Cup Cafe — Restaurant in Tucson

Cup Cafe located inside/outside of hotel Congress had great service and atmosphere, but the food is the only drawback. We came during the weekend dinner menu.

We tried the restaurant week meal with the Arroz Mar y Tierra, with the stuffed red bell pepper appetizer and the sangria for $45. Overall it's a good deal because you get an app, entree and an alcoholic beverage, but thats where the standouts end. The flavors worked together, but what we were served lacked seasonings and any standout robust flavors that really complimented each other.

As one of the lighter options we tried was the steak salad, which was presented well. Its what you would expect for a Southwest style of salad and flavors meshed we'll. Steak was under seasoned, but was complimented well by the house dressing.

The Steak Frites with the butter chimichurri was basically the same as the other dishes. The flank steak was well cooked, but lacked any profound flavors, the asparagus was seasoned well, but the French fries in the plate were the unfortunate standout. Overall, the steak could of been the Star, but the incomplete flavor profile of the Chimichurri brought the overall quality down.

For one of the more normal dishes we ordered the simple burger meal to serve as a baseline. The meat was a little on the drier side, which made each bite feel like I needed to drink in order to stop myself from coughing. This is a burger meal ment for the picky eater which finds ketchup attractive for extra lubrication.

Overall, we came as a group and managed to try a few of the different offerings, albeit the consensus was the same. The ambiance and service were great, but you don't come here for the food. You are paying a premium because of ambiance and the historical aspect of Tucson's Hotel Congress. The food itself is very hit or miss, I would recommend you come here for breakfast over their...

If I could give 0 stars, I would. I was really excited to try this place, I'd heard good things about their food. I made a reservation for 5:30 to have a nice wedding anniversary dinner with my husband and we were seated pretty quickly. It was busy but there will still some empty tables. My husband and I were placed at a very small table in a dark corner. There was an electric cord just hanging along side my chair away from the wall and my coat kept catching on it. But whatever, I could have dealt with that. After sitting at our table for a very long time, still no server showed up. Finally a server showed up and took our drink orders. She came back and said that what my husband ordered wasn't on tap anymore, so would he be okay with a bottle, which my husband said yes. The server left again and never came back. We're waiting and waiting and no one came by. Finally the server came out and went to a different table and ended up just chit chatting with that table for a bit. At this point, it's too long of a wait that would be reasonable to come back and take an appetizer order, let alone the fact that my husband never got his drink. I was still willing to give the server the benefit of the doubt if she would come to us next, but after finishing up with the other table, she walked away again instead of coming over to us. We waited five more minutes and she still never showed, so we got up and walked out. We've never just walked out of a restaurant before, it was the first time. We did tell the hostess on our way out that we were leaving because we weren't receiving service. Definitely won't be trying this...

Cup is the best restaurant in Tucson imo, with some recent caveats. The atmosphere is typically wonderful and so is the food and service. However recently the outdoor music is painfully loud in the dining area, and on Sunday nights the staff is not good. Both the guy holding the door out back and the bartender in the drinks side were really rude. All I asked the door guy is if I could still get a water, and he acted like I was ridiculous for asking despite the fact he was blocking it and said they were still open several more hours. I walked in to get a soda water, which I’ve never been charged for in the 6 years I’ve been going to Congress, and the female bartender said it was $2. I said I could do tap to pay but she said they don’t have that. Then got a big attitude and said well I already poured it so you can just take it. A water! So I did and said I’m sorry I thought it was just a water and she bit back at me “yeah we charge for drinks here.” Let me tell you that if you speak that condescendingly to someone you have some serious healing to do. Then she continued to say passive aggressive comments in response as I walked out the door! Worst service, so I left the water outside on a table. No one wants something like that, either give it or not, don’t be a jerk. Hopefully the management passes that on to her and also trains staff to be more personable. I went just last night and the bartenders were great (not sure of everyone’s name but the one named Ben was especially good). Also seriously turn down the volume of the...