La Casa Vieja has a few locations, but it started 30 years ago with a location in Nunoa that is now permanently closed. 30 years is a very long time for a restaurant in Santiago or Chile, so I was excited to try this somewhat historical restaurant in an old house.
I love pastel de choclo; in fact, it is probably my favorite Chilean food. This restaurant had the worst pastel de choclo I have ever tasted. It was *extremely* oily (very abnormal for pastel de choclo) and liquidy like a stew. The "pino" at the bottom was far too liquidy. The hard boiled egg and the chicken inside the pastel de choclo was COLD, while the top of the pastel de choclo was burnt. I could not finish my food, so I took it home; however, I cannot even bring myself to eat the leftovers, even though I hate wasting food.
My husband's pastel de jaiba tasted overwhelming cheesy and with very little jaiba (crabmeat). It was also very oily, although I have had oily pastel de jaiba before in another Chilean restaurant. It was better than the pastel de choclo, but not good.
The food here is terrible. But to make matters worse, the prices here are higher than other Chilean restaurants.
The ambiance is not terrible, they have a large private parking lot, and the service is friendly (perhaps because the entire restaurant was empty and we were the only customers). They also thanked us profusely when we left. That is why I am giving it 2 stars. Too bad the food is so bad that I would never return (unless they got a new chef). I really wanted to like this place. I am guessing the bad food is why it was empty. Such a shame. read more