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El Califa

4.4 (7 reviews)
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1 year ago

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10 years ago

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Sud 777

Sud 777

3.7(91 reviews)
3.1 km
$$$

Posting this in hopes that someone saves themselves $10,000 pesos (~600USD) How this restaurant has…read moreover four stars on google, a Michelin star in 24/25 and has made Latin America Worlds 50 Best is beyond me. I walked in with high hopes from these accolades and thought the ambiance of the restaurant was gorgeous. I should preface that I have been fortunate enough to dine at well over 20 different Michelin starred experiences all over the world. This was by far the worst tasting menu I have ever tried. Most of these dishes tasted like nothing or just tasted plain bad. The first course was ran by the sommelier and when I asked in which order chef reccommended taking the bites, he insisted I could eat them however. I thought that was odd considering I had a clementine with roe, a pumpkin tart and a beignet with guanciale in front of me. Luckily, I know my way around a menu and started with the freshest bite first. It was a plain clementine with overly fishy salmon trout roe (incorrectly described as caviar by the sommelier when ran). I could barely finish the first bite. I still had hopes that this experience would get better after that first inedible bite, but I was soon proven very wrong. Most dishes had either severely muted flavor, or the combinations made no sense. Dishes lacked balance, flavor, texture and seasoning. I almost destroyed my palate with how sharp the shallot tarte was, and that's coming from someone who LOVES onions. I also had gotten the wine pairing and there was no harmony between the dish and the wine. Just a random wine paired with the dish if I had to guess. I was lucky if I could get the som to give me anything more than a mumble of the name of the wine, let alone the region or grapes. Admittedly, I have very high service standards as my ex-wife worked for years at a two starred restaurant. I know what great service is and this was not even close. Dishes were being ran while over half a glass of wine from the last pairing was still sitting on the table. It felt so rushed that I had to ask 3 different staff members to have more time in between courses. I know that can be a personal preference but good servers should naturally adjust to the flow of the table. All members of the team should also be able to properly spiel each dish that is being dropped. I barely got anything other than the items listed on the tasting menu that was printed out and sitting right next to me. The table was left uncrumbed for the entire experience. The silverware was sloppily re-set each time. The server assistant even got his sleeve in one of my dishes as he dropped it. As the meal went along it got worse. The tomato-tonnato dish used awful produce; the tomato used was grainy and clearly overripe. Not to mention I did not understand the flavor combination of the tuna sauce it was sitting in. Dishes that were supposed to be hot, came room temperature or borderline cold. The Risotto and Sea Plankton dish was undercooked. There is quite frankly no excuse for hard risotto at a michelin starred restaurant. The Biscayan Style Cod was incorrectly ran to the table next to us, then finally hit our table and was lukewarm and very oversalted. Looking back, there were several dishes I should have sent back. It was the first time I was pained to pay for an experience. Good service is subjective, but the chef should be embarassed this is the food being put out. Even if I don't agree with the flavor profiles and combinations, the techniques at a michelin starred restaurant should be perfected. I am sympathetic to a couple mistakes, as we are all human but this was just consistently bad. I have been to restaurants where vegetable forward menus SHINE (Le Jardinier in Houston and Miami are a great example) and this menu was a disservice to menus that are supposed to focus on produce over protein. If this was my first introduction to a michelin starred tasting menu, I would never try one again.

came here with bryce and the food and experience was so good! did the 13 course small plates…read moretasting menu. never done anything like this so quite enjoyed it. will say it is quite pricy (a little overpriced imo) but loved how they catered to my vegan diet. service and ambiance were quite nice

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El Califa - restaurants - Updated May 2026

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