Faustinos Wine Tapas - Chichester

We visited with friends last night and whilst the service was good, the whole restaurant desperately needs a deep clean, refurbishment and improvements made to the food. We ordered the mixed paella which was fine but very bland, not much flavour, but nothing exciting/exceptional. The tapas was again not very flavourful. The restaurant is really starting to need a refurbishment and a very deep clean, it is very unclean/greasy, not to mention the awful state of the toilets. I hope something is done soon, otherwise it might continue to go downhill.

We 'd heard food was good at this tapas bar, so walked through the unlit alleyway to the restaurant which was empty apart from one young family (wearing their coats and the mother had a woolly hat on . So we asked the young waiter if he could put some heating on. Turned out he was new and knew nothing. He told us the boss would be arriving in 45 minutes and then carried on talking to his friend. We requested the wifi password (he didn 't know it . We ordered two glasses of rioja. I asked the female chef was boquerones were and she told me potatoes (they are, of course, anchovies! . Basically the staff were absolutely clueless and had no training, so had no idea how to welcome us or make us feel welcome. We asked for padron peppers they had none. So we told the waiter we were leaving his response? OK guys . No wonder this restaurant was empty. Went across the road to red.h restaurant which was warm, welcoming, great food.

We ordered four items from the menu and only one item was edible. Our paella was full of crushed shell- I have never known muscle shells to crack before? Our calamari wasn’t seasoned at all- it was served with Hellman’s Mayo. If you like Mayo, it would be a great dish as it was the only flavour detectable. Our prawns were sizzling in heaps of oil and no other flavour, though otherwise okay. The potato bravas resembled a school dinner, oily, burnt chips with tomato sauce blobbed on top. We concluded it was the worst menu we had ever eaten. Service was fine though hence the two stars. The waitress did forget our olives but we were happy to get out of the restaurant so we didn’t mind.

I booked dinner here for my wife and I for a much needed kid free night out, The staff were very friendly and check on us for the whole time we were there, Cocktails were good, A nice selection of wine. Food was very good and very decent portion size. Staff were happy to make recommendations from the menu. We had a great evening and will be back again for sure. A little tip the medium chicken chorizo paella is a little bigger than expected maybe knock done a dish on the tapas to avoid being super full. We were very kindly offer to take with us what we could not eat but were staying in a hotel for the night with no fridge or would have taken up the offer. Big thumbs up nice food, good fun.

Good quality, authentic tapas. Good-sized portions. Cocktail happy hour. Courtyard was comfortable and nicely lit. Efficient service.