Carmelito Cafe — Restaurant in Ottawa

The Longfields’ cafe ambience is very nice and very European. Being European myself, I appreciate the nice surroundings as they are similar to those in Germany and Austria. The pastries are good, however the service is extremely poor and it should be much better for the prices the cafe charges. I have been now in this location a few times, but will not be back. The servers are young people who unfortunately did not receive a proper training in the customer service. Each time I was there, there were problems. On the last visit, there were three servers behind the counter but the person who served me and took my money, also served me the pastries without the gloves. This was corrected by the daughter of the Manager (this is how she identified herself) who I mentioned this to and who went to the back of cafe and brought back the box with supposedly new pastries. At the same time, I questioned the flat white coffee which I ordered, the flat white should consists of double expresso and the frothy milk but she insisted that it consists of single expresso. On another occasion, the server did not pay attention and chatted with another server while my coffee was dripping...I had to show her that the cup was now dirty on the side from the dripping coffee. On another occasion yet, when I was there with my friend, the fork on the plate was dirty (left over food) and I had to ask for another and when I wanted to buy the extra pastries to take home I had to call for the servers attention as all three of them were standing around - two chatting to each other and the third one checking her cellphone. The Cafe Depot on Greenbank does not have the same ambiance, however the coffee and the service is outstanding and I will take my business there and for pastries I will drive to Simply Biscotti on...

I went for high tea at the Preston location with a small group of friends and it was quite disappointing.

We were seated in a room upstairs with absolutely no distancing or barriers between tables; the room had about five four-person tables with maybe a metre between each. Almost every table was seated by the end of our meal and we became increasingly uncomfortable. Also, the washroom didn't have a working sink (!!!), and there was a note suggesting you use sanitizer instead of washing your hands. This seemed wildly inappropriate during a pandemic and surely a health code violation as well.

The coffee was good, but the food was mediocre. The entire tray, which consisted of scones, finger sandwiches, and cakes, was fridge cold. This made the scones dry and hard, and the mini quiche was bland and watery. There was also a sticky note left on one of our trays, a scone missing from another, and plastic wrap on a third.

Our server was very kind, but busy with other tasks around the cafe. We were never offered water and didn't get the chance to ask for it, weren't offered coffee refills, and we had to ask for plates to eat our meal on. There was also some confusion surrounding the paying process, and we were initially overcharged for the meal (because we had to pay a 25% deposit prior).

The only redeeming quality was the atmosphere (minus the lack of distancing). The room was decorated in a cute European tea room-style and the food was presented nicely on ornate dishes. It's a good place to go if all you care about is getting a picture for your instagram story.

Overall, it was definitely not worth the $40, I won't be going back, and I won't be recommending the...

Unfortunately, this is a business that does not seem to care one bit about its customers and my recent experience amply demonstrates that. I was on the patio at the Preston St. location when someone sat down near to me and lit up a cigarette, forcing me to inhale their smoke. The ban on smoking on patios in Ottawa has been around for many, many years so it was astonishing that someone would be either so clueless or so inconsiderate as to smoke on a restaurant patio. What made the whole thing beyond astonishing was that the person was ONE OF THE EMPLOYEES. When I complained in an email to the cafe (using an email address I was told went to the owner), I received no response. I emailed a second time; no response. I called the restaurant and left a message with the office. No response. I emailed again: no response. That's why I'm writing this review. My complaint has been completely and rudely ignored. Such insulting disregard for the concerns of a customer is astonishing. I can only assume the owner simply doesn't care one bit if a customer has an unpleasant experience, even when it is caused by an employee's blatant violation of local bylaws. People can decide for themselves whether they want to patronize a business that is happy to take your money but ghosts you when...