The Wintergarden Restaurant at Hydro Majestic — Restaurant in Sydney

This is the 3rd time we've been to the Hydro Majestic for high tea, but it will definitely be our last as we all agreed it was disappointing and definitely not in line with our expectations given we are repeat customers.

We were a party of 3 adults and a young toddler. As soon as we checked in to the restaurant desk, we were advised that we only had 90 minutes for our booking. Looking back through their website after our visit, this information was not clearly stated on the website nor the PDF menu. It was buried deep in the booking transaction under other information. We had already driven 2 hours from Sydney, so we decided to go ahead anyway. On our previous visits, there was never any mention of time limits so we incorrectly assumed that there would be no time limit on this occasion either.

On the online booking transaction, we advised it was a special occasion (selected from a list of special occasions). We also added a note saying that we would have like a window facing table. When were then taken to our table, it was relatively small in comparison to other 4 person tables in the middle of the restaurant away from the window facing tables. I advised the manager (I presume) that in the booking we added a note saying that we requested a window facing table. The manager simply said "oh, the window tables are on a first booking first serve basis" and he left it at that. Fine, I thought as there was nothing we could do at that stage.

One of the other waiters asked if it was a special occasion, I told him that it was a birthday and that we had also marked it on the online booking. To cut to the chase, there was no birthday themed items in the high tea. I wasn't expecting balloons or other decorations like that, but a little happy birthday chocolate plaque on the dessert would have been a nice touch. Nothing at all. Fine, I thought as it wasn't a make or break.

The food (for the price) in the high tea was pretty average. We've had a lot better high teas at other hotels in Sydney.

To cut a longer story short, at the 90 minute mark (give or take a few minutes), we were still partly through our high tea. A waitress suddenly came over, dropped off the bill and said our 90 minutes were up and that we could make our payment at the front desk. She said if we would like, she could bring over a few takeaway boxes so that we could take the unfinished cakes home. A 15 minute time limit reminder would have been nice if you intended to strictly enforce the 90 minute time limit.

At this stage, approximately 1/3 of the restaurant was empty so it wasn't as if people were waiting in lines for their tables outside. We were made to feel as though we had to leave immediately, so it was in our best interest to pack the unfinished cakes into the takeaway boxes and vacate our table. The alternative was to leave the unfinished food to waste.

In summary, I was pretty disappointed with The Wintergarden Restaurant high tea. A high tea is usually a pretty chill occasion to catch up with family and friends. More time is probably spent chatting away rather than having to adhere to the time limits. Food was pretty average, service wasn't good. I definitely won't be going back again to The Wintergarden Restaurant or the Hydro Majestic Hotel. It definitely was not worth the drive...

Maybe skip the Christmas Yulefest dinner. We booked for the Christmas in July dinner - $170 pp for a 6 course degustation, and glass of mulled wine, that was more miss than hit.

The mulled wine was overly spiced, and nearly impossible to drink with all of the bits and pieces left in the glass- not to mention it looked like it had been sloppy poured straight out of a punchbowl with wine all over the base of the glass which immediately stained the table when placed down.

We were quickly served warm bread with sun-dried tomato butter. This was quite good but within 2 minutes our first course came out which felt too rushed and quite awkward.

The first dish was a beetroot starter. No complaints here, presentation was beautiful, and it tasted great.

We then waited 25 minutes for the second course after they cleared our plates, which was way too long. We were served a crustacean gallete... the meat was very chewy - overall a very dated dish. Flavours were OK but it just wasn't for me.

We waited another 25 minutes for the next dish - which was the first main, and the absolute biggest disappointment. Paperdelle "carbonara" with truffle and guinacle (well, if you could find any). The dish was bland, no flavour, and just boring! The only redeeming feature was that the pasta looked handmade. I hardly touched mine in the end, and noticed that there were other diners who also returned their plates hardly finished - with one woman next to us complaining of the same concerns. The other issue, is that my portion was three times the size of my partners - mine looked like a large main, his was more appropriate for a degustation. I highly recommend they take this off the menu before next week, and double check their portion controls - even the waiter didn't seem surprised that neither of us had finished.

