Octo Tapas Restobar — Restaurant in Ho Chi Minh City

I brought my friends there and wanted them to experience a dish I really enjoyed the first time I came there (the bone marrow topped with tartare). Unfortunately and for the third consecutive time; it wasn’t available. I came 3 times, bringing friends specifically for this dish, at lunch and dinner time, weekdays and weekends, and yet always the very disappointing experience of not having it.

You can eventually run out of stock of a product, I could get that, but seriously not 3 distinct times. And not something widely available in Vietnam.

And still, in such a — presumably — high end restaurant, not only would you assume this never happens, but also that the staff is at least trained to properly respond.

What struck me was the lack of customer service and poor handling of my genuine concern.

On that last time, and as 3 times felt too much, I directly shared my surprise and frustration to one staff, who said he would check. He never came back with a feedback. I then raised my concern, again, to another staff, who said she would talk to the manager. Nobody came and again not a single feedback shared.

At some point after 10pm, a staff brought us our bill without us asking for it. We were all surprised to see that nothing was offered as a compensation, being a simple dessert to share or a drink.

From precisely 10:30pm, a staff was standing next to our table and staring at us to push us through the exit. This felt extremely rude and made all of my friends and my friends feel very uncomfortable.

After being pushed away, and while exciting the restaurant, no one was there to give an explanation or apologize.

When you pay a bill of VND 10M+ for 6 people to receive such a service, this is definitely leaving you with the feeling of not...

First of all, the food is amazing, we tried a lot of different dishes and enjoyed each one of them, that’s why I’m putting 2 stars. However, we had a really bad experience there last night. We ordered maybe 7/8 different dishes to share, and for the main dish, we ordered the pork cutlets. At the end of the dinner, (everything comes as soon as it’s ready so it comes plates per plates), we received our main dish. After 2 bites, we realized that it wasn’t the pork we were expecting but instead, a good piece of beef. But the price of this beef was 4TIMES (!!) the price of the pork. We never ordered this as we don’t really eat beef, but still got charged it fully on the bill. To be honest we felt like our complain really wasn’t taken into account as they came with the bill without saying anything (even though we said it wasn’t what we ordered, and didn’t eat the dish except for those 2 bites), and offered us two strong drinks without even asking us if we wanted something in particular… It was very clumsy the way they handled this situation, and in the end almost half of our bill went into this dish we didn’t order in the first place… Even though we had a very good dinner, we left very disappointed by this place. We told the staff how we felt and they were very sorry, but it was a very costly mistake for us… They tried to offer us a discount for our next time (after we paid the bill), but, as tourists, we probably won’t be back in Saigon for a few years… This was the last night of our trip. So this comment is for everyone to double check the order with the waiter before anything else!! It’s also for the restaurant managers to improve the way they handle these kinds of situations, for...

Octo was a perfect break away from my daily diet of Vietnamese food in the past four days. My girlfriend insisted on bringing me here on our last night in HCM before flying back out the next day to Sydney.

The standards are usually a benchmark of any cuisine. I'm an old fashioned guy with a slight twist. But to my girlfriend I'm an old guy who's slightly twisted. But for today's meal, we're doing both. Keeping the young and old happy.

The three dishes arrived as entrees. Croquetas were salty, hammy and crispy. Just how my cholesterol likes it, as did I. My girlfriend's pick of her favourite ensalada was a little too leafy for me. Apparently, the pears were shaved last time instead of cubed. Not enough walnuts for her. The stuffed flor were a little oily and had a bit too much goat's cheese for my liking.

I later had to eat my own words when the girlfriend's friend's suggestion of the bikini trufada came out. I had passed comment that it sounded boring at first. I hate to say it, but the toasties were damn rico!

Our first main tuetano con tartar made the grand finale with great gusto. It didn't disappoint. Although, the fattiness in the marrow and tartar was quite heavy and a mouthful to some. But I practically scraped the entire bone clean until I almost passed out.

The last main guest to arrive was our conchinillo asado. Crispy skin, bones and succulent meat of little porky pig was muy delicioso! I could eat this with rice or grilled flat bread.

The service was a little lacklustre. While they appeared neutral to me, the servers may need to engage with the patrons and perhaps provide some recommendations for the untrained culinary enthusiasts like my girlfriend, her...