Firstly this sucks to write, I first visited cafe medina in November 2018 when first moved to Vancouver and had an awesome experience. Since then I’ve recommended this spot to several people and visited around once a year since then. This most recent experience however was so poor I feel it is important to share.

My partner and I arrived around noon. We were greeted by an employee at the front of house who informed us it would be around a 35-45 minute wait. Although there appeared to be several open tables we deemed it reasonable and waited outside. Over this time while we waited we saw countless people appear to go into the restaurant and get immediate seated. We had assumed that they had all already joined the waitlist and were returning during their window this was until a two person party approached us to ask if we were in line. We replied no you have to go in to join the waitlist only to see them enter and get seated immediately. We continued to wait for our seats, where most concerningly we noticed a trend where certain ethnicities were seated immediately when others would be told “we will text you in 35-45 mins.” When I went in to complain I had ‘conveniently’ timed it perfectly as our table was now ready. Later on I asked a table next to us who had been let in 15 mins earlier whether they had been put on the waitlist or not; which they hadn’t.

I should note I am unsure whether the profiling of customers is the under direction of the restaurant or just the actions of the employee who was working at the front of house. I think I overheard his name was James however that may not be accurate he was a taller guy with a receeding hairline.

Once we were sat we ordered coffees. Both mine and my partners drinks were enjoyable. Our waiter was nice enough. We ordered food which took around 25 minutes to arrive which felt long for some advacado toast and some waffles. My partners food was also served several minutes before mine leaving us unable to eat at the same time. When my waffles did arrive I was shocked to immediately notice a hair underneath one of my waffles. Due to its positioning there is no possibility that it belonged to myself or my partner (see photo). I noticed it as soon as my plate was placed but my waiter had already left so I had to signal to another waiter to have them exchanged. When I did finally get to eat the waffles they were very tasty but by this point the visit had been wholly unenjoyable and I was ready to eat as quick as possible and leave. My partners advacado toast was very tough to cut leaving a mark on her finger from the knife as she had to press so hard (see photo). Her toast did taste “okay” as she put it. The next table over who had ordered the same thing described theirs as bland.

Overall I left this most recent visit sad. My perspective on what had been one of my favourite brunch cafes in the city has totally changed. Despite finding hair in my food none of our meal was comped, which I didn’t really care about but maybe speaks to how little customer experience matters at Medina Cafe.

Do not recommend. :(