How Important Is Good Service To You?

How would you feel when a favourite restaurant of yours, which used to have a crew of bright, cheerful and efficient wait staff no longer offer the same level of service?

I don’t know the reason but I noticed since April, the staffs that we regularly see at Pasta Zanmai, Mid Valley were no longer working there. In their place, a completely new bunch of staff that unfortunately seemed clueless about their job; be it about the menu and taking orders, making sure food served or even giving us our bills when we asked for it.

Nothing sets me off like bad service, so pardon my rant here. (I’m revealing myself as a really fussy, hard to please, grumpy old woman here, right? LOL)

What we had for our dinner on Tuesday:

Raimie's Hamburg. He will order this every.single.time we go to Pasta Zanmai.

The staff asked us how we’d like it – rare, medium or well done which surprised us as Hamburg is not a steak, it’s a beef patty and the cooking style was always standard. It took the staff another two visits to our table to get this one right. Zaini’s curt answer was he wants the patty COOKED, just cooked.

It took ½ hour for this order to arrive to our table, and that was after Zaini threatened to leave the restaurant without paying. We would’ve stormed out if not for Raimie who really wanted to eat Hamburg that day. Cannot show tantrum at the expense of one’s own child, right?

Zaini had a mini combo of Chicken Teriyaki Pasta and Hotate Pizza . A good deal at RM22.00.

My Gyu Shabu no Spicy Pasta (RM23 ala-carte, RM29 for set) was really nice. Don’t be fooled by its look – this spicy pasta really packed a punch. My lips were tingling from the heat when I ate the pasta. The beef strips were nice and tender and didn’t taste dry at all.

After the boo-boo on Raimie’s order, our pot of tea (RM3) was replenished continuously so we had plenty of tea to drink that night.

Good to know that while the service wasn’t good, the quality of food served wasn’t compromised yet. I sure hope it won’t deteriorate any time soon because lackluster service + average food does not equal happy, repeat customers.

Anyway, thank you to Pasta Zanmai for the complimentary Hamburg and ice cream for desert. While it was a nice gesture (and the nice supervisor did apologise profusely to us afterwards) we are not looking forward to a free meal at the expense of a raised blood pressure any time soon! So there!