The second main was a cured salted duck breast. This dish was alright. The duck was beautiful, the rest of the dish seemed odd and out of place. Two sad single brussel sprout leaves left me feeling more green veg was required - the ballotine was dry, and again, a very dated dish.

The final dessert (singular) was great - but I was disappointed to see them first serve a tiny pallete cleanser as a "course". For $170, I expected more here.

Overall, I can't fault the staff. Whist the timing was incredibly inconsistent, they were friendly and courteous throughout.

Atmosphere was weird. They had a live singer - but she didn't sing a single Christmas song? At times was she was far too loud, and listening to someone belt out "somewhere over the rainbow" followed by 90s hits, really wasn't the vibe for a romantic, christmas in july themed dinner.

It's also the first restaurant I've ever seen boast mountain views - who then chose to blind up all the windows - presumably to keep the heat in, but it really made it feel like a large, closed in conference room, not a nice scenic restaurant.

The experience was below average all together - would I recommend you go? No, $170 can be much better spent elsewhere.

Also - parking was atrocious. There were not enough parks, people parked everywhere. We drive an EV and someone had parked over two spots, so we couldn't charge their either. I appreciate there is ongoing roadworks, but this was internal to the hotel and needs to...

Good lord, the 1 Star is for the view only, 0 stars for the service and food. Brought my mother here for high tea for Mother's Day, and it was so appallingly terrible. We've wanted to come here for years and we'd been so looking forward to finally making it happen. Firstly, we stood in the doorway for 10+ minutes being ignored because they only had 1 person at the front desk and she was taking payments. She didn't even look over and say "I'm so sorry, I'll be with you shortly." Or acknowledge us in any way.

When we were finally seated we were given kind of tatty paper menus which I thought odd. We had several people ask us in quick succession if we were ready to order, I'm not sure if the staff don't have assigned areas? The tea selection is pretty limited and underwhelming. The teapots, teacups, plates etc., are all very cheap feeling, generic hospitality bulk-issue type stuff, not fine china like you often get at other high tea services. One of the managers came over to collect our menus and was quite smarmy and remarked that I could keep my menu if I really wanted?? I'm assuming because it was folded he thought I'd done it, but someone who had the menu previously must have. If they had proper menus it wouldn't have been an issue.

We were served our tea relatively quickly but it was quite weak and nothingy, and certainly not high quality. We weren't given any milk to go with the tea and had to wait to catch the attention of a waiter to ask for some. When I asked for some ice to go with my water I was told that there was already ice in the jug he was pouring from?? I said that I'd like a whole glass full, which I got, but not without another weird look. The sugar cubes weren't actually cubes but more misshapen lumps.. they looked like a toddler had been sucking on them in turn and returning them to the container.

We were served our food and started with the savouries. We'd requested the vegetarian version. The wraps were small and barely filled, the filling and sauce they did have was awful. The sandwiches managed to be both stale and dried out, whilst also soggy mush, despite having the thinnest, scabbiest smear of ingredients, truly remarkable to achieve all of that at once. We couldn't even finish most of it. The scones were fine, although not very traditional in size or shape. We were given a pittance of jam and cream we had to ration out between the 4 scones, the cream was watery and the jam was nothing special either. The deserts were fine?? I guess? Definitely some weird tastes in some of them but generally inoffensive. Although, even they were scabby and the pastry cups not fully filled.

There was someone playing piano which sounds nice in theory but she was absolutely hammering away at that thing and it was SO loud, and I have hearing loss, so I can only imagine how thunderous it was for anyone with full hearing.

We left feeling queasy despite not even finishing everything. I've been to quite a few high tea services throughout Australia and overseas, and this is the worst one by far. Including the one in a dusty hole in the wall in Melbourne where an elderly lady served us strange food, blasted gangster rap, and regaled us with stories of her...