Review Calisto's Portuguese Restaurant - Johannesburg

There is no way that we could fault this restaurant. We were greeted with a warm smile at the door. The waiter, Gugu, did not take long to take our order. She was on point and always visible with a smile. She did not take long to bring our food, and she checked up on us on a regular basis. The food was fresh and devine! I will rate Calistos a 20 ot of 10 foor good customer service and will be visiting soon. Thank you for your excellent service 👏 👏 👏

Absolutely stunning food was full of flavor and extremely delicious will definitely be coming again

Staff are friendly and helpful, food was amazing with the prawn pasta just a little bit too salty. The Gold Reef double deal made the best choices on the specials they had. A definite must try

Best Portuguese restaurant. Great food and quick service. Friendly staff.

Absolutely loved our meals. It was delicious and the Prawns and chicken were cooked to perfection. Will be back. My daughter loved the chicken nuggets and chips so that made me even happier.

Wow. A GREAT experience. Food was epic. Service top notch. And they were full, so well done delivering such tasty food!

Perhpas the best dining experience ever! The food was outstanding with every part of every course tasting absolutely delicious. Hats off to the chef. The service was flawless and friendly. I highly reccomend this restaurant.

Amazing service and great food. A good family Sunday hang out for us

Food is excellent. Prawn special reasonable price. Vegetables, butternut and spinach well done and tasty. Meals are served with full size Portuguese rolls and unique salsa relish. Best place to try oven baked cheese cake or chai tea. Waiters are friendly and helpful on deciding what to eat.

Our waiter for the night was Raymond. I got to say wow, he was so friendly and was always on his feet, was impressed by how he knew the prices for most of the items on the menu. He maintained a smile and happy face with my family throughtout our meal, and was able to keep up with all our requests. He truly deserves a raise. Hope to meet him again, well done Calisto's.

The food was so delicious. The staff very friendly and helpful. The atmosphere was really good and perfect for family dinners. Like every bite of the food we had.

Loved the chicken livers for stater, blueberry n vanilla drink

We had a nice dining experience at this venue. The waitress was so friendly and efficient. The meals were prepared well. Will visit again.

Thabo was our waiter, we never had to look for him, he always knew when we needed him. It was my 1st time eating at Calistos, everything was delicious.

Went there for a valentines dinner, well it wasn't the 1st time I've Bern there. It was sooo packed but the vibe was everything, the food is great didn't mind the wait. Service was nice 👌.

For a franchise, superb food from the freshly toasted Portuguese roll, the homemade peri peri sauce on table, right through each meal. All items are priced well and the staff is attentive. We had a wonderful waitress in Alice. Well worth a visit!

Food was devine and atmosphere was great. Staff very friendly.

After work function..excellent atmosphere and good food

Great food and service. Decently priced. We had a lovely family dinner out.

Callisto’s is one of the best Portuguese restaurants I’ve been to, with delicious and fiery meals that keep you going. I think my dad and I only got through half of our seafood curry which had a rich tomato-based sauce. The meat of the prawns, mussels and squid was tender and juicy. The starters were amazing: garlic bread and cheesy garlic bread. I recommend this place for a big lunch of dinner because their big portion sizes.

Friendly staff. Great lighting. Spanish and Portuguese music. Good vibe. My family and I go often for dinner. Food is always tasty. The half a kilo prawns are a favourite, as well as the seafood platter and steaks. Must try their mozambican chicken curry.

Service was terrible, waitress didn't really care much with our table. Manager refused to credit the horrible blue cheese wings saying that is how it tastes, funny enough he did admit he also doesn't like it. Chicken was great everything else was below average. There are better Portuguese places in the south of Johannesburg.

I have not travelled in a while so I thouroughly enjoy when I have an experience reminding me of days abroad. The ambiance and music at Calistos at Gold Reef makes me nostalgic and I had a very relaxing experience where time became insignificant.<br/><br/>I am in love with the salsa on the table and could not get enough. It is fortunate that I could buy some to take home. The food took less time than I anticipated it would and it was well presented and still warm. We had a very attentive and accommodating waiter who could explain items on the menu and I appreciated the personal attention from one of the owners.<br/><br/>I had the Trinchado as a starter, the beef cubes were tender to bite into, however I found the sauce to be a little too salty for my taste, although, having it with the roll helped curb this and I did enjoy the starter.<br/><br/>As a main I had the signature dish. I was not prepared for the size and it is definately a dish that should be shared with a few friends. I am not a fan of crab meat but this experience has made me reconsider that view. The dish is a rice dish with a mixture of seafood and I found it pleasant, but it did not give me a wow factor that I would expect from a signature dish.<br/><br/>I had no space for dessert but did have a taste from my partner's Cappuccino Tartufo. The texture was a bit grainy but the taste spoke more of something of a signature dish. Dessert ended on a high.<br/><br/>The service and ambiance of the restaurant I found faultless. The food was not bad and the portion sizes more than generous. I would definately repeat the experience with a friend and would like to try different items on the menu.

Decided to do the Portuguese option as we received good recommendations. Empty on a Saturday lunch while you stand in two hour question to join a ride in theme park, hostess friendly but no interest in guest or any menu knowledge, George our waiter was efficient yet at the end he got a prawn order wrong and had to keep on reminding him about the drinks. Food was so average and rolls you can throw someone with. Snails and platter well presented but lack taste. Management more interested in the phones than actually enquiring about well being of guests. Have to compliment restaurant toilets on cleanliness, absolutely spotless thank you.

