The Turquoise Café-Bar Europa — Restaurant in San Diego

Update: We visited The Turquoise again 1/18/13 at the owner's behest. He really listened to my concerns and everything that could reasonably be fixed was. We had the same waitress and her hair was in a bun, and I saw another waitresses rocking cool pigtails, so that was a definite improvement. She also let us pour our own sangria this time, so I got a lot less ice in my glass and a lot more deliciousness. Do try the pineapple sangria, incredibly good. The food was still delicious, as usual. Thanks for encouraging us to try again, and I look forward to other improvements.

Our waitress kept playing with and whipping around her hair. I found that bothersome and kept worrying that it would end up in our food. But she was the only waitress with her hair down, so I guess it was a poor personal choice on her part. The food is really good, but the pricing rips you off. They ”don't do tips”, so they just charge an extra 17% of your total to your check. So if your service was bad, or incredibly slow in our case because they were either understaffed or disorganized, and uncommunicative, you have no way of showing your displeasure unless you fill out one of their poorly written surveys. They say if your service was bad they'll refund you, but there's no guarantee. They also say that the waiter with the best reviews gets a special cash bonus. But they don't believe in tips. So. Yeah. Make of that what you will.The band they booked that night was way too big for the space. So thinking we've got good seats near the stage area, we soon found out that we would be spending the majority of the evening with strangers' butts in our faces, rando-s putting their drinks on our table, their jackets on our chairs, or just stepping on or toes. And absolutely no room to dance. Maybe they should just not have that table available during big band night.The last thing, which I think is completely unfair to their employees, having waitressed at one point in my life, is that their kitchen door opened right on to the dance floor. This means that the wait staff have to balance food through a bunch of dancing customers. That seemed like a pretty bad idea to me.But the food IS really good. Amazing paella and tortilla. Amazing selection of sangrias.Pro-Tip: DO NOT PARK IN THE CAR WASH. People park any kind of way and you could get stuck trying to get out like we did....

I've frequented this place several times over the years and as a cafe, a bar, and entertainment spot I really do not have any complaints. Actually I have enjoyed many nights out enjoying good food and music here. UNFORTUNATELY, when I have to question the integrity and character of the people who work at or own the busines, it greatly compromises how I can even give a second thought about recommending this place to anyone , leaving me inclined as well to alert others of this issue: On December 14th I contacted the business through the website email listed to inquire about whether the business offered gift cards/certificates. My message was promptly returned by Basilio Ceravalo (listed as owner) to confirm I could purchase any amount gift card. I would need to submit a PayPal payment and once received he would create the gift certificate and email it to me. On Dec 16th I notified him again that the payment was sent and that it was intended as a Christmas gift, hoping to receive it as soon as possible. On Dec 19th after no response, I again reached out by personal email. Still no response. On Dec 21 I again reached out (this time through Paypal msg) to explain I still had not received a response or my gift certificate and again explained this was an intended gift. I did receive a response same day which states he was working on it and would email for sure the following day. Needless to say, that was the last I've heard from him. I've since left him another message through PayPal requesting a refund at this point. At this point, no matter how much I have enjoyed myself at Cafe Bar Europa in the last, I will no longer recommend this business in good faith and I hope others are cautious dealing with transactions like this. I typically would never PayPal money like this but I had assumed this business and it's owner to be quite reputable and honorable. Wrong. ...

I went there to listen to some live jazz, an realized that it's not the best of places to do it. i enjoyed the music, but the staff really didn't pay too much attention to people who walked in. no one really greeted us, also i notice that around 12:00am, there was no one to be found around the bar. they almost missed a chance to sell this one guy another drink because there was no one there. the food was ok but watch out for the prices. me and my friend both had non alcoholic drinks- we are underage- and one of the servers asked us for a refill; it just would have been nice to have been warned that it wasn't free. not really a problem though. the biggest thing is that they don't "accept tips" but they do charge a 17.5% service fee, a bit high if you ask me, so be careful of that.

would i go back? sure maybe not order as much stuff. it's not a bad spot, not great either. to me, the only selling point is...