Be Love — Restaurant in Victoria

Mediocre, pretentious, terrible service. We came here twice. My husband "disagrees with me whole heartedly" and thinks everything here is delicious. We tried five entrees (mine was so terrible the second time that I ordered something else), one appetizer, three cocktails, one smoothie, and one house made soda. The "cauliflower wings": the first time they forgot to bring it so we ordered it the next time. Tasted good but was soggy, didn't get the texture right. Wasn't spicy, but still tasted good. The "mac and cheese": okay this was rather good, but watery. The "saag paneer" again this was good, it had a variety of Indian flavors in a bowl together which was nice. The "polenta lasagna": terrible, wassitting in a bowl of oil, tasted like cheese. It was so bad I almost spit it out, my husband liked it. The "Jack bowl": simple food, but totally bland. The "Island bowl": this was nothing to write home about. It tasted fine but I was so put off by this place it was hard to appreciate. The cocktail I ordered had a huge layer of foam that was not specified on the menu. She said we could tell them if we didn't want foam, but how would I know you do that? Other then that the "Desert Rose" cocktail was tastey. The cocktails were the best thing here. The "Sombrio" was very good, try this cocktail. He also liked the other cocktail he had. The "ginger ale" tasted like lemon soda and was way too sweet for me. Didn't taste like ginger ale. The "mango lasso" smoothie I didn't try. He said it was good but not very cold. He said it was colder than room temperature. It was extremely hot in the restaurant so this isn't saying much. It wasn't frozen like a smoothie. The service. Gosh where to start? They seem put out to serve. The server looked at me with nothing in front of me and two bowls of food in front of my husband and didn't come check on us. My husband went to go ask for another menu because they didn't check in. Then we had to flag them down to order something else. Our original server gave up on us and another two servers took over, I guess she was too busy socializing. I was excited about a gourmet, plant based restaurant with superfood cocktails... But I wouldn't recommend it, try one of the other vegan restaurants here in town. Turns out the lasagna was free since I didn't like it, so I decided to change this from two to three stars. Maybe I'm nuts cause everyone else seemed to think this place was awesome. To be clear, this restaurant is NOT vegan, though they are plant based....

Me and my wife do not normally make negative reviews, but our experience here was not pleasant at all. We arrived well before dinner time (around 4:30pm), the place was almost empty. Upon deciding what we would order, our waitress took our menus and placed our order. My brother had told me that they usually take a while to make the food here, but when 40 minutes had passed he said that it was taking longer than he expected.

It was getting close to an hour of waiting for our food, and during that whole time, none of the staff (2 or 3 waitresses included) came over to give us an update on our orders, or to apologize that it was taking too long. They just came to refill our water and did not say a word. We started thinking that they had forgotten about us.

Finally my brother asked about our food, and the waitress finally apologized and told us that the order was on its way and thanks for the patience.

When we arrived we were hungry, and we had to wait so long that our stomachs started hurting. When the food finally arrived (about 1 hour and 15 minutes), we were so hungry that we ended up eating so fast that we did not even enjoy the food. The food was somewhat tasty, but not worth the wait time, or the price.

I was frustrated and asked the waitress myself why the food had taken so long. Her answer was "Its just that we are trying new recipes, and the cooks are learning them".

This was the tipping point of the night. If a restaurant decides to add new recipes to their menus, its completely fine, but it seemed like it was their first time practicing, and with customers waiting that is unacceptable. The management obviously did not take some extra time to properly train their staff on these new recipes, and the result is making people wait for over an hour for their food. Also, the waitresses did not do anything on their part to make us feel like they had not forgotten about us, or give us any updates. It seems like the management does not want to spend any extra money in having the cooks practice the menus when there are no customers.

We were deeply disappointed as we had high hopes in this restaurant. We left feeling very disappointed, and sadly we will not be coming back here anytime soon. It has so much potential, but not with the...

Be Love used to be my favourite restaurant to dine in or pick up a wonderful meal & deserts, especially after lock down when only takeout was allowed. Up until recently I would have given them 5 stars but a recent interaction with one of the staff changed this. Early October I did a take out of 2 main courses & deserts - exchanges were pleasant, I paid & left a gratuity & left. The next week I had time before an appointment & wanted a sit down meal. I alerted the hostess of my time limitations, sat in the front section which was vacant & no one on the patio. 6 tables were occupied at the back. I chatted briefly with hostess, perused menu & made my choices. I waited a bit & came to the conclusion that with a 20 minute period between taking my order & eating it I would not have time to make my appointment. I got up, approached hostess to advise her I would have to leave & if I had the chance to speak after that point would have mentioned I would come back for take out & also purchase some treats as I was leaving. She raised her voice & accused me of giving her attitude & wanting preferential treatment & that I had only been there for 2 minutes. Never even asked that. So weird. Then she went on to accuse me of being a habitual troublemaker, again weird as my only 2 interactions with her were the aforementioned takeout & this one. She then advised me I was no longer welcome & in a tone that meant the contrary to have a nice day. To say I was shocked is putting it mildly. I took some time to process & a few days later emailed them. 2 months later & no reply. If they were short staffed or unable to meet my timeline all she had to do was let me know. Plain & simple. Is it not the responsibility of the hostess to advise servers that some has a time crunch so they can at least take their order? I was recently at another restaurant this weekend & asked server if I would have enough time & not only did he mention this to kitchen staff he checked back periodically to let me know of the status of my order. I do miss Be Love but under the circumstances am hesitant to return. I hope no one else has to experience this. I hope this was merely someone having a bad day, but even so, no one deserves this kind...