Ten Second Review: Fuegovivo Churrascaria
Wednesday night, I took a break from the recent health insanity and went out to try a new churrascaria (I was motivated by a buy-one-get-one-free-coupon, but the main motivation was a new restaurant specializing in beef and wine).
There is no coupon that could entice me to return to Fuegovivo Churrascaria in West Houston.
The service was awful.
The meats were mediocre (at best).
The salad bar was poor (even though nobody really goes to a place like this for the salad bar, it's still nice if it isn't awful -- and if the plate one picks up isn't DIRTY. Not impressive).
It is hard to imagine that this place will be in business a year from now.
The standard for this sort of thing in Houston (and in West Houston) remains Fogo de Chao, although I'm actually partial to Nelore on Montrose.
In any case, AVOID Fuegovivo. Even if they offer you a coupon.
UPDATE (10/29/08): Robb Walsh says things have improved at Fuegovivo. See this post.
Posted by Kevin Whited @ 06/14/08 21:02 | Houston | Technorati
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Comments
I just can't believe that in one single visit you can form this type of opinion about a certain place, give them a chance, a whole lot of people say the complete opposite of you, do not use you "single bad experience" and this form of wide communication to bash on a place that you have no idea of how long and how much effort people put in it. You should not DISRESPECT people that have been working so hard to build a place and a concept and have tp deal with the IGNORANCE of others. People that make up things and stories without the true knowledge of what a restaurant really is. Use your words wisely, they can destroy a whole lot of lifes. There are a lot o employees on that restaurant that survive only because of people that ARE NOT LIKE YOU.
Posted by Just an honest person @ 15:23 on 06/16/08
Great food and an awesome experience! 06/12/2008 Posted by aggieljk
My husband and I went to Fuego last night for our anniversary and had a wonderful experience. First off the service was great, we had reservations for 6:30 but arrived at 6:10 and were seated immeadiately without a hitch. The salad bar was great offering many different varieties from olives to smoked salmon. Finally, the meat was fantastic, my husband and I sampled everything except for the turkey (we were too full by the time we saw it). The gauchos were at our table within seconds of us turning our cards to green (green means "more meat please") and the service stayed consistent the entire meal. The price is well worth it at $42 a person for dinner, $4 cheaper than that other place down the road. I would reccommend this place to anyone!
Pros: Great food and wonderful service
Cons: Haven't found one yet!
Posted by aggieljk @ 15:29 on 06/16/08
The same person posted both of those last comments. And within 6 minutes of each other. How clever!
To answer Multiple Personality #1:
I'm not into giving businesses that do a poor job "chances." I gave them a chance, they failed miserably, I wrote a brief about it. The owners and employees may be swell, and they may work really hard, but my experience was AWFUL, as described. So my advice to anyone affiliated with this place would be to take the comments offered here and try to improve.
If the restaurant's plans to survive are based on people who will put up with slow/bad service and mediocre meats, more power to them. But I can't really imagine that's part of the business plan.
To answer Multiple Personality #2:
I'm glad you had a good experience. My experience was arriving at 6:28 pm for my 6:30 pm reservation. I was seated at 6:50 pm. That was quite a waste of time.
On my trip to the salad bar, the first plate I picked up was dirty. Really dirty. Not good. The salad bar itself was mediocre compared to other churrascarias in town.
When I flipped my indicator over, I waited many minutes for the first gaucho to come through. And I waited many minutes for every other gaucho to come back by. It was embarrassingly slow.
When we finally decided to leave, we asked for the check. And asked again. And asked several more times. 15-20 minutes later, we finally received the check. That was quite a waste of time.
After this sorry effort, I wouldn't go back to give this place another "chance" if the meal were comped, and I certainly wouldn't do it for a buy-one-get-one-free coupon. If this is the norm -- and if people affiliated with the restaurant can't handle criticism in a more positive way than this -- I'll be even more surprised if this place is still in business in a year's time.
NB: I should add that we tipped 20% on the full amount of the check PRIOR to the coupon being applied. The restaurant had plenty of shortcomings, but the waitstaff at least checked on our drinks frequently. Otherwise, there's not much positive to say about this experience.
Posted by Kevin @ 16:30 on 06/16/08
KEVIN, you are completely right!
Posted by Marcos @ 14:40 on 07/22/08
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