11/14/07

HELP WANTED!

by fine_food_fan

I have a gift certificate for Pasion; I just read that it closed in June........does anyone know if the cert. can be transferred to another restaurant? Thank you!

06/20/07

The Famed Pasion Restaurant has CLOSED for good!

by gda26

Pasion, Center City's first Nuevo Latino restaurant, closed this past Sunday ( 6/07/07) Reported earlier that Pasion's chef, Guillermo Pernot, was poached by rival restaurant Cuba Libre, owner Michael Dombkoski closes restaurant after blaming its recent failure to the chefs absence in his kitchen.

04/09/07

It takes two to tango and Pasion doesn't have what it takes

by reality_check50

We look at two primary items when considering to return or not to return to a restaurant: good service, good food. Pasion didn't come close to either.

The Bad: The service. The female waitress was rude, impatient (as two of four of us asked for clarification of menu items) and ostensibly did her best to ignore us. We went to a relatively empty Pasion at 6:00 on Saturday night. As our friend was finishing her entree, the table was being quickly cleared of all items, the crumbs on the table were being brushed off. WE would've walked out (long before this). There wasn't a line at the door, what was their problem?

The food was sparce and rather ill-conceived. The flank steak, scantily clad the plate. While the chicken was moist, the citrus flavoring surrounding it was intense. Some of the appetizers were so overly flavored with citrus, they were bitter. They were also left on some of our plates. Why didn't the waitress ask us if everything was ok? (See above for the answer.) We should've sent it back but since our friends recommended the place, we attempted to be polite. We understood the chef took license to make his own creations but that was an understatement.

When we left to have dessert at Buddakan, the coatcheck man dropped a coat on the floor. He should never have attempted to pick up four coats at once and hand them out. There's a word for that I can't use here.

The good: The chicken was moist and without the INTENSITY of the citrus would have been fine.

Summary: We would've better understood some of the rush and lack of attention if Pasion had been busy. But, we've been to other restaurants in the same price range during their busiest time and they are attentive and polite. We're not going back. We went to Buddakan at 8 p.m., which was packed when we arrived. We had a drink at the crowded bar and dessert (and one of us made up not eating at Pasion). The service was attentive, timely, FRIENDLY and worth it.

• Pros: ceviche (but it was way too costly), ambience..., noise level
• Cons: Food other than the ceviche, lack of service, poor service, citrus flavor over-runneth