u/Hamza78ch11

First, I have to say that the service was lovely. There was so much care and thought put in to the entire experience and I have to say that I cannot compliment the wait staff, the host, etc enough. They were, far and away, the best part of the experience. Having said that, the $1200 price tag was not worth the absolutely mid food and drinks.

Neither my wife nor I drink which is fine because they have this cute little non-alcoholic drink menu to accompany each food item. We both walked out of the place feeling full but ultimately disappointed. It is always lovely to dress up and take my wife somewhere nice and spend the evening with the person I adore. But I absolutely could have done this at my local taco joint and spent orders of magnitude less money for significantly better tasting food.

I'm deadly serious. I cannot emphasize this point enough. The food was just...not good. I don't mean that the food was bad or poorly cooked. You could see the goal the chef(s) were aiming for but the execution was just poor. I am by no means a food snob nor am I someone who thinks McD's is the epitome of food and chicken nuggies are the ideal that we should all aim for. But my mom's cooking would have the chef's weeping on their knees. My wife is a better cook when she's having a bad day. The flavor profiles were odd, sometimes conflicting, you could tell that the chef definitely prefers certain things sour/bitter over others sweet/savory/salty. They did have an A5 Wagyu which was incredible and a lamb medallion which was amazing! The dessert options were also very solid. I was very impressed with their desserts and I absolutely plan to steal those ideas for myself. But out of ten courses if I can only talk good about four of them then I feel like being disappointed is fair. Scoring a 4/10 on an exam is abysmal.

The drinks. Oh God the drinks. I regret every penny I spent on that drink menu. Seriously, the chef needs an intervention. Every single drink after the first one. Every. Single. One. Was the most bitter, perfumed, gag-inducing concoction you've ever put in your mouth. There was one which was basically lemonade soda which was delightful and had a candy rim on top. The final drink which was a combination of matcha and strawberry was nice but too sweet.

I get that perhaps people go here for the novelty or the prestige and maybe I am just missing the point. But I was so excited, so beyond excited because I figured going to one of the best and most award-winning restaurants meant that every bite of food would transport me to some divine wonderland of aroma and taste sensation. Instead, all I got was lemon-buttery regret followed by red onion jelly on an unsweetened "cheesecake." I understand that this may just not be for me. Every single dish was a work of art. It is obvious the care, precision, and attention to detail the chefs put into each dish. The presentation of each was impeccable and well thought out. I don't want to be one of those people that poo-poos fancy things. It just sucks that it feels like they put all this effort into the food looking good and it did not feel like an equal amount of effort went in to making the food taste good.

As I said earlier, I am by no means a snob. I love art. I love human creativity and how much effort it takes to create something. I also understand that something that is egregiously average to me might be mind-blowing and delicious to others. But I have been to local Indian/Pakistani restaurants where the Karahi was a literal out of body experience. I have been to hole in the wall taco joints where if had nothing but their food for the rest of my life I think I could die happy. But man did this not live up to even something close to my expectations.

Maybe it's just this place and I need to do more research if I ever go to another about what they serve and if it would even suit my palate. I guess I just wanted to vent my disappointment.

Edit: it was Victoria and Albert’s in Orlando