Paggi House
This past Saturday I went to the Paggi House with the in-laws and it was delectable.
Got there at the time of our reservations and they hadn't noted that we were supposed to be outside. No problem, they took care of it. This gave us time to go to the bar for a cocktail (as an aside I really liked the design of the bar area -- modern but it fit well with the 30s style wood siding house). The cocktails were a delight. We passed them around so I tried 3 of them and the Texas Stormy was the stand out in my opinion, though all were good. We got seated about 1/2 way through the cocktails. I split with my wife the following: Foie Gras, Heirloom Tomatoes Salad, Duck Breast, and Rack of Lamb. The Foie Gras and Heirloom Tomatoes were both good; no problems, but not incredible. The duck breast was memorable. Primarily for the fact that the orange relish that accompanied it was unusual for me. I don't think I'd like the relish regularly on my duck, but it worked well and I really enjoyed it. The highlight of my meal was the Rack of Lamb; cooked perfectly, light sauce that let the lamb stand alone for the most part, plenty of fat. It was eyes roll back a little good. I order lamb semi-regularly and am usually not impressed, this was spot on. For desert I had the cheese plate, which was strong. All in all it was a great meal; the food and the setting were wonderful (we were seated on the deck and were fortunate to have a breeze almost the entire time). It is pricey but it was an occasion and the in-laws floated the bill.
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Paggi House
200 Lee Barton Drive, Austin, TX 78704
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we had a less than favorable experience at Paggi House last night. We went for happy hour apps and drinks, and planned to follow with a couple of entrees. We had a $25 restaurant.com certificate that i hadn't had a chance to use in the last sixth months, but the coupon explicitly stateed that it does not expire. When i asked the bartender for the regular menu, i mentioned our plan to use the certificate - he had to check with management. he comes back and says it "ended yesterday" and that we couldn't use it. wtf? we consulted another staff member who initially said she didn't understand why he told us we couldn't use it, then changed her tune, saying Restaurant.com shouldn't have 'printed up so many of those'. ok....we printed it ourselves from the email account i used to purchase the thing. but whatever. at any rate, they wouldn't take it, and offered no recompense. Needless to say, it left a bad taste in our mouths about Paggi House, and i doubt we'll return. I'm also pretty fed up with using restaurant discounts (restaurant.com, groupon, etc) and encountering uninformed staff that treat you like you're brokedick. But to restaurant.com's credit, after my husband told them about the situation, they credited my account $50 to be used anywhere else.
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Paggi House
200 Lee Barton Drive, Austin, TX 78704›8 Replies-
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re: NirvRush
dinaofdoom
Apr 2, 2011 08:40 PM
i have one of those too so perhaps i should preemptively ask for a credit.
boo!-
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re: dinaofdoom
turns out they're not going to honor your certificate. i emailed them on Saturday about our experience, and received a reply yesterday. Apparently Paggi House has been under new ownership for over a year now, and are choosing not to participate in or honor restaurant.com offers. The manager who contacted me said that they had notified restaurant.com about not continuing in the program, and allegedly restaurant.com continued to offer Paggi House coupons. attorneys were supposedly involved, etc, and they decided not to take any more r.com coupons. i can understand a situation like that, but why on earth didn't they inform their staff of it?? and why was it a bartender and hostess that told us they weren't taking the coupon? the minute mgmt was told we were restaurant.com users, they should have come talked to us personally and explained it better than just saying it expired yesterday. ultimately, i didn't get much of a welcoming vibe from the correspondence i received, more like "sorry you don't want to come back" vibe. whatever, there are plenty of other over-priced restaurants, most with slightly larger portions out there. just as when we were physically there, the response left me with the feeling that they weren't all that worried about wooing us a back, so that's that.
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Paggi House
200 Lee Barton Drive, Austin, TX 78704-
re: NirvRush
dinaofdoom
Apr 6, 2011 03:09 PM
wow, sounds like they are still in need of new management.
very douchey of them.i'll contact r.com and get a credit--they are usually really good about that.
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re: conquer
you know, i would if i thought it would do anything. the restaurant.com excuse/explanation is believable enough. it's just the way they (didn't) handled the situation - just come talk to us instead of sending your hourly employees to relay the message! can't really go to the BBB because they were a-holes.
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re: NirvRush
I guess something like this http://www.facebook.com/note.php?note... happened to them.
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ATXGastronomist
Oct 12, 2010 11:49 AM
I went to a HH at Paggi House recently with a group of about 20 people. We enjoyed great food and the patio is indeed wonderful. My only complaint is that they wouldn't split the check for us. I absolutely don't mind this policy when we're talking about a dinner with entrees and shared appetizers, etc. However, when selecting a happy hour location it's nice to have the option to keep separate bar tabs. I would absolutely go back to Paggi House for a romantic dinner or with a smaller group, but I wouldn't recommend this as a happy-hour meeting place for a big group of acquaintances. Just a heads up!
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Paggi House
200 Lee Barton Drive, Austin, TX 78704 -
dinaofdoom
Oct 11, 2010 12:18 PM
austinist has been doing a HH review each week.
they did one recently for paggi house.
if anyone is interested in reading:
http://austinist.com/2010/10/08/happy... -
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