Tiato Kitchen + Venue — Restaurant in Santa Monica

It's rare to leave a restaurant both angry and starving, which is what happened after I attended a dinner there last night. Our server said she was unable to give my family a separate check, even though I said we planned to leave earlier than the rest of our group. Trying to be flexible, I said we would work it out with our friends at our small table for 5. During dinner service, it took on average about 35 minutes to receive our drink orders each time. I will say the food was very good, and one might even call the prices reasonable considering the remarkably small portions they serve. When I was finally able to find out server to request our check, it was a fun surprise to learn that despite our earlier conversation she not only included our table but our table of friends sitting next to us. Rather than paying for our table of 5, I'm now stuck with the bill for a group of about a dozen people. And the look I received when I said we would be using just two separate cards plus cash to pay... My favorite part was that she needed assistance from another colleague and I needed to accompany them to the register to help them figure out the payment, despite writing down the totals to charge on each card on the receipt, and THEN watching them count the cash I gave them no fewer than 8 times. An hour later, I overpaid and left the venue a full 90 minutes later than I planned. It was such a shame as the space is beautiful and we were there for a celebration. The service staff here clearly weren't given adequate resources and training to accommodate the event with any semblance of organization...

WHATEVER UPU DO, DO NOT HOST A PARTY HERE. The food is good but I didn’t rate it since they ran out of food an hour before the contracted time and I didn’t get any. The event manager was trash- did not do what was talked about, difficult to find to fix issues throughout the event, and the promised floor plan that never got sent wasn’t what we talked about either. The flow was terrible since they did what they wanted. Terrible communication. When I tried to work this out, they admitted to not getting quality service but then ghosted me. The boss did not respond once to my emails to work this out. It’s too bad since the space is pretty (I didn’t get to use the pretty outside even though I had a completely buyout) due to some sprinkles of rain) and the food is good- but oh wait I didn’t get any but that’s what I heard. They are so unprofessional. What is the point of an event manager if they don’t manage things? I had to do my own research and booking for the vendors too. You can do better. DO NOT HAVE AN EVENT HERE. My event was ruined as well as my experience. I will not get it back and I was celebrating a health milestone....

Absolutely love Tiato! I found Tiato when I was looking for a wedding venue; it was everything my husband and I were looking for. I’m Vietnamese and he isn’t, so we were thrilled to find a place that does Viet fusion, but it actually tastes good! The food tastes like my childhood, while still being accessible for those less familiar with Viet food. Tiato also has great staff — super easy to communicate with and genuinely kind! They helped tailor every detail exactly to our taste, all within a reasonable (SoCal) budget. It was no surprise when so many of our guests told us we had the best food of any wedding they’ve been to! And bonus points for plenty of delicious vegan and and gluten free options.

Apart from wedding planning, we’ve come here many times just for lunch/dinner and will come many more times because we love the food. All of that to say, I would endlessly recommend Tiato for all event planning or just for a...