Beware of the hidden ingredient at the Old Spaghetti House

Last Tuesday, we found ourselves in Paseo Sta Rosa and had dinner at The Old Spaghetti House. I'm not really a fan of the restaurant after having tried it several years ago, but my sister and her boyfriend wanted to have pasta. I let them do the ordering and we ordered their Pinoy style, Mylene's pasta.

I'm a fan of pesto and carbonara, and since this is in white sauce, I figured out there's no surprises since the menu says: contains garlic longganisa.

Read more about this WTF experience after the jump:

Upon first swallow, I felt this sharp object in my throat, which I bravely rinsed with water. It felt like a fish bone. I dissected my meal and saw another fish bone.

I checked what we ordered.

By that time, my sister already segregated what seemed to be remnants of fish scales and other fish bones on her plate.

I called the waitress and asked for the ingredient. She said it might contain smoked fish.

"Then why did you not include it in your menu?" She just stared at me, no response, no apologies. I mean, not to be high maintenance or something, but what if I have allergies?

I dissected the remaining pasta on the plate and found a huge fish body part, among the other scales. I'm assuming it came from the fish head. I called the waitress again. This time, since I believe that I have already matured when it comes to dealing with these things, I politely asked for the manager.

As soon as the guy she called reached our table, I started to ask about the ingredient until I saw the name tag on the guy's shirt. She brought me, not a manager, but a waiter!

"Can you please, get me this restaurant's manager."

He left and got me another guy with a different uniform. I already know who this was but went ahead and asked:

"Are you this restaurant's manager?"

"No, Maám. I'm the Chief." He was the Chef.

"Please. I need to talk to the person in charge of this restaurant."

Finally the Store Supervisor came in. I told him the story. I lifted up my plate, gave him the spoon:

"This is not deboned or filleted as you claimed. This is a fish part. Here, take the spoon and feel it." And he did, because he doesn't have any choice since I held the plate in front of him.

There's no apology, or whatever attempts to pacify us, customers. Normally (having been in the customer service industry for 6 years) a manager/supervisor would have done some damage control already and apologized immediately. Usually, experienced managers would volunteer to replace the meal, or even waive it. But we're not after the free meal. We're after having a good meal.

I waited for a response and he said:

"Thank you for your concern."

I haven't said What the Fuck this year, but truly this is WTF-worthy. I told him, again, in the most polite and firm way possible:

"I am not going to pay for this pasta. Send us our bill."

And he came back with our bill, without the pasta that I complained about. But it amounted to Php 288.00 and a service charge. I told my sister we're not going to pay for the service charge. So we paid in the exact amount of two hundred and eighty eight. I handed over the bill to the Store supervisor:

"We're not going to pay for the service charge because this is such bad service."

He replied. "Okay, Maám. Thank you for your concern."

Seriously. What is wrong with the staff of The Old Spaghetti House in Paseo Sta. Rosa branch?