Origo Club — Restaurant in Richmond

My friends decided to try out this new restaurant on Sunday for Christmas celebration.

Note: Currently they only have bunch on Sunday

Parking: They have a lot of free customer parking in their building, please ask the front desk and they will give you a parking pass and the buzzer code. You can go in with the back door.

Ambiance: The inside of the restaurant is very elegant and I love the color schemes they use along with the furniture, china gives a fusion of east meets west.

Food: We had the brunch and I think there is room for improvement. I think the scones were OK, but the cream lacked flavor. I think the sweet choices such as the the madeline cake was very hard and difficult to bite into, the butterfly cookie was also very hard to bite into and the rest of the items overall were sweet but nothing amazing. The sandwiches were proportionally bigger in comparison to the other items and so it might have been better if it was cut in half. I think the mushroom tart tastes the best in the whole set. For $45 , you get either a tea or coffee and it has to be the ones for * or else there is extra charge.

Service: I think overall the service was good but there were a few feedback I would like to mention.

The good: The staffs were very accomdating to the dietary requests and asked if we were there for a special occasions and offer us parking. They came back to pour us hot water and when ever we needed something, they try to check in on us.

The next time: They never went over what our food was and especially to the ones we had changed so we would know. We referred back to the menu ourselves.

Because we had a big party and so auto gratuity of 18% was already applied. When one of the waitress gave us our bill separately, she said we are more than happy to tip more than 18%... Because everyone had different choices of drinks, the bill might be different and when we were paying...One of my friend was charged $1 more and so we just wanted to ask to ensure we paid the amount that was on the receipt. The waitress explain that it was done by seating ... When we asked for the correction, she offered to "pay $1 personally out of her own pocket"...and said because we are a large table it can open to mistake. I expressed that we wanted to make sure we paid our own bill and the amount in the receipt to ensure we are paid correctly...We ended up sorting it out ourselves...

I think overall it's an OK experience and for the IG, it's worth to go once... I am not sure if I would revisit again for the amount of food and the price I paid for. Keeping in mind it's relatively new.

Some of my friends did recommend the green tea cream puff and their coffee is...

The number of places that you can enjoy Afternoon Tea has certainly ramped up in Vancouver over the last couple of years. One of the newer and splashier places is Origo Club in Richmond. What sets Origo apart from other places that serve Afternoon Tea is their attached gallery that displays various contemporary Asian art pieces. I know it sounds a bit disconnected from the French-inspired fare that Origo strives for, especially when you consider Afternoon Tea being so closely associated with old world English culture.

Origo Club is located near the Richmond Oval and, as you can imagine, street parking is a bit difficult to come by. They do, however, have an parkade but it fills up quick. Tip: there is an unassuming door that leads you from the parkade into the back of the restaurant so you don’t have to walk outside to the main entrance.

We came, of course, for the Afternoon Tea ($45) which is stunningly served in a rounded display case which plays off of their attached art gallery. It truly looks like this could be artwork that is on display. Even the teapots and teacups that they use here are elegantly designed. It is a bit of a departure from some other Afternoon Tea places where the teacups don’t always match the saucers.

Now, about the tea here itself (we ordered the Imperial Green Tea and the Early Grey)… which you would think would be one of the main parts of “Afternoon Tea“, there really isn’t a large selection of teas to choose from. However, they do have other drinks such as coffees and lattes. I do appreciate the ability to have other drinks other than tea but don’t come here expecting to be overwhelmed by the tea itself… that seems to take second stage to the sweet and savory items.

Overall impressions of the Afternoon Tea… the teas here really weren’t very flavourful. However, the aesthetics of the presentation of the food as well as the environment were enjoyable.

After our Afternoon Tea, we stepped into the adjoining art gallery. This isn’t a huge gallery but it does have some very nice pieces. If you turn around, you’ll see a grand display case which surrounds the entrance into the cafe.

Many of the pieces here included ceramic porcelain and pottery which related to tea.

While this isn’t a huge art gallery and some of the pieces located in the top of the large display case are difficult to see, it was a nice change and...

Really nice restaurant, decor is great, food is on point.

Reason they get a lower rating is for service. Arrived for our reservations on time, but our table was not ready as guests were still there, that’s fine. What wasn’t fine was the hostess didn’t offer any suggestions, like please have a seat in the waiting area(which they don’t have) or even a “would we like to wait at the bar for pre dinner drinks?” Basically said sorry, table is not ready yet, went back to what she was doing. So we decided to wait outside the front door as there’s really no room to stand and wait at the front. Waited maybe 5-10 mins before she came out to get us.

Everything after seating was fine. But after dinner, plates are cleared, I was looking forward to trying the coffee and seeing what desserts were offered. I’m guessing we probably sat there for 10-15, no one came by to offer any tea/coffee or if we were interested in dessert. At this point, kinda getting put off and asked the hostess for bill so I could leave.

Last, this is a minor thing, but for a restaurant at this price point, I would expect maybe amuse bouche, or at the very least bread/butter before the meal. I’m assuming, I don’t know for sure, that they have a pastry chef, judging by the Instagram pics, they make croissants and pastries, at least offer some bread for the customers.

When a restaurant wants to be upscale like this one is, it’s not enough for the food to be good. I would expect these minor customer service details to be something the front of house would focus on, as it does affect the whole...