[Laguna Niguel] [American] Bistro K

Bistro K
30100 Town Center Drive
Laguna Niguel, CA 92677
(949) 495-9101
http://www.thebistrok.com

I bought a 4 course dinner for 2 at Bistro K from Travelzoo.com for $59. It was a great deal, unless they try to cheat you by adding a ridiculous amount of MANDATORY tips on the bill. Last time we used a Travelzoo voucher at Gemmell's, similar thing happened. The food at Bistro K was amazing. But because of the mandatory tips that they forced us to pay, we probably will never step into this restaurant again.



We went to Bistro K on a Friday night. To our surprise, this place was completely packed with tons of people waiting. We were glad that we had reservation. The seating was tight. We were only a few inches apart from the tables next to us. When people get up to leave from the next tables, we actually had to move our table to make room for them to get out. They had a guy playing guitar and singing at the bar area. It was very lively with customers singing along with the singer. The music was really loud though. We had trouble talking and hearing each other over the music. So don't go there if you're expecting a quiet and romantic dinner.



House Red Wine ($8.00) / House White Wine ($10.00)

The 4 course dinner deal included 2 glasses of house wine. Dr. P got a red, and I got a white.


Bread

The restaurant was super busy, so it took a long while for them to bring us the bread. Also it took very long to order. Our waitress did the ordering at each course. She only took order for the appetizer in the beginning. Then after we finished each course, she would come to take the order for the next course.


Carpaccio ($12.00)
Thinly sliced beef with extra-virgin olive oil, arugula, shaved Parmesan and capers

For our shared appetizer, we picked Carpaccio. The beef was really fresh. It tasted so good when eaten with arugula and Parmesan cheese.


Soup du Jour ($7.00)

For our second course, we got one soup and one salad. The soup was AMAZING! It was some kind of seafood soup with eggs. Pieces of fish, egg drops, cilantro, all cooked in chicken stock... yum yum yum! The soup actually reminded me of Taiwanese style salty soy milk.


Caesar Salad ($10.00)
With sahved Parmesan reggiano

Caesar Salad was good. The Caesar dressing tasted homemade.


Beef Short Ribs ($17.00)
Slow cooked all day in a tangy red wine sauce

For our main course, Dr. P got the Beef Short Ribs. Sorry for the bad picture. It was really dark inside. Some of the short ribs were tender, but some were dry. The flavor was great. The green beans and potatoes were both cooked well.


Moqueca ($26.00)
A Brazilian fish in a coconut milk stew with red peppers and cilantro-jasmine rice

My Moqueca was another amazing dish. The buttery white fish called Moqueca was so soft. The prawn was tasty. And the coconut curry sauce was freaking good! I loved it so much that I think I could lick the plate clean.


Tiramisu ($7.00)

We were really full at this point, and the portion of the dessert was huge. We couldn't finish the Tiramisu.


Creme Brulee ($7.00)

The waitress said they normally make their creme brulee in a bigger ramekin, but they ran out of the big one so it came in two small ones. One of the creme brulee was great, but one of them was way undercooked and all watery. We didn't mind too much because we only had room in our tummy to finish one.


Coffee ($2.00)

Two cups of joes to finish the meal.



Although the music was a bit too loud, although the service was a bit too slow, but the food was amazing. So up to this point, we thought we love this restaurant and started talking about coming back again. The waitress presented us the bill with original amount, and told us we only had to pay for tax and tips. Great! We took out our phone and started calculating the tip based on the original amount of $108. Because service was really really slow, we thought we would tip 15%, which came to be $16.20. We would just round that up to $17. With $9.45 tax, we would pay $26.45. After we calculated everything, Dr. P gave our waitress his credit card.



Then she brought us back a different bill, a bill with a total amount that was ALREADY charged to Dr. P's credit card. So on this new bill, not only the $9.45 tax became $10, they also added a $23 tip, which was 22% of the original bill. On top of that, they added ANOTHER tax of $2.89 of the original tax + tip. What? A tax on top of a tax? It just didn't make sense to us. So we asked a waiter about this whole thing (because we couldn't get our waitress' attention at all for like 10 minutes). He just said for all Travelzoo voucher, it is the MANDATORY tip. And that amount of $35.89 is what ALL Travelzoo voucher customers HAVE TO pay. We weren't sure what was our option there. Could we tell them we didn't want to pay that amount? Would they let us leave if we refuse to pay? Plus the music was so loud that we were all shouting at each other just to hear. That made the situation even more stressful. So we decided that we would just pay, then I would write an email to Travelzoo to ask them about this whole mandatory tip policy that we received from the two restaurants by using their deal vouchers.

I got a reply from Travelzoo saying that there was no indication on their vouchers that there would be a mandatory tip amount. It is in the discretion of the restaurant itself about their tipping policy for using the voucher. They advise me to call the restaurant first to ask about it before going. I had two more vouchers that I purchased from Travelzoo. I cancelled both orders after getting their reply. I never had trouble using Groupon or any other similar daily deal vouchers. Getting this dinner for 2 for $59 seemed like a great deal, but with the mandatory tip and two taxes, it came out to be $95. Not so great of a deal anymore.