Milanos - Dawson Street

Morning all,

Quick question - out for birthday dinner in Milanos last night with a group of friends. Not rowdy crowd. Sat down at 9.15pm. At 10.45pm we were told that they had stopped serving alcohol at 10.30pm. When we asked why they didn't let us know there was a cut off time, they said they weren't a pub and weren't obliged to.

I have never heard of restaurants stopping serving this early - the waiter said it was because it was a Monday?? He also mentioned something about there being an issue with serving alcohol to a customer a couple of weeks ago and "it wasn't worth his job to serve us".

Also when we asked for the bill, they eventually gave us a non-itemised effort with 10% added on. We requested an itemised bill which, after a lot of huffing, they provided us with, and they'd overcharged us. The guy waiting on us was really quite unnecessarily obnoxious.

I've been to Milanos a lot before, and generally always enjoyed it, but this one incident would put me off going again. Can anyone confirm whether this 10.30pm on a Monday cut off point is legal?

M

i thought a premesis can close when they wish, a lot of pubs don't open until 5 even when they can serve from the morning.

its interesting were you told they were closed or refused service ????

They just said they'd stopped serving at 10.30pm - several people just wanted one more glass of wine - if we'd known they were going to stop serving we would have ordered before the 10.30pm deadline... they were still serving food etc.

really the point is they gave us a booking for 9.15pm so the chances are we would have been there till just past 11pm anyway - we got the feeling the waiter just wanted to go home...

M

that is what i would read also about the waiter, a venue does not have to tell you they are closing the bar or give a reason why they do so.

But the attitude of the waiter should lead to you not givig them your business again in the future.

muffin1973 said:

Also when we asked for the bill, they eventually gave us a non-itemised effort with 10% added on. We requested an itemised bill which, after a lot of huffing, they provided us with, and they'd overcharged us. The guy waiting on us was really quite unnecessarily obnoxious.

Click to expand...

Did you pay the full amount? And any service charge? And any tip? Did you ask to speak to the manager?

ClubMan said:

Did you pay the full amount? And any service charge? And any tip? Did you ask to speak to the manager?

Click to expand...

good points, service charges are a thread all on their own.

We paid the bill but didn't leave a tip - we certainly didn't cough up the 10% they'd added on. We spoke to the manager who was no more helpful than the waiter. They were really defensive, it just spoilt the evening for us....

M

I'm not really a fan of that branch of Milanos. The staff are incredibly snooty and often forget half the order. It's only Pizza Express - they seriously need to get over themselves.

I am a big fan of Milano's but had a very bad experience recently in their Templebar restaurant.

Extremely poor service which included my pizza being nearly thrown across the table at me.No apology, just a large 'tut'. I hate tutting, at the best of times. An awful smell of bleach. An awful attitude from the waiting staff..... felt as if we were troubling them just being there.

The one and only time I have never left a tip & I swear I thought the (pizza throwing waiter) was break one of the plate's he was thrashing around in his temper.

Now at the same time I have been back to other Milano's since & always got very good service. I would not return to the one in Templebar.

SNB said:

IExtremely poor service which included my pizza being nearly thrown across the table at me.No apology, just a large 'tut'. I hate tutting, at the best of times. An awful smell of bleach.

Click to expand...

What flavour pizza was that so I can avoid it!

ClubMan said:

What flavour pizza was that so I can avoid it!

Click to expand...

I've always liked Dawson Street but wouldn't rate Temple Bar. I have a feeling that their business is going down. Temple Bar rarely busy and Dawson Street not as busy as it used to be. Didn't the one on the quays close ?

The one on the quays changed it's name to Condotti as far as I can gather -not sure of who the owner's are etc.
Yes reckon the Waiter wanted it handy that night.

Condotti is a far superior restaurant to any of the Milanos in terms of food and decor. Only problem is that they seem to have air-conditioning on constantly and it's very chilly in there!

If you ever tried Milanos in Galway........you'd know its awful....nice premises.....staff alright......food awful....

Have you ever tried ordering anything from Milanos besides pizza? If you watch closely, you can pick up great tips on preparing authentic Italian food from them - like peeling the plastic off the frozen product before you stick it in the microwave. I saw it happen in the Cork branch, which perhaps didn't truly think the consequences of having the open-plan let-the-customers-see-us-at-work layout through. It's just the same convenience stuff you can buy for a fifth of the price in the supermarket... and even that is overpriced.