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Chic And Run
By Anthony Lowenberg and Michael Anderson
Special to the Dicta. But then, who isn’t?
By the time you read this it will be 2007. Hover cars will have replaced your old-fashioned “auto-mo-biles.” The Metroplex Cowstars will have won the Legend Air Jello Pudding Pop SuperCupSeries, led by Chan Ho Romo-bot 3000, whose smile was set on repeat after the game. The coach of the Cowstars, Chad Hutchison, will have taken a congratulatory call from President Federline. A good time will be had by all, as ordered by the Department of Homeland Spirits. Forgotten among all this excitement, however, will be the memory of our trip back in 2006 to Chic from Barcelona. You see, Chic from Barcelona was like a real trip to Barcelona; it was really pretty and had a nice vibe, but it was more expensive than you thought and after a few too many glasses of sangria your had a hard time converting the pesatas into Euros into dollars, your head started to hurt, the taxi driver dropped you off at the wrong hostel and… where were we? Oh yeah, reviewing a restaurant.
Chic is a great idea, no doubt the brainchild of genuine Spanish people with taste. The d?cor is definitely modern chic (hence the name, we guess), and the food concept is straightforward: let’s do only a few things, but do them well with some Spanish flair: Catalon rotisserie chicken, Magda style beef and some traditional tapas items. Well, they got the let’s do only a few things part right. The do it well part just needs a little more work. There are exactly three entr?e items on Chic’s menu, the aforementioned chicken ($9.80), Magda style beef ($15.25), and turkey-stuffed canelons ($8.75). We tried the chicken and the canelons. The signature half-rotisserie chicken was pretty good. It’s served bathed in a generous amount of olive oil and rubbed with herbs. The accompanying baked apples are a nice touch, the chicken was tender and juicy and the herbs added a nice earthy quality to the meat. The turkey-stuffed canelons were smothered in bechamel sauce that tasted more like gravy and was fairly bland. If chicken off the bone isn’t your thing, shredded rotisserie chicken is available on a salad ($6.85). The shredded chicken, romaine lettuce and olive oil was, unfortunately, as they say over yonder in Catalonia, aburrido y sin inspiraci?n (boring and uninspired – thanks Google translator!). The Madga style beef is described on the menu as “thin slices of beef tender marinated with white truffle oil. What a powerful taste!” Without trying it, we described it as “what a powerful way to spend $15 on thin slices of beef!” And don't forget to visit www.lawreviewers.com – what a powerful way to waste several hours!
Appetizers and the tapas dishes are the better way to go here. The potatos bravas ($4.50) were on par with the other more traditional tapas restaurants in town, and were smothered in a spicy red sauce. Red piquillo peppers ($4.50) swam in more olive oil, but had a nice tangy taste nonetheless. The best decision we made on our visit was to pair the peppers with the pan con tomate ($3.75), a sort-of Spanish version of bruschetta, and topped with optional manchego cheese ($7.75 extra). Without the manchego on top, the bread looks pretty ordinary, but the cheese adds a nice nutty element and smooth texture to make it a more interesting dish. The best of the three desserts ($5.95 each) we tried was the tart and sweet lemon sherbet, but the other two weren't especially noteworthy.
Service was demur, if not a little slow and quiet (the waiter practically whispered to us). The whole experience was a little disappointing compared to what we expected, especially given the final bill of $22 for each person. We give Chic points for being something new and different on the Dallas scene, but, much like our AAdvantage miles, those points are really hard to redeem and just end up going to waste because you have to book the flight at least five years in advance. On our famous, traveling around Europe after the bar exam five-gavel scale, with five gavels being a trip with a bunch of Australian co-eds on an overnight train that left Munich station at midnight after a day at the Oktoberfest fairgrounds, and one gavel being one of those French toilets that’s just a hole in the floor, we give Chic from Barcelona 3 gavels, or a pricey Spanish meal served in Dallas, Texas.
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Comments
In the past, I have enjoyed many of the restaurants advertised in the Passport without any problem. Today at CHIC was different.
When it came time to pay for the bill, I went through my typical process of requesting the bill and handing the waiter my coupon. He graciously accepted and went to total the bill.
A couple of minutes later, he returned to tell me that the coupon was not valid for lunch. I looked at the coupon and there were no time nor date restrictions. On the back, it stated "Open for lunch and dinner!" After showing this to the waiter, he trotted off to the manager only to return to say that she would not accept the coupon. At this time, he offered that I speak to the manager and I quickly accepted.
This is when customer service started going down the drain...
Now that I've negated the "coupon not valid during lunch" excuse, the manager comes to our table with a new reason stating that the lunch menu item we had was an "offer" and the coupon states "coupon is not valid with any other offer." I have never heard of a menu item being equated as an "offer." The word "offer" was never written anywhere on their menu. She just made up an excuse to justify refusing the coupon.
Let's "assume" that she meant "no specials valid with this offer." Well, this wasn't written anywhere on the coupon either. I've seen many coupons that are not to be use with a menu special, but the coupon states that upfront or there is a notation as such in the menu. An omission like this by the restaurant is not a reason to decline to honor the promotion that got the customer in the door.
The manager then proceeded to make the situation MY FAULT by telling me that I did not present the coupon before I ordered. Again, no where on the coupon did it say I had to present before ordering. Other coupons in the Passport state "Please present certificate before your bill is totaled" or "Please mention discount when ordering." Neither of these phrases were on the coupon thus we have to return to the lesson we learned in the previous paragraph!
From this point on, the conversation just went downhill. I could see that she had no intention of honoring the coupon and she had no intention of creating a happy customer experience.
In a similar situation, my wife and I ate at Kirby's Woodfire Grill on Greenville Ave on Tuesday, April 6th. Somehow, we came into possession of a $20 gift card. Thinking it was the same as cash, we proceeded to have a lovely dinner. Upon the bill being delivered, the waiter noticed that a gift card was being used and told us that one of our menu items did not meet the requirements. However, at his own insistence, he took it upon himself to get our gift card approved. If I can paraphrase what he said, "The pizza menu item was not intended to be use with this card... but let me see what I can do about that." He returned to our table with the $20 deducted from our bill and delivered it with confidence and a smile. Now that is customer service!
The moral of this story is... if you chose to go to CHIC because you saw it in the Passport, don't expect them to live up to the expectations set by other restaurants that advertise in the Passport.
Rob
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