This restaurant is mentioned in the guidebook as a splurge. We were in Porto last month with some family and friends, and had booked an evening here well in advance, a last hurrah before some of the folks started traveling home. I'll even note that the person who made the reservation had a confirmation from the restaurant about a week prior. Anyway, we all get there at the appointed time, and there's a confused looking guy standing outside asking what we were doing there. Dinner, we replied. Oh no, he says, there's a special event and there are no reservations tonight. After some polite back and forth he looks at our email, looks us up on their schedule, sees our reservation, and basically says sorry, don't know why someone took the reservation (because it was made 3 months ago was our response), but I'll help you go somewhere else. Essentially it seemed to us that a private party was a better deal for them and we and others were the losers. As an old Seinfeld episode says, they knew how to take the reservation, but they didn't know how to hold the reservation. The guy did take us to another place, we had a nice dinner, and we were even comp'd dessert and a glass of port each, but ... overall a disappointing evening given how much we were looking forward to it. I'll give them credit for doing more than simply turning us away, but it is a good reminder to always have a plan B.
Please sign in to post.