Ostra Restaurant — Restaurant in San Antonio

We were here July 9th weekend and I have to say after 1 meal here, we ate here exclusively all weekend!!! First shout out is to Julie who was at the bar shucking oysters... This woman needs a raise and should be out in front of customers all the time! She made both our weekends with great conversations, service and food! I am pregnant and she designed a seafood platter catered to my needs!!!! She was the #1 reason we returned as much as we did!!! I can't wait to go back and see her again in Sept.!!!! Andy, the manager, was amazing as well! He approved all substitutions for me and even listened to my thoughts and ideas on how to make a mommy-to-be spa weekend even better at Mokara Spa! "Mokara-Mommy-Mocktails" should become a thing!!! Jon , the executive sous chef, was awesome in preparing our food all weekend and even came out to see if we liked our meals. They met any special requests I had which made me feel amazing!!! On to the food! My first taste was a baby-moon chocolate mousse that was delivered to our room.... I loved it so much I ended up ordering more the next few nights! The wedge salad was so fresh and delicious and was the first of my orders at Ostra with special requests that kept me coming back all weekend! For breakfast on my mommy-to-be spa day, I had a fruit bowl, which was huge, yogurt and some toast! For lunch, my husband and I ate a chicken caesar salad with extra croutons, a shrimp cocktail and the fish and chips basket! Again, my special requests for my salad were met no problem!!! I had a five-layer chocolate torte cake for a mid afternoon snack and the slice was huge, rich and very decadent! We had some of the cevieche and Julie even added avocado to the mix!!! The seafood platter is a must try! Since I cannot have raw oysters, Julie customized our platter with a few oysters for my husband to enjoy and more items that I could have while pregnant.... I was so touched by this because they really care about their customers!!! I ate so much shrimp and crab claws and I have to say this is the best I ever had and I live on the gulf!!!! My husband enjoyed some bacon roasted brussel sprouts which smelled amazing! For breakfast on the final day, I had theSour Cream Blueberry Pancakes and whoa..... absoluetly delicious!!! I even got extra custard! My hubby had the Malted Vanilla Waffle and blueberry sage sausage, we have never eaten so many delicious items at 1 restuarant!!! I hope the owners see this post as again, I have to promote and praise Julie on her amazing customer service. As an HR professional, she has the culture, passion and drive to make that restuarant succeed! I also have to praise Andy and Jon one more time as well, this staff combo, really know how to make the meal, day or weekend of their customers!!! I am sending my company's sales reps here next week on their trip!

MUST PAY OSTRA A VISIT!!!!

Much love for the staff! ~...

Let’s see, where do I begin! It started well when we got our Calamari! That’s one of the best Calamari’s I’ve tasted, and I’ve had it in many places. It was on a bed of Asian sauce, lettuce, and peanuts. I had never tried it in a salad form. Their dressing was super! I rate that dish a five. Then, my lobster plate came. I never would have guessed how bad any lobster plate could have ever been. The lobster plate had a tiny piece of lobster meat, and it came over a pasta. It only says pasta underneath the main dish which is lobster. It mentions squid ink pasta. I envisioned it was lobster and a side of pasta. Anyhow, it was grotesque. There was absolutely zero flavor. I asked for pepper and salt and overwhelmed it with salt, and it was still disgusting. I cook a hundred better tasting cream sauces then how the one on it tasted for $48 dollars. It was a cheap tasting dish with a tiny bit of lobster and no more inside the pasta. It was bland and just horrible! I didn’t eat it. Also, I noticed someone else’s review below that got the same plate and had a lot of lobster. I asked our server, “Where is the lobster?” He said, “That’s all it comes with”, but now I realize they didn’t have enough lobster to make this dish but didn’t say a word and still prepared the dish without any remorse to cheat a customer. Please do yourself a favor and do not order this dish. It is a complete rip off in every sense of the word. I have no idea what the chef and manager are thinking in presenting this expensive abusive mess without lobster. What an absolute waste of preparation time and our money! The Mahi Mahi fish dish was good and edible. I wasn’t super impressed with the taste because even my chef at a hotel in Cancún cooked my Mahi Mahi I caught much better than that, but it was edible. The masa cake the Mahi Mahi sits in was horrid. I make better corn cornbread then that. The masa cake was insipid, but the Mahi Mahi wasn’t horrid like the pasta, that I presumed wrongly, was supposed to be a lobster plate. Their Brussels Sprouts were excellent! The server was kind! However, if it wasn’t for my great company, the night at this restaurant would have been a complete disaster! Please do not order this black pasta dish with a tiny piece of lobster. It is a rip-off in taste and price and...

We popped in last night for dinner. The cocktails and appetizers were delicious! I had some Louisiana oysters served with a delicious mignonette and an Empress 75, the house take on the classic French 75 cocktail. My girlfriend ordered the calamari and the flavor of the squid, breading tartar sauce, and the bed of greens were all delicious!

Our server, Genaro, was very attentive and did a great job taking care of us. He sold us on the nightly dinner special, a crispy skin, pan-seared red snapper atop a bed of lemon-cilantro rice with a seafood & cotija cheese empanada. We also ordered the lobster arrabiata with squid ink pasta and tobiko.

The snapper was overcooked and did not have crispy skin. The flavors of the empanada were a little flat, and now I'm wondering if the seafood filling was also overcooked. We sent the dish back and it was comped for us.

The lobster arrabiata was DELICIOUS! However, the kitchen did a subpar job of cleaning the lobster. We had pretty much eaten the entire dish, then towards the end we found a total of 3 pieces of shell/bone. We informed management and they gave us a 20% discount, which is definitely fair as we had eaten a good 70-80% of the dish before we found those inedible bits and quit eating.

The manager Andy and our server Genaro we're both very polite and handled our complaints professionally. I'll be excited to try it again in the future, when hopefully the quality of the entrees is tightened up a bit more and worth the price point. As I said, everything but the special tasted absolutely delicious, and the only problem was the cleaning of the lobster on the other entree. With everything firing on all cylinders, I could easily see this being a 4- or...