STK San Juan — Restaurant in San Juan

First off, as a resident of San Juan I've been really looking forward to an excellent steakhouse with a fairly good reputation like STK. I hoped to add it to my favorites list and recommendations to the likes of other top-tier San Juan restaurants like Viande, Marmelade, and more.

They just opened so I was super excited to give it a try with a friend of mine. Appetizers were overall solid, nothing to brag about but definitely solid. Service (the waitress) was very nice and professional.

We both ordered the Rib Eye Steaks. I ordered mine medium-rare and my friend ordered his medium-rare as well. About 25 minutes later we received our steaks.

I got mine and the waitress said it was the medium one. I was a bit confused but whatever. My friend got his "medium-rare" steak and he said it was find he'd trade with me as I normally always prefer "medium-rare".

I took a few cuts of the steak. The first cut right at the edge was already rare and as I took a second cut deeper very quickly I realized that the steak was pretty much raw inside. It was lukewarm/cold inside, and probably the most rare steak I've ever had (besides Beef Tartar which I eat often in Europe/Japan/Korea).

I confirmed with my friend and asked him if it looked way undercooked and he said it was the most rare steak he'd ever seen.

Then we looked at his steak and it was definitely not a medium but instead a medium well (totally brown inside, no pink).

By this time I just told someone working at the restaurant that the steak was raw and she took it. I assumed they were going to give me a new steak that was cooked correctly considering the steak was $100~ more or less with tip.

Instead 10 minutes later I got my original steak back that had just been thrown back on the grill.

Seriously?

This is supposed to be a top-dollar steakhouse who messes up on cooking the steak and just throws it back on the grill and gives me back the steak that is more heated up? Totally amateur...

The waitress kindly offered to replace it with another one for free but by that time we had waited so long and my friend was done eating I just said forget it.

Later the manager came out and said that the steak was fine actually, it just is more rare inside toward the bone and that it was medium-rare. I told him obviously it is a bit more rare towards the bone but literally it was just completely rare for 90% of the steak. I got pretty annoyed that the manager would argue with a customer about whether or not the steak was medium-rare or not when it clearly was just the mistake of the kitchen. He told me that the chef had told him that the steak was fine but once again I mean the chef was probably just protecting his a$$ and no one there was really qualified to tell me that actually I just don't know what a medium-rare steak looks like.

As someone who literally eats and cooks steaks once a week and has been to very nice steakhouses with no issue ever before, it was insulting which wasn't the managers intent to be fair, but it came off in that way. He did offer a refund in the end of that steak.

All in all, for the price point, service, and overall experience, unfortunately I have to give this a 2/5. I will possibly come back again in a few months after they've made all their mistakes to try again and edit my review if all goes well.

I recommend the same to anyone considering giving it a try. They need time to make their mistakes on their guinea pigs first, improve their level and then they might be ready in about 6 months to serve high quality steaks cooked to perfection.

P.S. the inside decor is beautiful and elegant. The music is very loud, there is sparklers everywhere, and people yelling shots so don't expect to have an intimate convo or conversation in general without talking at a 8/10.

TLDR; high expectations, instead left without eating...

Upon walking in the restaurant, our group of 5 was separated. As one hostess told 2 members of our party they could go ahead and get seated. However, while the other 3 of us were waiting, one of our friends were told that she could not enter with her shorts. Her shorts did not have any rips or jagged edges. She had no problem going back to our dwelling area, which required a taxi round trip fare. She came back in a dress. However while she left another hostess told us we would not be able to be seated without her, and may forfeit our reservation. Because we needed 3 people there. I informed the hostess we already had two individuals inside. She then said your table is not ready., your table will be ready within 10 minutes.

In which, this was understandable, because we did arrive early. I told her I would go to the bar, one friend waited in the front. While walking to the bar, I noticed a woman with ripped jeans, and ragged flares. Which on the internet the dressing policy states that there are no ripped jeans, or tankless tops, in which she had on both. There were multiple parties with tankless tops, and later during the night, men were coming in with ripped jeans, and basketball shorts, which are gym attire.

