PDX Caffe Allora

[duckduck]

Last friday I had a truffle class with Jack and Iva from JaCiva's. Wonderful class. Afterward I went looking for lunch. In Good Taste said they quit doing lunch 7 months ago but they send people to Caffe Allora. We decided to give it a try. The food was, well...oh, no, wait...we didn't have any food because we COULDN'T GET ANYONE TO TAKE OUR ORDER! The only reason we had a menu to look at was because there was a gentleman that was sitting across from us that was so totally perturbed that he had been sitting there so long with no service that he went and got a menu for himself and us. Twenty minutes later, we left because he still had not seen anyone to give his order to. God only knows how long he had been there before us. Some people should just serve food to their friends and throw great parties. They should not, however, open a restaurant. Not unless it comes with a huge sign on the door that says that a meal there will be an all day process if you ever get it at all. HERE'S YOUR SIGN.

We hopped the streetcar to Miso Happy and were served almost immediately. It was piping hot, good and I was happy.

[rachaelLK]

Yikes! What time were you there? I've eaten there three times and enjoyed it very much - two have been early dinner-ish (5pm) and another was just for coffee and munching around 2. I recall them saying that they just have coffee and nibbles from 2:30 until dinner....still, such a shame. There is no excuse for poor service!

[fierydrunk]

Sounds horrible and I am not intending to be snarky, but did anyone get up, look around and ask where the service was and if they were indeed serving or was the caffe entirely empty and wide open? Maybe I am pushy, but I would have been wandering about!

[duckduck]

It was maybe 3pm but there were a couple tables with food so they were serving. And they knew we were there. I was surprised when the perturbed gentleman that was there before us went and asked for a menu and he told that someone would bring it to him. The person that said that could have just handed him a menu. And when that didn't happen, he asked "Are those the menus there?" and he went and got it himself. I felt like our presence was more of an inconvenience to them than anything and I didn't enjoy feeling that way. I won't be going back.

[Alberts]

...we didn't have any food because we COULDN'T GET ANYONE TO TAKE OUR ORDER!

We had the same experience there twice. At least the only waiter in the place was apologetic on one of the occasions. There was a lot more going on at the bar. The tables were neglected.

We had Vin Santo and desert, which were fine. I will admit that it is hard to tolerate poor service when there are so many excellent choices in our town for other places to eat.

[duckduck]

I can't believe they were given a good review in the Oregonian today. All that was mentioned was a "little attitude". Was that the attitude we got when we walked in and the servers looked at us, turned their backs to us and walked away? We stood there awhile before we decided to seat ourselves since they obviously weren't going to seat us or tell us to seat ourselves. I just don't get it.

[trillium]

I never really got the feeling that the Oregonian takes its restaurant reviewing all that seriously. The reviews frequently read like PR releases to me. Harsh, but how it comes across to me.

regards,

trillium

[ExtraMSG]

Agreed. The Oregonian's Food Day does some decent features, but I don't trust the reviews in general. I've been burned too many times. WW is much more trustworthy, although I don't know that the right person always reviews the place they review.