Switch Lifestyle — Restaurant in Melbourne

I made a booking at Switch fountain gate approximately 2 weeks in advance for my upcoming birthday. I requested a table for 16 people. The booking process was surprisingly easy. I arrived for my booking to find that they had seperated the booking onto two booth tables, I was pretty unhappy about this as there was no mention of not being able to seat us all at 1 table upon booking, had there being, I would of booked somewhere else from the get go. I don’t find it appropriate to be expected to have your back to half of your guests. After a lot of discussions with the management staff, we were placed onto a table seating 16, although we were made to feel that it was a big inconvenience for them, problem solved on our end. We placed our orders at approximately 8pm. There were 2 kids meals in this order. It was now 9:05pm and no sight of our meals or the kids meals. We asked the waiter where the food was, we appreciate there was a wait to ensure all the meals came together but over 1 hour? And the kids meals really should of been brought out prior to the adults meals, or at least we should of been given the option. Approximately 9:15pm the orders arrived, minus 1. A meal was forgotten, which I also appreciate things happen but when the staff try to blame the customer, that’s a whole different story. The forgotten risotto arrived shortly after everyone else finished their meal, so 1 person was made to watch everyone eat their dinner and then eat their dinner whilst everyone else watched them, hardly the most comofortable experience. I asked a manager if that meal would be on the bill, I was advised “I don’t know, I’ll have to check”. There was no apology, no explanation. 3 requests were made for tomato sauce for the kids meals, finally it was brought over after about 10 minutes of asking. We brought our own cake and they stored it for us until it was time, unfortunately little to no care was taken with that and the top of it had been so compacted and shoved down that the top of the cake was damaged. No questions were asked about it, they just took it upon themselves to shove it and make it fit however they saw fit. I’m sure you can appreciate that good cakes cost money, good money. I don’t expect it to then be treated with such little care that it is damaged. But still, little to no care factor. Comes to paying the bill, which may I say was a good bill for them for the night.. no split bills. Again, something I feel should of been mentioned to me upon time of booking especially for a table of 16 so I could pre warn the guests to bring cash. The food was very hit and miss, some people saying there’s was okay and some saying they were very disappointed. A staff member tripped next to our table and smashed 2 full plates of food, I felt awful for this young waitress as the whole restaurant was looking at her and it would of been exceptionally embarrassing. But, the food and smashed plates made their way into my birthday present bags, with smashed porcelain and food splattered all through them, it also took about 10 minutes for this to be cleaned up. Meaning one of my guests had to stand up away from the table as it was right under and behind their chair. Whilst we were waiting for this to be cleaned, waiters and waitresses continued to walk through it with another waitress almost slipping in the spilt food. The waiters and waitresses are doing their best, they are young, but that isn’t the issue. I feel they need more time dedicated to training them properly. I was severely disappointed and underwhelmed with the whole experience and I will not be returning nor recommending switch to anyone I know. Very little care shown by any...

Our party of four were in for lunch today at around 1pm. I ordered the Quinoa and Kale salad and was looking forward to it as it sounded nice. I make lots of salads with these ingredients myself. Unfortunately what I got instead of an appetising Quinoa salad was a plate with half a bunch of Kale leaves on it, most with the hard stalk still attached and a couple of table spoons of Quinoa sprinkled on top! The proportions were off, there should have been much more Quinoa and Pomegranate with the Kale chopped and through the salad, not giant stalks just sitting on a plate. I pointed this out to the waitress who apologised and brought the dish back with a couple more table spoons of Quinoa thrown on. The dressing which I luckily asked for on the side, was thick brown goop, which I tasted then had to ask for some fresh lemon and olive oil as a substitute.

So I ate all the meal, like a cow chewing solid grass for 45 minutes, lucky I like Kale!

The idea is there guys but the execution was terrible. Fresh healthy food doesn’t mean ripping a Kale out of the veggie box and plonking on a plate, there was no love, no flavour. And a fresh simple dressing doesn’t take long to make, especially in a quiet restaurant, the dressing I was served looked like a dressing that had been made a week ago that has been sitting in a squeeze bottle and I copped the dregs at the bottom. It was disgusting.

I eat raw Kale but I when I serve it to guests I blanch it and refresh it in ice, not difficult at home, should be even easier in a commercial kitchen, it retains the flavour but softens the texture slightly making it far more palatable.

Please get Chef to look at some Quinoa salad recipes, many of which use Pistachio and Pomegranate and Kale and are drop dead gorgeous. The one I had today was not good.

I would have at least appreciated being offered a free coffee at the end of the meal considering what I was served for lunch but none was offered, not good business practice. Costs your business nothing but the gesture would have gone a long way. Will we go...

We attended Switch on Sunday 15/6, party of 5. We did not have a booking and arrived at 12. We waited approx 5minutes before we were rudely acknowledge by a male 'front of house attendant' (he was not wearing an apron like the wait staff). We were advised we would have to wait while he could "sort something out" for us. Approx another 5min went by and we were told to follow him. After what seemed like forever and after several attempts to catch his eye only to be given a finger to indicate 1minute, we finally ordered. One of our party asked a question about one of the dishes but then decided not to order it, and he rolled his eyes at her. They were Clearly understaffed as we could only see one waitress taking orders/serving meals, one person behind the bar and then the 'front of house' person. The place was quite busy. The food was very underwhelming with soggy chips and calamari that had way too much pepper/spice, that one of our guests could not eat it after two pieces. Half of the meals were untouched and at no point when the plates were being cleared were we asked if there was a problem. If you don't have enough staff to operate your restaurant, you should not open, or at a minimum you should restrict your service. You are damaging your restaurants reputation, with disgruntled customers, leaving negative reviews rather than proactively reacting to your staffing situation. Having someone work front of house that is rude, arrogant and inattentive is a massive mistake. The tone was set from the start and it just completely and rapidly spiralled down from there. We used to really enjoy going to Switch. It has been a while since our previous visits, and I was really looking forward to visiting, but bringing friends here for our special lunch was not only embarrassing but it was costly and left an extremely bad taste of never going there again. And I would definitely suggest you find yourself a new FOH. He is killing your business before you even get a chance to...