Cora Breakfast and Lunch — Restaurant in Whitby

I took my son here this morning for brunch. As we walked in we were greeted by a waitstaff who asked “table for two?” I said yes. She lead us to the side of the store that I notice from my countless visits they use when the store is full. She sat us right next to the kitchen where it was a bit loud and all the food smells were getting to me so I asked to shift over to the other side of the completely empty dining area. My son asked why we were out there all alone and I had no answer to give. I started noticing several groups of people who arrived after us were being seated in the main dining area and only about 2 groups of ppl had left since we had sat down.

I asked a different wait staff why we were seated by the kitchen far away from the main dining area and she fumbled her words eventually saying it was because the main dining area was mostly full (this is at 11am on a Friday morning). I asked if there were any tables available at all and she said yes so I asked to move there as my son didn’t feel comfortable where we were. She helped us move our recently arrived food to a table in the main area where I noted at least 8 free tables. (Pictures attached). The entire restaurant was quite empty compared to when we usually go on weekend mornings. It was no where near full. I asked the staff if we were seated in that area because we were black and she’s said “it wasn’t anything personal”. The staff who was serving us was also serving many tables in the main dining area so convenience could not be the reason, a full dining area wasn’t the reason. I then heard the original waitress who had seated us in isolation lie to my waitress saying she asked me which side of the restaurant I wanted to sit on and said I picked the isolated side which is an absolute lie.

I strongly believe the staff who seated us is racist. She was very curt with us when we arrived and then continued to give me very dirty looks while we were seated in the isolated dining area. My actual waitress was very attentive. It’s a shame that there are ppl still around like this. It ruined our entire dining experience and my son still has questions as to why we were seated alone and I don’t want to have to explain to a 5 year old just yet that biased disgusting ppl still exist.

I won’t be going back here as long as this staff...

Hello Cora MANAGER,

We usually do not often write reviews; however this first experience at CORA will never bring me back again unless a change is made. This experience has truly left a SOUR taste in our mouth. To start, some positive things to note: the male server that served us was very kind and patient. We had tipped him, enjoyed his service, and hope to see him serve us again. The food was acceptable and the store was overall clean. The menu was organized and had a good variety of choices.

HOWEVER, what left us with a negative experience was the female server that served ONLY DRINKS. IT IS UNDERSTANDABLE THAT AT THAT TIME, IT MAY HAVE BEEN BUSY, however, the female server did not even bother to give a welcoming atmosphere. She looked at us with a side eye every time she walked by as if she had not wanted us to be there. Although she smiled and treated other customers kindly. When we asked to order our food that we patiently waited for 10 minutes, she passively told us that the other server would come to order for us and to just quickly order the drinks (Note: The drinks that she did not even come with). We understand that every worker has their own task and hardships BUT she could’ve told us nicely and in a welcoming tone. In the end, we waited 10 minutes to order and did not even get some water or the proper amount of cutlery. We truly think that something can be changed in order to bring an overall better experience for your customers. We will again give this restaurant another chance as we truly believe it has potential to...

I actually go to this Cora's quite often I would say about 3-4 times a week I had a server today his name is Chris he did not want to come over and asked us if our food was okay or if we needed anything else the first time that I've ever experienced my home fries being burnt I feel like he's a server and he seen that on the plate and he could have fixed it or correct it he didn't do that at the end when we're getting ready to leave we still had like a whole plate of food it took about 7 minutes and we had to wave him down and tell him we were ready to leave then he ran over the bill he left the bill on the table scene a whole plate of food there and didn't even ask us if we needed a box to go he left the bill and walked away quickly we were thinking that he was going to grab us a box we actually had to go five minutes later wave him down and tell him that we needed a box for our food to go so overall the experience for that waitress I'm not happy at all with the experience I...