Seed Clare Valley — Restaurant in Clare

I ate here with my husband on a Friday night in early January. The food was very nice, as were the drinks, good selection of everything and the servings were good. However, the service was very poor. It took 25 minutes for the staff to take our drink order after we had been trying to get the attention of staff - and keep in mind there were 4 tables of people there, certainly not busy and the bar staff were chatting to one customer a lot of the time. The waitress wasn’t very familiar with any of the items on the menu, she returned after 5 minutes to say they were out of one of the drinks we ordered, then came back after another 5 to say they were out of the other. We chose another and she said one would be taken off the bill to apologize for the delay, she then brought out the wrong drinks but we decided to keep them as by that point we’d been waiting 40 minutes. Overall the staff were very inexperienced, lacking knowledge, initiative and direction. We weren’t sure who was in charge, a woman behind the bar looked very frustrated the whole night and we heard her complain to a customer about the unprofessional nature of one of the other young staff members - which we thought was unprofessional in itself! There was a big mix up with the bill at the end, apparently someone else paid our bill which clearly wasn’t our fault, but it took 3 staff members to sort it out. Considering there were only 5 tables of people all up in the 2 hours we were there, we were shocked at how bad the service was - we heard other tables asking where their order was and there were a lot of mixups. I would recommend the food, hopefully someone will give the young staff more training and direction asap otherwise customers won’t return...

Im really sorry, but I’m not one to slate a small country business, but this place needs a massive wake up or they will go under.

We went there as a couple. We were the first to be in there and were followed by 3 other couples shortly after arriving.

The service was nothing short of embarrassing. There was a male who I assume was the owner or “manager”. He was focused on his phone and the entrance (not to mention the white scarf he wouldn’t leave alone) clearly willing in customers. No matter how much eye contact we made, he simply didn’t get the message. Sat there waiting for drinks while 2 girls chatted, one multiskilling whilst she folded napkins and took Snapchat pictures the other I have no idea what she was doing.

We ordered some starters which took about 30 minutes to arrive and they were “ok”. Once these were eaten we sat there again waiting for service to order some mains, but sadly, said service didn’t eventuate. After another 30 minutes sitting with dirty dishes in front of us (still only 8 people in the joint) we decided enough was enough and decided to try our luck elsewhere.

A very disappointing experience and as I said, if they don’t do something soon, they...

I had a group of 20 booked for a dinner at Seed on a Saturday night. Was told to pre-order to avoid clashes with a function upstairs.

Preorders sent in, we arrived on time, and expected to see the food relatively quickly.

Instead, 20 minutes after arriving, Sam (the manager for the night) came up to us and asked if they should start cooking our meals?

I was very unimpressed, and pushed them to start the preorders immediately. Our meals began arriving 20 mins later, but we weren't told that our pizza orders were being delayed to prioritise the function upstairs. Our guests received their pizzas an hour and a half after arriving.

No apologies, no flexibility, they even tried to charge us for meals they forgot to serve. No issues with the food, just poor service. Does make it hard to enjoy your food when others don't have theirs yet, or have finished theirs an hour ago!

Every single person that night left disappointed on the service received from all staff.

Do yourself a favour, if you want your meals served in reasonable time, I wouldn't recommend eating here without holding them accountable...