Democracy* on Locke — Restaurant in Hamilton

We were very excited to try this place out. We were here once before and had just ordered a take out because we were in a hurry. This time, we wanted the full experience and decided to dine in. We ordered the smash burger with a side of sweet potato fries and the Friday pizza along with the lemon raspberry loaf. What we hadn't realized was that the Friday pizza had the same exact toppings as the smash mac. I wish the lady working there had mentioned that to us, though because the menu didn't have any information about the pizza. We ended up switching the smash burger for a sunny side up sandwich with just egg. The overall price came to a dollar less than what we had originally paid. I wasn't super concerned about it, until the lady working said in a rather annoying tone - "I can pay you back the dollar or..." We let it go and waited for the order to arrive.

We started with the lemon raspberry loaf. The icing was too sweet and the loaf didn't taste anything lemony at all. It was rather subpar. We then got the pizza. The pizza toppings were great. However, the dough wasn't fully cooked and was very underwhelming. It looked like a crispy naan, only it wasn't crispy and we could actually see many undercooked spots on the crust. We finally got the sunny side up sandwich and the sweet potato fries. I'll be honest. The only reason I am still giving this place 3 stars is because of the sweet potato fries and the chipotle mayo dipping it came with. That was the only saving grace and was probably one of the best I'd ever had. The sandwich unfortunately lacked flavor altogether. It didn't seem like there were any sauces in there. There was no seasoning in the just egg and the tomato and spinach were just plan raw with no seasoning whatsoever. It felt like they just bought everything from a store and assembled them together and charged $13.95 for it.

Given the price of the food, this was an extremely disappointing experience. We won't be going back there. There are many vegan places in Hamilton that are well worth the price and provide you with great food and customer service but this isn't one of them. Very...

I went to Democracy because I had heard about their vegan friendly menu. I went a few times, but I was for the most part disappointed. The last time I went was about a month ago and I'll never go again. The first two things I tried to order from their vegan menu they told me they could not make for me because they didn't have the ingredients to make them. Finally, I went for my third choice and when I got it (after a 40-minute wait) all it was was two small slices of toast with some sauce and some kale or something in the middle. It cost $9.50 I think. It obviously was not filling enough, so I ordered another one because I was desperately hungry. So after I finished my next two slices of toast, I was out $20 and still hungry. So I had to go over to Goodness Me and find something to satisfy my appetite. You'd think $20 could get you a satisfying meal, but not at Democracy. Not only that but the service was horrible. I had to wait a good 40 minutes or so for my order, I'm not even kidding. And while I was up at the counter giving my order to the young lady, another staff member came up to her and started asking her a question, literally cutting me off right in the middle of my sentence. No joke, it really happened. To top it off, they have no Wi-Fi there as they claim to want to have a "talk to each other" kind of atmosphere going on. The thing is, a lot of people go to coffeeshops by themselves and want to use that time to catch up on some emails or some personal business online. Not everyone goes to a coffeeshop with friends to socialize, many go just to have some alone time and catch up on some emails. And - newsflash - this is 2015, coffeeshops have wi-fi (it's expected). In short, I was very disappointed with Democracy. In spite of their vegan friendly menu, I DON'T recommend their establishment since you can't even be sure they'll have the ingredients to make what you've ordered from the menu and what you do get is way overpriced for the little amount of food that you do get. Go...

You should add the hello sailor back to the menu - it's the best dessert you have

The food here is GREAT, the staff is friendly and accommodating - but their delivery through Skip The Dishes has consistently not been great, and the Manager I spoke with - Dennis - is not really customer-facing competent.

Storytime:

I got addicted to their Bahn Mi sandwich and hello sailor and since then had been ordering probably 2-3 times a month if not more. I also started getting a breakfast spread. I realized I'd like it with more of the just egg and sausage and fewer home fries. Called in to make sure it was possible and kept ordering it that way. Got a long note in my breakfast order today saying "We can't charge for it so you're not getting it today, you've been getting it for free". Fair enough. Although, I wouldn't have ordered it through delivery again without the mod. Spoke to a staff member who listened and was very friendly and respectful, they referred me to a manager to give feedback. I spoke to Dennis. I found him to be really dismissive and condescending. After explaining that I would have preferred a choice and why, he basically just said, "well we're a business and this is what we needed to do" and when I honestly said "I get it, I just don't feel cared for as a customer" he basically just SIGHED in an annoyed way at which point I just said bye and hung up. I called in and am writing this message because I want to support vegan restaurants and I wanted to be able to make requests that made it easy for me to keep supporting Democracy.

I find it kind of silly to write long reviews for free, like get a life - right? But this time I'm genuinely bummed out. I was relying on Democracy and getting breakfast from them today to make my day easier, and better - and that was not the case.

All the staff are professional and nice - but because of Dennis (the manager), I won't be ordering again and will just make it my mission to learn how to make my favourite recipes from this...