hi..recently we came to know that a new restaurant has opened which is just like Nando's (sort of copycat) and last night we went there for dinner.The girl at the reception said there is no space here for 3 people so she took us upstairs (although the space was there but i didn't argue, thought may be its reserved).when we reached upstairs i didnt like the place for sitting as i wanted a cosy seat instead of chairs and she said ok i have some space downstairs and we went to the ground floor again.she apologised twice for this..phew!!!she herself cleaned the table for us which was untidy indeed.The other filipino girl came and took our order.and then she got busy with other customers.i called one waiter and the filipino waitress twice and asked to bring the portuguese bread first and they said ok fine but we didn't get it, rather it came with the grilled chicken after 45-50 mins.Very quickly she brought the drinks and we waited for almost 45-50 mins for our food to arrive.in the meantime i did notice that there was lack of staff.The people sitting next to our table got undercooked food and it was replaced with the new one.When our food arrived after 45-50 mins, the portuguese bread was not warm and it was lil bit hard from the top.i asked her to warm this.after 15 mins she brought the bread and left in a hurry .now i noticed there was no butter with it.i called the manager and asked for butter and complained about such a pathetic service and he said sorry i bring the butter.now the grilled Chicken topped with that horrible barcelos sauce was just okay .the spicy rice (as stated on the menu) seemed to me really stale and they were not spicy at all..i asked her to replace it with potato wedges.the coleslaw tasted horrible and me and my husband didn't eat it at all..Moreover, the drinks were not refillable whether they are regular or large(Go large 3 Dhs ADDITIONAL) in size and by the time the food arrived they were not cold enough !!!in short it was indeed a bad experience with barcelos and i would never ever go there again..we asked for the comment card and the manager said sorry we don't keep that..(wow!!!)while we were having our dinner, three guys who had already waited for 50 mins like us they suddenly left when their food arrived and talked very rudely with the manager about their service.Another person who was alone and was silently sitting near the window really waited that long and when his food arrived he just started eating it and after he finished he called the waitress and said u brought wrong order for me ..i was really hungry so i finished this !!!
It is not easy to copy a big name like Nando's and the quality of their food is beyond barcelos' approach..!!!