However after seeing the woman, I noticed my friends were already seated. I went to take pictures of them, and just take in the ambience. STK is beautiful, and I love dining at the STK in Chicago, and Atlanta. However, being in a new location, and as it was all of my friends' first time dining with STK, I wanted to capture the memories. This process took about 5 minutes, As I was turning around to go get Ari, a member of our party, the hostess was just bringing her over. Which was ok. The atmosphere was amazing, however Charles our waiter, seemed a little irritated coming back to the table because our other member of the party was not back yet. So we ordered drinks. The first round of drinks were delivered perfectly. However, once the restaurant got busy, it was another story. FIrst we have to order everything at once. So theres no ordering appetizers. Because we were waiting we wanted to give our friends the adequate amount of time to view the menu. However once she arrived, it took him almost 30 minutes to come back to the table. Let’s put time into context, We arrived at 4:50, and didn’t leave until 9:20. One of the appetizers that arrived did not taste pleasant. The shrimp tasted very dry. As seafood connoisseurs everyone at the table tasted a piece of one of the four shrimp. We had almost 3 and half shrimp leeft. We called Charles, and the manager would not come to the table, At first they wouldn't take it from the table, but then Charles removed it. During this time, I had asked for a ginger ale, 4 times, and It did not arrived to the table, until our meal was halfway eaten. Also one of my friends ordered the same cocktail, which was the name of the street, after she finished her first cocktail. Her drink looked different and tasted different than mine. Her drink was really light. I then asked Charles if he could bring her more passionfruit, because her drink was not fruity and tasted just like liquor. Mind you, I still have not received my ginger ale. The passion fruit came out as we were finishing our last bites.

One great thing is one of our friends' steak wasn’t cooked how she ordered it. They did take it back and cook it more. Especially because the table next to us ordered an $80 dollar steak, and it was cold, and the waitress threw it away. The manager had a very nonchalant attitude, and said that there was nothing he could...

BEWARE !! IF I COULD GIVE ZERO STARS I WOULD!!!-For the manager and 1 star for the server. 5 stars for the server assistants.**

Initially the atmosphere and overall ambiance of the venue was beautiful and peaceful. Our server Charles greeted us pleasantly, gave us great advice/suggestions and answered all of our questions. He was patient with us ordering as we awaited our friend to return from changing her shorts to match the dress code. I am vegetarian and the eggplant wasn’t offered anymore due to covid so he suggested the cauliflower steak instead. Our reservation was for 5pm and we arrived a few minutes early, but after our initial greet and entire order was taken, Charles was becoming less and less attentive. Each correspondence we encountered with him became few and rushed, so much so that we had to ask several other servers/server assistants to help get us the drinks we ordered with Charles. My friends ordered about 3 different drinks that either came out incorrectly or not at all. By the end of the night when the check arrived, we noticed some items were not removed as promised, even one that Charles stated he would send the manager over- who never came until after the check was dropped off. The manager Jose came over with defensive body language, unwilling to not only remove the items, but not even listen to what had actually happened. Jose claimed he checked the cameras and verified with the bartender that we received all of our drinks AND that Charles personally delivered everything, but that was not possible since Charles was overwhelmed and busy. Charles was constantly running away from our table after only taking one request instead of getting everything resolved in one setting. The server assistants brought most of our drinks and helped deliver the food and much more! Jose continued to cut us off, call us liars and completely disrespected every single one of us. Our bill was almost $1k and it wasn’t about the money, but the principal that we were called liars and forced to pay for something we didn’t receive. WHAT HAPPENED TO THE CUSTOMER IS ALWAYS RIGHT?! They offered NO SOLUTION to help resolve the issue whatsoever. We even noticed a table next to us with similar issues and they refused to fix it. I understand fine dining and strict policies but this was by far the worst the...