The atmosphere is busy and the music is played very loud. The food quality is not bad but not very good either and should not be recommended to vegans or vegetarians. There is one vegetarian option on the whole menu; excluding the side dishes. Service is of moderate quality

Food: The pina colada needs to be worked! That's my only complaint. The food is absolutely amazing, it packs a punch. I had two servings of the Mozambican chicken curry and I still wanted more!<br/><br/>Ambiance: The music they play just gets me dancing. It makes the food go down nicely.<br/><br/>Service: Absolutely great service. We had a very attentive waitress.<br/><br/>I'll definitely come back here again!

We were there a few times before, good food, good service<br/>Big portions, friendly staff<br/>Nice variety of foods <br/>Love their starter veg soup with fresh roll and nice sangria<br/>Also tried the espetada, very nice, with the milo frito<br/><br/><br/>

Do not go to Calisto's if you have something else to do after the meal. The service is excruciatingly slow! We went there this past Saturday. We were a big group of 14. The experience is one I'd never want to repeat again. It was my first time there and I most likely will not be going back. On arrival, it took all of 30 minutes before our drinks order was taken. Then another 30 for the drinks to come. We had no specialty drinks orders. Just the usual grab from the fridge kind. After bringing our drinks our waiter disappeared for another 20 minutes instead of just taking our meal orders. It was a full 1hr 20 minutes from arrival into the restaurant for our food orders to be taken. We then waited close to an hour for our food to come. Yes we were a big group but half the table ordered tbe Family Feast platter so it was only 6 people who had seperate individual orders. Even those were kept simple to try and minimise delivery time. When the food came, those eating from the platter had no plates to eat from. We had to ask for these. The salt shakers were broken and every salt shaker at the table spilled all it's contents on the users plate. We asked for the affected plates to be replaced and they replaced them. This was probably the only highlight of the evening. The food was average at best. I had the Family Feast which had prawns, piri chicken, chicken livers, hake, garlic rolls and an option of veggies and chips as a side. I'd recommend just the piri chicken and the garlic rolls. All in all, service really needs to be improved.

Greatly improved service. Waiter Kumbo was extremely courteous. I had the LM Piri chicken which is by far the best ever. This is by far the best Calisto's in JHB. Gotta love the manager and his famous cat :-D<br/><br/>Only issue is the stale rolls served as starters. But this seems to be an issue at the other Calisto's also.

What they hell happened to this place, rolls used to be complimentary, we arent big eaters so a full chicken along with starters is enough for us, came here today to find out we have to pay for 2x rolls as the main course only covers 2ppl, along with that service was slow, waiter was chicky and the full chicken came with 7chips and a salad tgat consisted of a tomato wedge, 1 lettuce leaf (smaller than a tablespoon and 3 julienne of carrots..... Will never be coming here again, what an absolute waste of a Sunday afternoon, chicken was raw too!!!!!! I highly recommend u visit other restaurants in the vicinity.

This used to be one of my favorite restaurants,however recently the service is pathetic. waited over an hour for our meals on a weeknight with only 2 other tables occupied in the restaurant.Management and staff are not helpful,we got a lame excuse that the chef is busy with other orders....spinach was not cooked and on a previous occasion our chicken was also not cooked on the inside.

Been eating here for years at the original Calisto's, we ordered peri peri chicken, chicken Madeira and prawns. The prawns were good but the other two dishes were mediocre at best. The large Greek salad for the table was predominantly leafy with probably one tomato with barely any pepper. I won't be eating here in a long time. Miss the old Calisto's.

I am a big fan of Calisto's. I like the crispy rolls you get on arrival; I like the quality of food; I like the chilli sauce they sell and what I like the most about this particular Calisto's is that doesn't have a children's area right by the restaurant. I love that this one is more sophisticated and less noisy than the others. <br/>I tried a cocktail that was delicious and fruity with the perfect balance of alcohol at the end. We shared the calamari starter and which was perfectly cooked and didn't have the usual 'fishy' smell. I usually order the mild peri-peri LM chicken and as per usual it was delicious and tender and came with chips and a side salad.<br/>Our waiter was exceptionally friendly but also very professional and efficient and as previously mentioned this Calisto's has a more sophisticated air.<br/>We will definitely be returning in the future.

Was at Calisto's @ New Market Mall in Alberton ...Service 100% ....Food was divine ....Management presence felt ....very warm and welcoming ....Great stuff

Best prawns. Nice portions. Great service. Nice family restaurant. I have never had a bad experience here or at the Gillview branch. Will be back over and over and over :-)

We enjoyed a very tasty meal of rump steak and prawns followed by their sticky toffee pudding on Saturday night.  The ambiance was delightful and the service was good.

I ordered the Chicken Deluxe as a take away today for lunch and it was a very pleasant surprise. It is a grilled chicken breast with an avo, tomato and onion topping. It is quite a massive portion and it was very tasty. I am not sure whether it was good because my expectations was really low or whether it was really that nice, but it definitely exceeded my expectations.

Good food and vibe, chicken was cooked well. Definitely recommend if you going to Goldreef for a spur of the moment supper. The only thing was that we waited abit more than the average time for the food. But we had good company 😊

I wasn't too impressed with this restaurant's food. In all honesty their food is not particularly great. The fish platter we ordered was lacking flavour yet doused in some sort of peri-peri. The desserts were not bad and there is a wise variety to choose from

When you want authentic Portuguese food, the South of Jozi is the place to go, fab atmosphere, vibey and buzzing, we go for the peri peri chicken, seafood and the hot sauce, divine with a bottle of white wine

Worst food ever.rather braai at home.lucky I can't give -10 as a review. Prawns kak. Prawn curry even worse. Over priced for what you get. I will NEVER BE back here again