Gaucho's .vs. Bolero's - Winner - GAUCHO's by a LANDSLIDE!!!
a) Gaucho's - Staff at Gaucho's is amazing, friendly, knowledgeable, and consistent with both locations.
I love the sides! A few items they have include a Caeser Salad, mashed potatoes with melted cheese on top, this wicked tasty creamy chickpea/bean salad (sounds disgusting but oh so good), rice, and chicken stroganoff to name a few.
I am a sucker for the sides. I always coach myself prior to lay low on them, but just can't resist!
The meat is consistent and flavorful! My personal favorites? Bacon-wrapped chicken and Parmesan Beef!
The staff is absolutely wonderful. If you want a specific skewer, just ask, and they will be right there! The price for a Full Rodizo is $40
next... Bolero's
Venue looks nice. The server provided a list of skewer's that would be around with the Full Rodizio. There was a list of Beef, Chicken, Pork, Lamb, and cheese/buns options. I was excited!
I was disappointed with the "gourmet" sides bar. This bar included with green spring mix (honestly equivalent to the stuff you can buy at Superstore) with 3 options of salad dressing (Ranch, Thousand Island, and Italian). It was strange how thick the dressing were
They also had a nasty pasta salad. It was macaroni pasta (mushy), with bland tomato sauce and beef. They had shrimp for shrimp lovers. Their hot sides, coconut rice, some beef stu
Not only did the sides bar look bad it tasted like day old high school cafeteria food.
I remained positive as i thought "Hey, i am always a sucker for sides, so it's good that they suck here, I will fill up on the meat!!". I eat all the cuts of meat, however, my fellow-foodie, she does not eat pork. She has also been my Goucho's partner, and has never had a problem as different sorts of meats come out.
The first item up! Parmesan Pork, didn't have much flavor. Next, Pork Ribs. After this, Bacon wrapped chicken. At each time something came up, my friend notified the staff she couldn't eat pork. We never asked for anything else, as hey, we would just wait for the next item. This is another thing, there were times, where it was 20 MINUTES between skewers coming out (at Goucho's i would say, even when busy, 5 minutes apart). 35 minutes in, our 4th pork dish came. My friend politely notified the skewer-server for the 4th time she does not eat pork, and if they had chicken, beef or even lamb options?
The skewer-server was so rude. She just said "We have an order, and we know". I told her that that's great, but the list given when we had ordered the Rodizio had various meats, and though i enjoyed the pork, perhaps bring a chicken or beef dish next? She got upset, raised her voice (i mean, seriously?) and said, we have all those meats, but I KNOW when to bring it, stood there and stared at us like a we asked for her firstborn for about 20 seconds, and walked away.
Next came Pork Sausuage (yes now 5th item in a row that is pork. Don't get me wrong. I love Pork as well, but this was now too much pork). The Pork Sausage, I will admit, at Bolero's was better than Goucho's.
Our server (not the skewer-server, but our main server who sat us down) noticed my friend no longer eating, and asked her if everything was okay. We informed him of what had happened. His response? "Next time, you should order the Teaser Platter. It's cheaper at $35, and you can chose two beef or chicken dishes". I was honestly surprised because he was the same person that spoke so highly of the Full Rodizo, and actually gave us a written list of the skewers, a lot of them beef, chicken, or lamb.
This was after about 50 minutes in. You would think instead of saying "next time" he would go and ask for a chicken/lamb/or beef skewer but nope. we waited and additional 10 minutes for our next item.
No jokes, next item, another pork item - it was bacon-wrapped filet mignon. At this point, my friend was just turned off from eating and done. I love bacon, but how can one burn it to crisps?
This is something else i noticed. Goucho's the meet is always consistently cooked. Bolero's - nasty.
After the Bacon-wrapped filet mignon, came 3 beef dishes (Parmesan Beef, Rib Eye, Top Sirloin). At times the meat was sooo raw, i just couldn't eat it. The meat also tasted the same. Flavorless. The Parmesan beef, very underwhelming.
Next came Chicken drumsticks. SERIOUSLY burnt black. How can you screw up on chicken? After this, Jalapeno Pork and Lamb.
They came with grilled pineapple this was amazing. Finally, they brought garlic bread. It was SO nasty (how can you screw up garlic bread?). You know the types of buns that you can get for Safeway, used for sliders? The ones that are like 12 for 99cents? Yeah those ones. Yes, they had those one a skewer with some garlic butter melted (not all around and throughout) just on the top.
Final Verdict - i will never ever go to Bolero's, even if i am paid to eat there. read more