Pablo's Restaurante & Cantina
Reviews
To start, the hostess was about as helpful as a federal worker. Pablo's was obviously understaffed for the busy Friday evening ahead. The food served was as cold as a corpse and the service was death warmed over. The only thing hot about this place was the Alabama weather. Everyone get out your Sharpies and join my family in marking Pablo's off of your list. Save your money and go to Taco Bell. Cheaper, better and faster than Pablo's.
You may find this hard to believe, as we did ourselves, but we never saw the hidden cameras or Ashton Kutcher explaining that we were being Punk'd. Nope. All we saw after a 3.5 hour suffering was a measly 15% discount and a very inviting stretch of pavement to get the heck out of there. I'm writing this immediately upon arriving back home, because it was...well...really just that bad. We were told we would have a table in approximately 45 minutes. 1 hour and 30 minutes later we were seated. I have worked in the food industry. I get it. No one really knows how long it's going to take. I was a host before, but twice the time? With no apology? So we meet our server, who I will leave unnamed, after a solid 20 minutes of twiddling our thumbs. I've noticed he's been busting his butt running to and fro to serve the surplus of tables he already has. It's apparent they are understaffed. That's fine. Again, I've worked in the food industry, and I know that's common. At the twenty minute mark he arrives to get our order, which we promptly give him. One hour later half of our drinks arrive. Thirty minutes after that our food arrives. Much of the food was cold and portions of our order were incorrect. At this point I politely explain to our server that we aren't mad at him, we realize he's working hard, but we need to speak to a manager or the owner about the current state of his business. He leaves to retrieve the owner, is gone for quite some time, then returns to explain that he couldn't find the owner. He then leaves to look again, then returns to explain that the owner was unconcerned with our problem and refused to speak to us in regards to our poor service. Here lies the beginning of our real problem, Steve, the "owner." Our server explains that he is basically out of options, at which point one of the people at our table leaves our table to locate this Steve character. After much searching, we locate Steve and calmly explain to him that we have now been there for far longer than we ever dreamed we would be, some of our order was cold and inedible, and other parts were incorrect. We gave our server credit for his effort and asked if we could have the two inedible meals taken off of our ticket and a discount applied to the rest. He then began to raise his voice and deny our request. When we confronted him about his irrational and immature behavior, he threatened to call the police. We welcomed his offer to involve law enforcement in the matter, seeing as how any additional person who had a functioning brain being added to the mix could only benefit us. We sat back down, in no way trying to avoid paying for what we rightfully owed, and waited for the police officer to arrive. Steve wasn't bluffing and within several minutes a local officer pulled up. After dispelling many of the lies Steve had told the officer prior to arriving, the officer realized where the real problem was and asked Steve to "handle it." Steve agreed to comp the two meals that were inedible and apply a reasonable discount to the rest of the meals. Once the officer left, the receipts were brought out, with the two inedible meals still on there and a wopping 15% discount. At this point we were willing to take whatever would get us out the quickest, so we paid and left. I am astonished at the scene the "owner" made in front of many of his regular patrons, myself included. I will now NEVER return to this restaurant or any affiliated with it, and I will make it my mission to blaspheme the name for as long as I have contact with anyone who has the option to attend a Pablo's. Steve, if you're reading this, best of luck to you, buddy. I'm not sure you have much of a future in business if you keep up that attitude.
Good is good! When you get it. Service is pretty slow and they seem disorganized, but the food is good! Wait staff not to friendly. Had this rated 3 stars because the food was good, but then I found out the server was making out with someone before bring my food, not acceptable.
If there was a lower score than one star I would choose. Server was making out with someone in the bar. Service always sucks. Very slow. Food is okay.
Had dinner for the first time (7/31/12) and everything was very good. The servings were plentiful(brought home leftovers) and good. Our two boys (7&9) declared the mini burrito and grilled steak on the kids menu wonderful. The fajitas nachos was enough for two people to share. The server was warm, friendly and quick with refills. Hope to go back and try sitting outside and enjoy the music. The guy singing and playing guitar sounded very good. The cheese dip was good and salsa a little hot. :)