Luma — Restaurant in Toronto

Unfortunately my friend and I were not able to enjoy the food at Luma due to the absolutely poor and discriminatory service from their staff. We arrived on Saturday, May 7th at around 730pm.

When we arrived to the hostess booth, there was no one there, and we just stood there waiting. We had several employees of the restaurant look at us both, and just proceeded to walk on by, and did not even acknowledge us. At first I thought it was because they were busy, however after a quick scan of the dining room/bar I noticed the restaurant was pretty dead - I would say it was only 20 to 30% full at best.

After another 5 minutes of staff looking at us & walking right by, we were finally able to flag down someone who worked there, who was willing to acknowledge our presence. We mentioned we had reservations, and we were soon brought to our table.

A few moments later, our server appeared. Our server was a 20 something year old young man with blonde hair. The server came over, and did not even acknowledge us, say hello or introduce himself. He was silent. He proceeded to just fill our cups with water, in complete silence which we found odd. After he finished filling up our glasses, we said thank you, and he simply just walked away, no eye contact, and not one word spoken. We found this odd.

I gave the guy the benefit of the doubt, thinking perhaps he was just really tired, and was working a crazy shift. However, I again took a brief scan of the restaurant and to my point earlier, it was not busy at all. There was more empty seats in the restaurant than actual people dining.

We proceeded to read the menu and decided on a few appetizers and drinks to start. We just sat there waiting for our server which seemed to be an eternity. We eventually got the attention of the hostess and asked if she could send our server over.

The server came by eventually (same guy who filled our waters when we first sat down). Again, he didn't' introduce himself or really say much.

We proceeded to order the Octopus, a few drinks, and the Beef Sliders to start. We then mentioned we would be ordering main dishes after a few more minutes of going through the menu. The server then mentioned the Beef Sliders come in 3, and if we would want an additional slider. I said we were fine, and I declined.

The server seemed to get really annoyed at my response, looked at me with a prolonged stare, which seemed almost aggressive in a way due to his silence and the duration of his gaze. After that he just walked away.

At this point both my friend and I felt very uncomfortable, and just didn't want to be there. Both of us are visible minorities, and were the only folks of color who were dining at Luma that night. We do not like to just casually throw out claims of racism so lightly, however we both truly felt an "air" in the room from the moment we stepped into the restaurant, from the several staff staring at as us/walking by us when we arrived, to the cold/rude behavior of our server.

I was wavering, whether to post my experience at all, especially since I didn't have a racial slur or a more blatant act of racism occur. However, I realized that racism is not just within the "blatant" or extremely visible acts, it also occurs within the minor things that people do ( or do not do), and the micro aggressions that are present.

Additionally, I feel it is important to write this review, because as a person of color, I don't want other POCs to have their night ruined due to ignorant staff like we clearly had at Luma. I'm not saying Luma as a whole is a racist establishment, however their staff clearly need some Anti-Racism training.

Luckily, our night was not ruined. We informed the staff that we would be cancelling our order, and would no longer be dining with them that evening. We went to another Restaurant on King street which treated us just fine, where we spent $300+ on dinner/drinks.

If you're a Visible Minority, I would not recommend This restaurant due to DISCRIMINATORY PRACTICES. Spend your money...

Good: Environment was excellent: high ceiling, filled with natural light on a sunny day, comfortable seating. As seen on Instagram! The steamed mussels in thai curry would be the only thing I would recommend. Good portion and nice flavour - can't go wrong with thai curry.

Bad: Service: Not impressed. As we just sat down we realized the table was shaking. So we asked our waiter if he could find another table for us (as we saw many unoccupied tables). He went away saying nothing, and came back with a piece of paper trying to fix the table - which was fine to us. After a few minutes, he was still struggling down there, so my friend asked nicely again if he could find another table for us. Without standing up and having eye contact, our waiter just replied in a cool tone "So where do you want to sit?" - We were a bit surprised, as one would assume typically the waiter would find an appropriate table for the guests. Now, my friends ordered B.C. snapper ceviche... we knew it was supposed to be raw, but was surprised how tasteless it was... and that was the beginning of a tasteless nightmare... Stuffed squid: rice was totally, totally undercooked - unacceptable!! the squid was steamed, instead of grilled, and tasteless. A note to the chef - if you decide to steam a squid, and stuff it with undercooked rice, flavour would be something you may want to add. Also, the radicchio was miserably bitter. Atlantic salmon: Something you can totally cook at home by yourself. Don't even bother to order here. Plain. Panna Cotta: average. like any home-made one... Puff: same as above Cheese platter: I, could not, would not believe that they called that a cheese platter, when it just came with a small square of cheese, and literally three pieces of small crackers (which you can always get a whole bag of for $1 in any dollar store). I literally laughed and forgot to take a photo of it. My friend just did not even bother to eat it.

I know how some people say you should not expect too much for summerlicious. But we have been to many other restaurant during summerlicious and found it a nice platform to explore the restaurants in the city, so we know which one we can revisit in the future. Not this...

Great restaurant, great menu, Great service! Originally I was looking for a restaurant that can accommodate a group of 12-14 people before a show at the princess of whales and we were thinking of going to Byblos however, they were very demanding & very difficult to deal with and not to mention pretty expensive considering they were trying to force their Prix fixe menu on us, which is a huge contrast to the service that I got from Luma! From the moment I called to inquire about reservations at Luma, everything was smooth; Monami, was such great help on the phone. She was very accommodating, very understanding & she left the choice with us whether we wanted a Prix fixe menu or to order off their à la carte menu. She made a tentative reservation for me & my group since I needed to confirm the number of people attending and when I called again the next day, the reservation was still there & I just had to confirm, she even went as far as noting on their system that we would prefer separate bills at the end which again was great considering the number of people attending & how busy the restaurant would be at dinner on a Friday evening. The day comes, & we go for our dinner! The restaurant's proximity to the princess of whales is just perfect, the decor, atmosphere, & ambiance was just plain elegant & sophisticated without being overwhelmingly so. Everything on the menu looked absolutely great & when the food came out it was beautifully plated & not to mention delicious. The food came out in a very timely manner which allowed us to eat, enjoy, & to get out in time for our show. Everyone in the group was amply impressed by the restaurant & the superb service everyone in there provided. It definitely won't be the first & last time there! Will...