Madame Janette

Hearing a lot about this restaurant ....The experience of waiting 2 and quarter hours to be seated and served with rude service and Hostess that was not a very good lair, when we would be seated did not help, and That's with a 3 day ahead reservation......when the food finally arrived it was rushed service and the taste and quality was average..could had the same meal at any reservation on the island...That was my 12 visit to Aruba...the worst experience in all...This place I would not recommend to family or many friends who visit Aruba.....or on our 13th visit in Nov,2013 for two weeks..

This was our first visit back to Madame Janette's after taking a few years off.

Atmosphere here is very nice as long as you are not on the porch. The porch tends to be warmer, louder and some seats have a view of the service bar area. This is where we were seated this year and were not happy with it. We were only about 20 yards from the music and could not hear it. Frankly I'm not sure why they have live musicians as we've been here 5 times and only could hear them once from our seats.

The food is always very good and we were not disappointed this time either. My wife and I shared a special entree and it was great. They do charge you for sharing an entree but if you also get an appetizer sharing is a good way to go. Portions are very large here. My wife and I shared an appetizer then an entree and it was perfect.

The food was excellent. Ask to sit under the stars!!

I'm a little late on this review, as we last dined at MJ in October 2012. We have been to MJ our last 5 times to Aruba, and unfortunately this restaurant seems to be on a continual slide downward. One piece of advice...if you are going to this restaurant, be prepared to wait...and wait...and wait. The service is EXTREMELY slow, even for Caribbean standards. The upside is that I love the atmosphere in this restaurant, but that can only take you so far. We were eagerly anticipating the Bang Bang Shrimp appetizer, but were highly disappointed with it...the shrimp used to be nice big juicy shrimp, but this time they were like what you'd expect from a Chinese Buffet - small and rubbery, but the sauce they were covered in was still pretty tasty...honestly, Bonefish's Bang Bang shrimp are now wayyyy better than MJ's, sad to say. I ordered the Mahi Mahi special and my husband ordered a steak. I very seldom send food back, but the Mahi Mahi was so bad, that I couldn't bare to take more than a few bites. I spoke to the waitress about it, she apologized, and the chef came out to speak to me, and he was very kind and understanding...they took my meal off the bill and comp'ed us a dessert. I have a feeling I wasn't the only one sending that entree back that night! My husband's steak was to die for though, so I think I will try that if we go back next time. All said, it was a disappointing experience...it's sad to see this once great restaurant continuing to decline.

We stop going to MJ a few years ago when the quality sharply went down. Decided to try it again based on better reviews. Should not have done that. It's a lovely setting, but the place is probably too big for a kitchen. We were waiting for such a long time for virtually everything that the management rewarded us with a free desert. Our waiter and a busboy were very nice but it did not compensate for a quality of food that was mediocre.
There are much better choices.

The recent reviews have been mixed. We've been coming here at Christmas time since they opened and it's still our favorite. That said, it's not perfect.

We are picky at home and don't give out high scores easily. This year's
'10' for food is based on what we ordered. I'm not sure that all dishes are equally good. The almond crusted grouper is one of their signature dishes, and it was outstanding, as usual. We have our favorite waiter, and we asked for him and got a big friendly greeting and outstanding service. I noticed some of the other staff looked like they were having trouble keeping up and dealing with the Christmas eve tumult.

We had a second meal a week later and one of the 4 of us had just a mediocre fish (not the grouper!). We had the same waiter, so service was great.

We rate it as we experienced it, but with another waiter and different food choices, you might not be so pleased. I think they are having trouble with
the huge seatings. Restaurants are fragile. They need to pay better attention to staff in the front and back end and improve consistency.

We have been coming down to Aruba for Christmas for years, and Madame Janette's has been a favorite for just as long. The food had always been good, and the service acceptable.

Last year we noticed a downturn on the service, and this year will be our last.

Madame Janette's has made the capitalistic decision to mass produce, and squeeze as many people in during the holiday week as possible. And at those prices, who can blame them?

Our entrees were fair to good, our main course was practically inedible (they reheated pre-prepared dishes... they charge you $7 if you change a veggie you may like, or a side dish. Our plates for all of the same three dinners were scalding hot, and the food was no where near as hot). Desserts were poor.

The service was not as good as the food.

Overall, this is not acceptable no matter what time of year it is, again, especially for the prices they charge.

Until they decide to foregoing trying to serve 700 people in one night, and they begin refocusing on the quality of their food and service, I will no longer risk my money there. I would rather play the slots.

If you are on Aruba when it is NOT a holiday... I guess it is okay to go... but otherwise, caveat emptor.

WE had dinner at Madame Janette's two weeks ago when we were in Aruba. It was highly recommended on all of our friends lists. The food was exquisite and delicious. The service started out a little slow but the 2nd server picked it up and was very good. I would definitely go back on our next excursion to Aruba. Some people we met the week we were down in Aruba had said that MJ had been not up to par over the last few times they had been there, service wise. But we found after a rocky start it ended okay.

I recently, went to this resturant on Tuesday, November 20th for dinner at approxinately 8:00pm. We had a great table near the guitar player and what we thought was a very nice waitress who said she was from Holland. Our dinner was amazing until today I found out that the waitres stoled my credit card number and other information. Now I have over $600 in fraudlentant charges made in the UK, when I am in Aruba. I know it was this waitress at this facility because this was the only place I used this card. Great job you unethical establishment.

Loyal customer of Madame Jeanette restaurant since 1999!!

We were in Aruba for two weeks - October 20th to November 3rd and visited Madame Jeanette twice during our stay. Our first visit was superb! I had the lamb chops with a demi glace to die for and my husband had the delicious grouper which covered the entire plate. It was so good we decided to cancel our reservations for another restaurant on our second week to go back again. Our food was again, outstanding! However, we were ignored completely by our young waiter when another couple came in while we were eating. He stood over them while we ate and finished our meal without ever glancing at any of his other tables. We had no idea who was in charge that evening, we were not greeted as we usually are by anyone who seemed to be managment staff. We called a nearby waitress to see if she could pull him away from the other table so we could get our bill. Normally we would linger and have drinks after our meal but we left because we didn't want to be ignored any further. We WILL be back again next year!! Hopefully with an attentive member of the wait staff...

We have been going to Aruba for 24 years and only dicovred MJ 5 years ago, Needless to say it has become our favorite. this year we even went twice - for our wedding anniversary and for our last night on the island. The food was great - our only complaint is that there was so much we had to take it home to finish. Do try it on your next trip - not a bad item on the menu