The following is a review from one of the NYFF faithful - Nora S.:
Bar Paya
65 Second Avenue (b/w East 3rd & East 4th Streets)
New York, NY 10003
www.barpaya.com
Dining Date: Saturday, 12/18/10
Time: 8:00pm
Party of: 4
For my sister's birthday, we returned to Bar Paya on my recommendation. The service had been less than stellar at our first outing there, but I chalked that up to one waiter taking care of 16 people with 4 seperate checks. The food had been delicious, and I assumed they wouldn't have trouble with a small table of 4. Apparently I was wrong. Also - as it was my sister's birthday, before she arrived I told the waiter and the hostess that I'd like to have a dessert with a candle come out at the end of the meal, and another girl with us also told the hostess.
We ordered a bottle of wine - for 3 of us, the 4th isn't a wine drinker. We then ordered the guacamole (good, more lobster in it this time), duck (good again), patatas (not my thing - too spicy, but my sister enjoyed them alot), quinoa salad (excellent - could eat a whole plateful for lunch), and the tuna ceviche (also good). That was for 3 of us, as the 4th non-wine drinker is also a bit of a picky eater. She ordered the steak from the bottom "bigger portion" of the menu.
The food began arriving quickly - the first 4 dishes. Then we waited ... waited a bit more. Then the waiter asked if he could get us anything, to which Girl #4 said she could get the steak she ordered. My sister then also had to remind him that we ordered a tuna ceviche. I noticed he wrote nothing down in the beginning of the meal, so therefore he forgot 2 out of the 6 dishes. Our ceviche came fairly quickly, but it took sometime for the steak to arrive. I was told it was delicious, though. We ate her yuca fries -- good dipping sauces, and I liked them better than the patatas.
The waiter then told us he'd give us a complimentary dessert because of the delay with the steak. After we finished we waited ... and waited ... and waited.The waiter then brought us 4 half-glasses of wine - even to the girl who clearly doesn't drink wine. The wine was selected specifically to go with the complimentary dessert, which were chocolate truffles. They were delicious - rolled in crushed hazelnuts and spicy - but several things were wrong. First, they didn't let us make a selection of what dessert we wanted, they simply brought it out. Two, there was zero fanfare/candle/etc for the fact that it was a birthday celebration -- and we told them three seperate times. Three, there were 3 truffles in the bowl. I understand that is the serving size, but I would think when they are sending out a complimentary dessert to a table of four after having messed up the order, they would toss a fourth truffle in there. Yet, they did give us four spoons. We had to actually still ask to see a dessert menu after the fact, but still didn't get anything.
All in all, the total was $130 plus tip, after the complimentary $6 dessert. We spent around 3 hours there which was a good amount of time, but seemed like most of it was sitting around waiting for food or someone to acknowledge us.
So ultimately, while I liked Bar Paya's food enough to go back, the service was again so poor I don't plan on ever going back.
