Aside from Patricia Unterman's dubious proclamation of Mexico DF as "the Frontera Grill of San Francisco" (among other glowing hyperbole), reviews for the FiDi upscale Mexican joint have been subpar at best. That in mind, not even harsh reviews from Bauer and Sens prepared us for the carnage of one diner's experience. The scene: restaurant industry folk on a Saturday night, 9:15 reservation for an 8-top (made at 8pm the same night; never a good sign). The entire report is worth a read, but here are the lowlights.
1) Mexico DF's response to a running-late alert: "OK, that's fine. Your table isn't ready yet, so you're working with us just as much as we're working with you."
2) After waiting over an hour: "Around 10:30, I was beginning to wonder about how table timing was being managed...and considering that I had made my reso with a manager, and not a hostess, this was especially worrisome."
3) "An hour and forty five minutes after our initial reso, we were seated. We were eventually greeted by the kind of server that's a prototype for El Torito, or Chevy's...but not a supposedly hip, upscale restaurant."
4) "Around this time, things at MDF were clearly winding down.... Busboys polished silver, cooks put away mise, and our server...was no where to be seen. This was a small problem for me, because he had talked us into getting the one pound portion of carnitas...and had only brought out three tortillas to go with it. (Seriously, was there a tortilla shortage that night or something?)"
5) "The bill. This is where things get good. They added gratuity, which was fine ... Strangely, when my card came back, another 18% gratuity had been added to the balance. I double checked everything, and looked around for our server to ask about this, but again he was AWOL. I got up and went to the host desk and asked to see the manager, who was out front smoking. I had to wait for him to finish smoking before he came in. I showed him the problem with the bill, and his response was "No, that's just the way the POS (he really said the letters POS) works...you're reading it wrong."
Suffice to say, Patricia Unterman's glowing review isn't looking any better.
· Mexico DF. Sometimes I get mad. [linecook]
· Week in Reviews Bonus Edition: Patricia Unterman Loves Mexico DF, Hyperbole [~ESF~]
Anyone else have opinions on Mexico DF? Also, if you have restaurant horror stories, please do feel free to share.
