Lunch at West Seattle Matador – Probably Not

Saturday, June 26th

Matador in West Seattle:  Ok… here’s the deal.  This was my first time going to Matador in West Seattle and honestly I probably won’t be back.  It wasn’t because of the food, the scene, or them being too busy or anything like that.  The bottom line; the bartender was a bit of a slime ball.  I know this might sound a little harsh but here’s why:

We sat down at 12:30pm.  It was a pretty bright day in Seattle and the restaurant was a little on the dark side so my eyes were still adjusting.  After we sat down, I saw the happy hour menu on the table and saw the times ” happy hour “4 – 6″ and “10 – 1″.  Since my eyes were still adjusting I didn’t see the actual Happy Hours were “4pm to 6pm” and “10pm to 1am”.  At the end of the day, I’m responsible for not seeing this.

Here is were I have a serious issue.  While we were ordering our food, we picked four items straight from the Happy Hour menu.  I was holding the Happy Hour menu while I was ordering.  I was pointing to the items on the Happy Hour menu that we were ordering.  Did it not occur to the bartender that I was mistaken whether it was happy hour and that maybe he could have given me a heads up?  Needless to say I was a little surprised at the sticker shock of my tab.  Instead of being somewhere in the expected mid $20 range, it was in $46 and some change.  When I asked the bartender why my tab was higher than expected, he said something to the effect of “sorry, it wasn’t happy hour”.

So my advice is this…  When going to the West Seattle Matador, just be very aware of what time it is, what menu you’re ordering from, and double check your tab at the end of the meal.  And don’t expect the dark haired bartender with a beard to be forth coming about what your final bill may be.

Lesson learned.

Tagged as: seattle