Buenos Ayres Market & Grill — Restaurant in San Juan

Forget this place, its no better than Bonanza or Sizzler but much more expensive. First of all, there are no actual menus offered, they are still using the menu you have to scan the code on your phone. As a customer, I see this as an indication of cheapness. (cost saving scheme) Covid19 is over, no reason to not offer a menu any more. Nobody wants to squint at a small phone screen to see a menu. The owners will try to rationalize this cheapness though tired and out of touch excuses, but as a customer who is going to pay for a sit down meal, I want to look at a big nice menu. Beer and soft drink refrigerators are in the dining room, not pleasant to look at unless Im shopping for a bottle of beer at a corner store or walgreens. Owners have placed a Quilmes branded beer refigerator in the dining room most likely in a misguided way to remind the customer that they are in a genuine argentinian restaurant, but is looks tacky and out of place. Beer refrigerators should be behind the bar.

We ordered churrasco, potato and garden salad, my friend had the same but ordered a caesar salad instead of garden salad. We each ordered a Perrier Sparkling water, and 1 gin and tonic. Total with tax and 20% tip was $145. Both steak had no flavor at all, were average size, and came on a small metal plate. ( I suspect when I get meals on small plates, they are used to make the meal look larger than it really is.) Exremely basic. We had to ask for chimichurri sauces, it should have been included. (another cost saving scheme) No bread for table. (another cost saving scheme) Baked potato came with only butter. (another cost saving scheme) Super basic. Garden salad was nothing more than small bowl of chopped romaine lettuce, some grated carrot, and a few slices of tomato with the stem of the tomato included with the slices. (Had to spit out the stem on each slice.) Friend said the caesar salad was terrible. The restaurant has a small area in front they call a "store", its mom and pop style. (that means not elegant) What you will find is overpriced mate and alfajores, and small other Agentina items. They had a few boxes of Havanna lemon cookies for $34 dollars (absurd price). Chairs were cheap unfinished wood and hard as rock. Apparently the mate cups they have for sale were too "valuable" to be displayed in the "store" and were behind the cashier in a safe rack. Im surprised this place is still in business. Mediocre atmosphere, mediocre food. For some reason this restaurant still has the "valet" parking, reminiscent from Che's, the restaurant formerly there, that actually had good...

Food was excellent! Service has a lot of opportunity. Servers seem to be at war with each other and steal each other's plates. Everything moves slowly and they are unapologetic about it. You can see in some of the servers' eyes they despise the place and overall attitude towards management. Wouldn't return, better places nearby.

Edit for response.

It will be my pleasure to provide details then, I was trying to not make it seem that bad for your sake.

We will start with the seating. After a manager sits us down in a semi clean table, we waited for over 25 minutes for anyone to talk to us, even when we told the manager and he just kept saying someone would come to us shortly. After that we see a server taking care of the table next to us and just ask him. He was awesome and took care of us even though we were not his table and had no idea who was supposed to take care of us. We immediately order some apps, a soup and a parrillada (rare). After another 30 minutes the apps come out but no soup, kept asking the server and the manager for it and after 20 more minutes the manager tells our server that there's no soup left. That'd be fine, it happens, you run out, however around 2 minutes later, a table that got seated a good 30 minutes after us actually gets 3 serving of the same soup!!! How is that possible? At this point we just want to get out as it has been over an hour and we still don't have our entree, it isn't until after 18 mote minutes that we manage to ask our server for our food and he says that it should've been delivered a while ago. Again, the food went to a different table and we were stuck with a well done plate of beef in the end. At this point it makes no sense to return it as we just didn't feel like waiting another 30 minutes for a very easy plate to be remade. The server, whom you are blaming for the issues, actually told us to please not give him a tip as he knows management fudged us over several times, however we didn't comply because you could see he was trying his best and deserved a tip for his efforts since literally nothing that happened was his fault. Then whose fault is it? Management, they should keep eyes on the floor and help servers, not chat in a corner of the pastry counter or prioritize some tables over others because they like the server better or whatever. I hope these details help, if not, feel free to reach out, my email is right there...

I've traveled the world and have eaten different foods from different countries at various restaurants this experience ranks dead last! I have walked by this restaurant a couple times during my vacation and decided to finally give it a try. Vivian, who was our waitress was horribly rude from the very moment we walked in! She kept on reaching over our drinks and plate area, moving things around without even saying something or asking politely. I asked for a half order of ravioli and I received what I later found out was a full order (without knowing the difference mind you). The meat sauce that smothered my ravioli was indeed horrible. The meat was in mixed in this greasy unflavorable sauce. When my family asked for a refill on their non-alcoholic drink (lemonade), she flat out said NO! Then when I said something to my husband, she goes and corrects herself and said that they do not give free refills, you would have to purchase another drink! Fine, I will order another drink. Next, she did not ask my husband if he was finished with his dinner and just assumed he was and grabbed his plate and pulled it away! She was about to do the same to my daughter's plate in which I had to stop her and let her know that she was still working on her food. When she brought the check to me, I noticed I was charged for the full size ravioli plate instead of the 1/2 order which I had requested! When I mentioned something to her about it, she said there was nothing she can do because the ravioli's was consumed (which was not true, remember the greasy sauce I mentioned earlier that was horrible). I told her I requested the 1/2 order and how am I supposed to know the difference in between how the half order looks like or the full order looks when it was my first time there! She went back and talked to somebody and came back saying all we can give you is a $2.54 discount because the food was already consumed. At no point after she took our order did she go over the order with us or come back and check if we were alright, nothing. I would understand if it was a busy day, had a large party going on, something for her to forget to do something like that, BUT there were only 4 customers in the restaurant and one of them was not even her table! Wow talking about taking care of the local people on island and visitors to the island! I do not recommend this...