Konakai Peruvian Cuisine — Restaurant in Sunrise

Friday night date night with my wife. Decided to try out Konakai, which is right down the street from our house. Checked the reviews, and they looked good.

Except for that one complaint about the long wait for service and food. We decided to brush it aside and take a chance!

Upon arrival we were immediately seated. There were two other tables seated when we arrived. In the middle of the restaurant was a large table with three people sitting at it. It appeared they were waiting for the rest of their party to arrive.

We order our food. Wife gets a ceviche with a Peruvian beer. I ordered the Konakai platter. As we wait for our food, another table is seated, a couple of people join the large table in the middle of the restaurant.

Three servers mill about, taking orders and attending to the growing table in the center.

Dish after dish leaves the kitchen, dispatched for tables other than ours. After about 15 minutes, my wife's ceviche arrives. She digs in and comments that the dish is quite good. A couple of sips from her beer and I'm still waiting for my food.

I watch as more people join the center table with what looks like a large family and their children. Possibly affiliated with the owner of the restaurant I'm guessing. More food leaves the kitchen. More food is placed at the center table.

I wave down my server, who mind, you hasn't come over once to check on us. I asked politely when my order will be ready and she assures me it will be soon.

More people. More food for people other than me. It's been about 30 minutes now and I've just watched my wife finish her food and drink. This is where I get up and tell our server to just box my order to go and give us our check.

Our server tries to apologize and say that the large party placed orders ahead of time. I told her that was unacceptable and how can the restaurant send out one dish and not another for the same table? A little behind, I could understand. But it took about 40 minutes for my food to arrive. The ceviche is already cold. It could have waited to come out with my dish.

The entire restaurant had food on their tables except for me. I looked around and was fuming at this point. Asked for the check, paid and promptly left.

Got home and tried to eat something after losing my appetite from such a crappy experience. My Konakai platter was mediocre at best. Soupy mix of vegetables and triple meats. Nothing special.

Do yourself a favor and avoid this place. I mean, if you want to wait forever to get served (at the same time) and eat an overpriced ...

We found this place while visiting family in the area and decided to go for dinner. I believe this place has potential, the ambience is fantastic and the food is great, but there is so much more to a restaurant than just the food. People also go out for an experience and to enjoy themselves. It seemed that the place was uncharacteristically busy, and understaffed. I think I saw only 3 maybe 4 waiters for the whole place, which was almost full to capacity. To start the visit, we sat for about ~30-40 minutes before we got waters for the table, the waiter didn’t even ask if we wanted anything, just brought us water and we didn’t see them again for a long while. We were a group of 7 adults, and 2 were missing, so I am assuming they were waiting for the late comers to arrive before approaching the table. I would have thought that they would’ve wanted us to order drinks and appetizers while we waited, but well… Then there is the food. Took another 30 minutes between the arrival of the first dish until we got the last one. I’m guessing it’s a small kitchen with only a few people on staff as well and it reflected on the timing and service. I want to mention we had a baseball game in the background on my phone and the game went to the 11th inning and we watched from the bottom of the 4th till way passed the end and we were still there. Lastly, we never got a single refill for the water, we got that single glass at the beginning and that was it (at least the people who ordered drinks, had the water and whatever they ordered for the 2+ hrs we were there) I think this place is the product of inexperienced entrepreneurship and the labor shortage. Overall I could probably give this restaurant a lower star rating but I hope that as they continue to grow in popularity, they will learn from their mistakes and become more effective...

We used to go frequently to that restaurant (but not anymore) The truth is that lately the service is very poor. The last two times I made an order by phone to pick up, they told me 20 to 25 minutes and when I arrived they made me wait for 30 more minutes without anyone having the grace to come and give me an update on my order. Twice when I placed my order they were giving me something that I did not ask for, and when you let them know they tell you that was what you asked for !!! On Sunday September 12 we went to eat with friends of mine and the service was the worst of my life !!! First they tell you to wait outside until they have a table available (understandable due to the pandemic) but since the waiters do not know what they are doing, if you are going to wait in the car, they call the first person they see by the door and they do not respect order. After we entered and waited almost 20 min, they did not bring us the cutlery, we asked 3 waiters for water and none of them brought it, then they did and we asked for water without ice for one person and they did not bring it either. They sent a young waiter to take our order, he repeated it and left. After almost 25 minutes they brought us the incomplete order ... When we asked about the food they went to the kitchen and came back saying that unfortunately they had not prepared it and that due to the mistake they had made they were going to give some desert called "picarones". After the disappointment of not having received the food and the long wait we asked for the bill ... Oh surprise! They charged us for the food that they did not bring and the "picarones" that should be free !!! We call the waitress and let her know , she acting like she knew what she was doing, and go to the register and change the bill! What a shame ! The worst...