Blooming Cafe and Restaurant — Restaurant in Sydney

I visited this afternoon and was greeted, placed my order, and took a seat. Our drinks arrived promptly. According to my Apple Pay timestamp, payment was made at 2:17 pm. From there, we waited an exceptionally long time for the food to arrive. By 2:45 pm, I raised my concern with the staff, who apologised but did not seem to have a clear approach to resolving the situation. A few minutes later I was told the food was coming. I explained that if it did not arrive within two to three minutes, a refund would be the only reasonable outcome. I timed those three minutes on my phone. The staff member followed up and informed me it would actually be another fifteen minutes before the food was ready… another 15 minutes…?

This shocked me because it confirmed that at almost 3:00 pm, the food had not even been started. I could hear the kitchen staff discussing my order of eggs benedict, with one member in a navy top repeatedly saying it was on the way. Meanwhile, I noticed other customers who had ordered after us receiving their food well before we did. There were also at least two other tables experiencing similarly long waits.

When I requested a refund, I was initially told it could not be processed. I had to insist that the staff speak to someone in charge who could authorise it. Eventually this happened, but by that point the experience had been entirely soured.

It left me wondering whether the venue could actually handle the volume of orders coming in, whether it was a time management issue, or whether they were severely understaffed. Whatever the cause, food should be served within about twenty minutes at most. Anything longer is unacceptable for a casual brunch service. We finally left at 3:05 pm, after being told the refund would take two to three business days to process. For an experience so sour, I believe the venue should of refunded our whole order, and for the price, I would rather have gone a little further to one of the more reliable premium...

Seen this place on instagram and husband wanted to try. Aesthetics great, very pretty looking cafe. We ordered: salmon dish - tasted extremely fishy, was trying so hard to eat it, but just couldn't, plate was oily aswell. I gave my husband a piece, my son a piece and my daughter a piece as I thought maybe it was just me but all of us said the same thing, was very fishy. (Picture below was after giving them all a piece) I think maybe pat down the salmon with paper towels before frying it? Not sure. Also the veggies underneath need to be pat down with paper towels so doesn't have too much oil on the plate. The Spinach and broccoli added a great fresh touch. And I really enjoyed the lemon Mayonnaise it worked well. Rainbow pancakes - extremely doughy my son who is obsessed with pancakes and could down 5 pancakes in any one seating only ate quarter of it as was very doughy, I did try myself, the flavours are there, just too doughy, definitely has potential for sure! The breakfast plate- was simple, clean and great, enjoyed that the plate was super crisp and clean in terms of not being oily like other places. Breakfast burger - my son said he enjoyed it. Fresh juices - extremely fresh we got watermelon and pineapple juices, they were so refreshing with perfect amount of ice!

Massive credit to the potion sizes, as they're quite big. Overall decent place, will definitely come back and try again in future as I always love to give benefit of doubt, plus they were super friendly with their service!

But definitely needs some work. They are fairly new so can understand how they can only get better from here.

Services was great and very friendly. Aesthetics are just beautiful and very picture worthy.

Also enjoyed...

Food is beautiful 😍 felt like such a shame to tuck into it. We googled places to eat & this popped up. Whilst a bit of a drive for us, we decided to venture out. Glad we did.

Oh, we booked a table, it was pretty busy when we arrived, but we got seated straight away with our booking. Much to annoyance of those that were waiting without a booking.

The food here is generous, flavoursome & you can taste they use quality ingredients. We spent $144 for 4 people, each with a drink, main & sides. We ordered haloumi, mushrooms, Southern Fried Chicken burger, Beef Burger, Mediterranean salad with grilled chicken & Eggs Benny is a must try. The crab meat is so creamy & paired on the rotti bed it was next level. The Butterfly Pea Lemonade 😍 refreshing & my daughter rated the 🍓 Matcha. There are no onsite toilets, you need to trek it to the building next door & head into the basement carpark. Not a big space, parents with prams be mindful of this if planning a visit. Not sure if they offer high chairs. The kids that we saw were sitting on normal chairs & the bench. Perhaps because they were old enough to not...