaurant $$$$ forced us to pay gratuity. In this instance, we should have received a partial or full refund, not being charged more. Truly inexcusable service. Our restaurant experience was...

Bit frustrated with this experience. For 4 adults and 2 young kids we paid $500 (only 2 alcohol drinks)!! We are regulars to chauma gauca and since we booked this reservation late and they weren't available, figured we'd try it and we're sadly dissapointed. We'll be sticking to chauma going forward.

Waters were empty majority of the dinner, wasn't until before we left did she ask if any of the empty glasses wanted a refill. One of the people that brought ham by, dropped a large piece on the floor and just left it there In between two chairs, NEVER picked it up. I eventually did. The plates were rarely cleared and our table was dirty and overfull.

Price is the same as chauma gauca but the quality and service does not compare. First off the food was alright but for the price you pay should have been better. The chicken, pork and salmon were all overdone. The chicken especially was super overcooked and dry. The beef servings were under but That was fine with us. We noticed quickly they constantly brought the cheap meats by, the most expensive meats we had to request or flag down.

Most frustrating by far was the last hour we were there. We said early on once we're close to being done with dinner we wanted to order carajillos to have before/during dessert. We ordered them about 15 mins before getting dessert and dessert came and still no drinks. When I asked she kept saying it was coming but it took 30 mins, it didn't come until we were almost done with desserts. When the desserts came they forgot one, few mins later I noticed the server was helping another table so I asked about the dessert and she was clearly annoyed I asked, as she was when I asked about our drinks. We paid for an after dinner espresso cocktail and it took 30 mins and got there pretty much with our bill.

Then we get our bill which surprisingly had gratuity added. We had 4 adults and 2 8 yr old girls and she included 18% gratuity. With good service we typically tip much higher but they didn't apologize or acknowledge any of the issues, didn't comp the dessert that mom had to eat by herself after everyone else ate theirs and same with the drink. On top of that we split the tab between 2 cards and they then don't include the gratuity but actually wrote in what we were supposed to tip on my receipt I sign. Never In my life have i seen that. We went ahead and paid it as they included it on the original receipt and it's clearly the tip she wanted us to pay lol

Overall the price is for a 5 star dining experience and it is far from that. They had an opportunity to gain a regular customer and they lost it. Well be sticking with chauma gauca going forward and recommend that to everyone. Makes sense now why they had a ton of reservations open the day after valentines day when chauma gauca has been booked for the whole wknd for wks. Clearly management needs to make some changes to how they manage...

Where to start...

We had a reservation at 7:00 p.m. And didn't get seated until about 8:30 p.m. I believe they ran into issues where they were overbooked and potentially understaffed. Everyone in the establishment minus a few people seemed to be stressed and unhappy. This translated to our experience from the staff. Our server was a little bit rude and unattending, and we ended up actually having two other servers attending our table. One being the hostess. The food came out very slowly where I was waiting between 5 to 10 minutes from an empty plate to more meat showing up at the table.

We were sat right up front next to the bathrooms, which every now and again we would catch a whiff of which is not a pleasant experience while dining.

The quality of the meat seemed to be lacking as if they didn't actually spend the money on prime cuts, as well as most of the meats being a little too charred for my liking. The bottom sirloin cut which is usually my favorite at Brazilian steakhouses, was definitely not up to par compared to others. Overcharred and under seasoned and a tough chew. Disappointing to say the least. The bacon-wrapped chicken was dry and somehow under seasoned even though it was wrapped in bacon. The lamb was okay. Didn't have any complaints there other than it being a little on the dry side.

The salad bar was also underwhelming. A lot of which seemed to be starting to get warm, which is a little disconcerting. My wife didn't care too much for the meat like she normally does, so she ended up eating two plates of warm salad instead with a side of a few pieces of meat.

Meat variety was lacking, salad bar was warm, service was mediocre at best, bartender didn't quite know what they were doing from what it seemed at least.

I don't like writing bad reviews as you can see from my other reviews. And I am only speaking from our own experience. Unfortunately it was restaurant week and I believe this may have been the main reason why everything was so underwhelming. The staff was stressed and trying their best to keep up with the heightened demand because of restaurant week. I know most of the staff are trying their best so I am sorry to be writing this, but I think management should know what some customers experiences were, especially during this tough week. The staff is still appreciated and I hope they will be less stressed next time restaurant week...