Restaurant 424

New Orleans is famous for its fresh seafood due to its nautical history and location, whilst on Bourbon Street, we decided to check out one of its better known seafood restaurants. The staff were friendly, the night however didn't run smoothly despite their best intentions.

Firstly, our very impressional waiter introduced herself, she was very nice and took our order, we ordered a bottle of wine and I chatted to her asking her recommendations based on my lack of local knowledge. That's where our first problems started, we made our selection and off she went, the drinks didn't arrive so we called her over again. She informed us she was not allowed to go behind the actual bar and needed to wait for them to bring the bottle to her. I never checked the time we arrived to the time she took our order so I am unaware if 30 or 45 minutes elapsed while we were just sitting at an empty table.

When the bottle finally arrived, she was unable to pull the cork and sought assistance from another staff member. The protocol for wine service is to pour a taster to ensure the wine is not corked or spoiled, she didn't do this, I'm guessing a lack of training by the establishment.

She did know a little about the selection, her knowledge was fairly limited though. I was surprised when she made the comment that our selection was ok for the price, not the price we were paying here, the price if we purchased cheaper in a liquor store. We all know restaurants jack up the price of alcohol to boost profit margins, being told like that is pretty insulting though.

As this is a seafood restaurant, we viewed the extensive fish menu, she then informed us when we went to order that all fish was sold out except the red something or other, our least desired option. This is, of course, why this his fish remained, nobody wanted - more delays. We ordered just the one fish and shared making up the volume of menu with entree and snacks.

Still hungry, we ordered two selection of pie, who was surprised when only one came out? Kitchen staff out with surprised looks on their faces, our waitress was nowhere to be seen, she kept a low profile. Manager out apologising, no actual reduction in bill or offers of a free coffee or similar.

When we came to pay the bill, the slip came with suggested gratuity of 18% or 20%, are they insane?

Train your staff, pay your staff accordingly and get the place organised. We left cash on the table, we tried to hail staff to come and pick up the cash, ignored again. So we just got up and left after numerous attempts to gain attention.