Roca & Martillo at The Rock — Restaurant in San Antonio

So we went here for my wife and her twin sisters' 50th birthday celebration. The food was Olive Garden-type fair, honestly, for the prices, I would just go to Olive Garden instead. First of all, the bread service we learned about was limited to one stick of bread per charge, unlike Olive Garden, where you can have as many as you want. Additionally, we informed our waiter and another person assisting him that only 9 of us were eating, but they still charged us for 13 people. I paid for their mistake that the manager didn't want to fix. Granted, there are only 12 chairs at that table, not sure where the 13th chair came from that they charged us. They also messed up our ticket and overcharged my sister-in-law an extra meal, and charged my wife and me an extra drink. We should have been charged the extra meal, and my sis in law should have been charged the extra drink. It was a night of celebration, so I didn't want to contest that or argue and ruin it in front of them. I did mention this to the person in charge of the waiters, Amador, I think his name is. Our waiter, Daniel, was friendly, but he should have done a better job of keeping track of the split ticket. We did tip him $25 for the evening. At the end of the night, the meals were still charged wrong, even after I went to the guy named Amador to correct them. Still, he didn't, we were charged for 13 people eating the bread service even though there were only 9 of us there and the tickets were not correct and we still had to pay different items for different family members. At the end as we walked out, Amador made it a point to look away as we walked out right next to him, pouting as if we were in the wrong after we had spent over 300 dollars and he was not able to give us the correct ticket, nor able to count how many people were eating the bread service. Oh yeah, bread service means one stick of bread dipped in olive oil per person, not like Olive Garden, where it's all-you-can-eat breadsticks. This wasn't explained to us. Save your money, pick a different Italian restaurant where Amador does not work. Oh yeah, when I told him that the mistake was on them for overcharging us four people on the bread service, he blew up at me like he wanted to fight or something. This was very unprofessional and disturbing, especially since we were only discussing a $10 charge. He took an aggressive stance toward me, which was odd since I don't know what he was trying to accomplish by that. I told him I would be writing a review about our evening, and he said, "You are writing that over the four breadsticks that you ate?" to which I replied, Yes, I told you that there were only 9 of us, and you still sent that out to us. We paid in full for what was charged, and we tipped well; we did what we were supposed to do....

I don't know that I've had much success with JD's concepts and Roca & Martillo didn't change that. I think the jam may be spread a bit too thin with his ventures because none of them seem to hit the marks they should easily hit. Located directly in front of the new Spurs training facility, the space is well-appointed with both indoor and patio seating. While there is a side parking lot, I can imagine it gets filled pretty quickly if there are events going on at the facility proper. While we were there a band was doing a soundcheck and there's NO way you can enjoy your meal while a band is playing. The bass reverberated through the dining room as if you had front row seats. The furnishings are beautiful though the seats at the tables in the main dining room scrape loudly when pulled out. So much so, the host that sat us apologized before he pulled one out for me. I wasn't a fan of the cocktail menu and its lack of posted prices. Something about it makes me think they're trying to scam you with unlisted prices. I enjoyed the refreshing Eastern Sunset cucumber and gin cocktail, though the promised saffron syrup was undetectable. My husband's Four Roses old-fashioned was sufficient for happy hour. Nothing about the meal was memorable, which is sad to admit. The best bites we had were the Tuscan risotto arancini and HALF of the porcini-crusted onion rings. The cippolini jam the onion rings were served with would've been more appetizing had it been served at room temperature or warmer. As served, you had to use a fork or, heaven forbid, scoop the jam up with the onion rings pinched between firm fingers to get a bite with the two together. The seared ahi tuna mains that we ordered felt disjointed. The mandarin segments felt played out but the ahi was decent, but the "sear" was non-existent. The dill gremolata promised was absent and the citrus vinaigrette tasted as though the canned mandarin orange syrup was the "acidic" base. It was cloyingly sweet and artificial-tasting. The inconsistency of the veggies' cuts is a basic skill in culinary school, which I'm assuming wasn't pushed as important in the R&M training sessions. As someone who's faced down my fair share of public health inspectors in kitchens, a massive pet peeve of mine is chipped stoneware. The cup of vinaigrette I was given was pocked with chips to the point I skipped using it. This spot is definitely a one and done for us. Instead of quickly standing up concept after concept, I think Jason Dady needs to go back to the basics and spend more time impressing upon his GMs and staff the importance of attention-to-detail, consistency, and...

Seeing this restaurant on Eater San Antonio’s top new restaurants in San Antonio made it a no-brainer that we had to go try Roca & Martillo. Made reservations as it was a Friday night and was pleased to find out that the restaurant was not very busy when we arrived. Parking was a bit difficult as there was a special event going on at The Park and most of the parking was reserved for VIP tickets.

After ordering our drinks, one of the beverages that was ordered a nonalcoholic beer was delivered and unbeknownst to us until trying it. It was actually a regular beer. This could have been a very bad mistake as one member of our party is allergic to alcohol. The server blamed the bartender and said that the bartender had not checked however, they were all out of the non-alcoholic beer. No other options were provided, and water was substituted.

Starters consisting of the pulled mozzarella, cauliflower bisque, and field green salad were chosen for the beginning of the meal. These appetizers were all flavorful and good with the exception of the pulled mozzarella. That was a little bit dry and rubbery, however, it was still very flavorful.

The meal continued to go downhill when the entrées were brought. Two people had the brisket lasagna unfortunately the lasagna was ice cold in the center and was smothered with so much sauce the actual lasagne was hard to find. The brisket inside, rather than being shredded or pulled brisket, appeared to be ground beef like pieces of brisket if you could call it that. After asking them to heat up the lasagna so it was warm it took more than 30 minutes to get the food back. By that time all of the other meals the party was eating or either finished or cold from waiting.

The Gnocchi Roulade, if you could even call it, gnocchi was more like two slices of potato that had been mashed and fried flavorless and disgusting.

The bucatini was OK, however even that was lacking in the flavor department as the brown butter sauce was not very browned in flavor.

Overall, the experience was lackluster, definitely not what I would consider food from a top quality chef. It appears Jason Dady is more interested in being a clipboard chef than putting out a quality product, unfortunately.

I would not recommend this restaurant to others unless there are significant changes made. After expressing our discontent to the server, nothing was done other than she informed me. She did not charge me for the beer. That was the wrong product anyway.

A major disappointment and not sure why it is even on the Eater’s list of top new...