Rodizio Brazilian Grill - Melrose Arch - Johannesburg

This evening I took the family out to Rodizio's a Brazilian restaurant situated in the business district of Melrose Arch which is a short 40 minute drive away. Granny's birthday and yes it even included the mother in law who is up for a longer than expected extended break of 10 days. The place was not very busy and presume being middle of the week most families are skint from the festive season. Normally this place is buzzing and as you can see there was literally no one around.

If I had to guess there were maybe 30 other people dining out besides our table of 8 which was 6 adults and 2 grand kids covering 4 generations. The family seeing the menu found it amusing as it was all SQ and this was amusing as in my head i was trying to guess the prices. How bad could it be and was I going to get shafted? This would not bug them one bit as I noticed the cocktails were flowing freely and they kept on coming. Over the last year I have been broken in slowly with the overseas restaurant prices and was quietly confident we would not be seeing Paris prices tonight.

Rodizio is a Brazilian restaurant that specializes in their meat menu that is served on skewers. This is controlled by a wooden block in the center of the table that has a red end and a green end. When the green end is facing up the waiters must keep on bringing the food and when the red is facing upwards you are taking a break. When the wooden block is lying flat then you are signaling no more and that you are finished.

The 3 table sauces being garlic butter, peri peri and who knows what the last one is which i never got round to trying. The peri peri was hot or had a kick which was then replaced by lemon and actually was quite pleasant.

The sides of veggies being butternut/pumpkin, creamed spinach and chips which are bottomless and are automatically replaced when finished. We also had a carnival salad which for a non salad eater or not a big fan of the lettuce stuff was actually not that terrible.

Are You Brave Enough?

My family was rather disappointing tonight as they wanted to turn the wooden signal onto red on numerous occasions. They were struggling and we were not even half way and looked like amateurs.

How it works is there are 4 meats all having various different cuts and these keep on coming. Once you have completed the round you can then be more selective on what was your favorites and then hit round number 2.

Round number one this is what was delivered and you can pass if you don't feel like that particular meat cut. The meat is served on skewers and depending on the cut is carved next to you and you use a pair of tongs and grab the freshly cut meat as it is being cut.

Chicken was simply wings and drumsticks so no surprises there. This is when you think this will be easy and find out how much food is coming. If you are a veggie I suggest you stop reading now as all you are eating is the 3 dishes above and some salad.

Lamb - lamb chops, rack of lamb, ribs, leg of lamb and lamb sausages.
Beef - Picanho steak which was superb, sirloin steak, fillet steak and beef sausages.
Pork - leg of pork, pork medallions, pork ribs, chorizo sausage
Chicken - drumsticks and wings.

You have to forgive me for not taking photos of every single dish as to be hones there were too many and you would think I may have over done the eating part tonight. Two of us completed the first round and started on round 2 with the Pichana steaks being a must have.

The chicken was more of a snack, but was also surprisingly succulent and good. You have to try it all to know what is worth having again. Those are not dog bowls in the picture and are used to dispose of the bones.

The SQ prices were actually not that bad and the entire bill came to R3700 including tip which was for 6 adults and 2 kiddies plus various drinks and yes one pudding which was not me. This is roughly $40 each if you exclude the kiddies which was minimal so I found it actually fairly reasonable for what we all ate. The Rodizio meat price per person is R315 so roughly $20 and the rest was drinks. I would go back again and now that I know my favorites would skip certain meat cuts and be more selective requesting those from the start.

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