American Traveler who was simply traveling to see family in Istanbul, Turkey last week. My family…read morebrought us to this restaurant saying they heard it was very good.
I know that no matter how expensive the meal, no matter high-end the restaurant, things happen. Though getting sick from a meal is never a good experience, this restaurant's greatest failure is not having the courtesy to even give us a refund or accommodate after my incident.
We selected a few different types of fish, oysters, and various dishes and shared them. With a group of 8 people, we felt we needed to order a lot but we knew how much we ordered. They overcharged us and brought out extra dishes we did not ask for. We were very pleased as the servers were kind. We enjoyed a bottle of Roki and felt the table service was good.
Several hours after the meal, however, my friends and I began to feel sick. We cut our evening short and drove towards home. The drive home was very painful, embarrassing and uncomfortable. A few hours later, my family called that they had too became ill with the same symptoms.
As we had had different things for breakfast and did not eat lunch that day, coupled with the timing and all of us exhibiting the same symptoms, it was fairly obvious that we had become ill from the shared meals at Beyaz Restaurant & Cafe.
I was so upset that we were sick all night and into the next day, that I called straight away to notify them that something was awry in the kitchen. I was met with a flippant, unconcerned and discourteous response from the person who answered the phone. I was told the manager was not able to provide us with a refund. The person on the phone did not even bother to tell me the chef would be informed of my report! I got the name of the manager and decided to write a letter right away.
I then called again and messaged addressing it to the manager. I provided my check number, time of reservation and the items we ate. I informed management we all became ill. My Turkish family reached out and complained many times and even sent them our hospital report for a member of the group who became violently ill. We even sent photographs of my boyfriend who was sick with an IV. I currently write this on my 8th day of still being sick thanks to this restaurant.
To this day I have heard NOTHING from the restaurant except an offer to eat there again. Not only did we pay a great deal of money for a meal that made us all sick, but I was treated with disrespect and lack of concern when I reported the matter. Now, I can understand that someone answering the phone may be having a bad day, is untrained, unprofessional or all 3 - but to have the manager of the restaurant not even bother to refund us was the worst part.
This is a very poorly run operation. I will never eat there again and I am skeptical about the training and operations of Beyaz Restaurant & Cafe after this experience.
