Roza, A Thorny Meal

I have to tell the truth. My meal at the popular Roza kosher meat restaurant was a very "thorny" experience. It wasn't just the menu that didn't tempt me or the nothing spectacular food. It was the disgraceful way the staff treated us.

Now for the story.

We had gotten a coupon for a "free meal for two" a few months ago. We don't live in Jerusalem and we pretty much never go out to eat together. I can't remember the last time my husband and I went to a restaurant, just the two of us. Last year we also got a coupon for that restaurant and never even tried to use it. But this week after meeting up with HaDassah and friends, we walked up to Roza, on Rachel Imenu just off of Emek Refaim.

The day before we went, my husband checked the coupon and saw that it was only good for two months, so he called the person who gave it to him and was told that it would be honored, "No problem." But just to be safe, we showed it to the waiter before ordering to ask if what we'd get for it. He brought it to someone in charge and told us that it was good for ns250. If we had been told it wouldn't be accepted we would have left the restaurant, and my husband would have returned it to the person who gave it to him. We would have eaten someplace else, like at home.

It was a cold night, and I enjoyed sitting under the heater. So we chose a meal, which wasn't easy. Nothing appealed to me. My husband got their Roza Schnitzel and I had lentil soup which wasn't bad and some sort of grilled chicken on "stir-fried noodles."

The prices of the actual meals wasn't high, but besides my husband's dish they didn't automatically come with side salad, which annoyed me, since most or all good restaurants in Israel give a side dish of salad with a main course. There also wasn't bread, which wasn't the end of the world for us, since we try not to eat bread with a meal except for the Shabbat challah. I barely nibbled the noodles. My husband had some of them, and still by the end of the meal most were left-over. Stir-fried in most Israeli places includes lots of vegetables, but not at Roza's.

Since we did have ns250 to spend, my husband ordered a glass, of white wine, even though it cost more than what I spend on a whole bottle at Rami Levy. I took this picture before he sipped it. That's right, less than half full, and it tasted just like the same wine we buy. I also ordered their Corona beer from a bottle (after seeing how stingy they were with the wine I didn't want them to pour it) which came open with a slice of lemon.

And then we paid with the coupon and left a tip. But just as we were leaving, we were accosted by the manager who said that our coupon was worthless and we had to pay with money. We were treated like criminals even though we had specifically asked beforehand if the coupon was good. He said:

"The coupon is worth ns250, but since it has expired it's worthless."
I countered with:
"Then we should have been told that when we asked in the first place. Either it's worth ns250 or worth zero!"

We were forced to pay, and I promised to write about their awful treatment of us.

Now, please remember that I work in retail, and if we make a mistake and have the wrong price on a shelf, such as ns50 instead of ns100, we charge the customer ns50 and then quickly change the sign. And if a food item at Rami Levy or clothes at Yafiz has the wrong-priced sticker and the barcode shows more on the computer, the customer will be charged according to the sticker, if the discrepancy is pointed out. Also, all cashiers have a special pen to mark bills to check for counterfeits. If a counterfeit bill is found in the money accepted on a shift, the cashier pays. The same rule, if the cash is short. So here, in this busy restaurant, they made a mistake by telling us that the coupon was worth ns250. They were profiting tens of thousands of shekels that night, so the ns250 would not have made any appreciable difference to their profit margin. If they had been nice to us, I would have written a nice review, trying to point out the good parts of the evening.

We had not meant to steal from them and shouldn't have been treated like thieves. They made the mistake in giving us the wrong information. OUR MISTAKE WAS WALKING INTO THAT AWFUL RESTAURANT. Never again!

PS Two Jerusalem restaurants I wrote bad reviews for don't exist today. It's not that I have such a powerful blog, but bad food and bad service do take a toll on one's reputation.