Bernstein's Deli — Restaurant in Winnipeg

I went in the other day during lunch hour with my daughter and there were several open tables open and it didn’t look overly busy (got there around 12:15) the hostess? asked for how many, she wanted to put us at a very small table by kitchen and I told her my preference would be a bigger table, she walked away so we sat at a table in the corner for 4. After sitting and getting menus and ordering drinks, our waitress (17 year old approx.) came back and asked if we would move if someone else came in ...but as there were still other tables available with 4 seats I told her that we would not be moving and she then said to me that we would have to move to another table if it got busy and asked if I minded and I told her that I did mind and she snapped at me and told me that she minded too and stormed away! I was surprised at the sassy attitude and immaturity by this waitress. I have shopped here and sat in the restaurant before on several occasions and have never been spoken to like this! We left immediately and I also wanted to make sure someone heard my complaint as I am sure this is not the first time she’s had an attitude with customers, so I told the lady with the pink streaks in her hair of this incident and that I will not be recommending this place to any of my friends and family!! She acknowledged the complaint. I just wonder what would she have done?? Tell us to move to another table in the middle of a meal?? There were also several other people in the restaurant that were sitting 2 to a 4 seating table! I wonder if they were asked and treated...

2024: It’s a weird little place. Weird layout pre and post renovation. They have some delicious food. The restaurant staff are super nice.

Update Spring 2025: There have been some recent new servers hired. The regular servers are AMAZING. Extremely good at their jobs, kind, and they KNOW the menu. They offer help and suggestions for people with allergies. Excellent service.

The new servers seem absolutely uninterested. I’ve asked questions about them menu and they’ve bot even offered to find the answers and say they don’t know. I appreciate that new staff won’t know everything but I do expect them to find out - especially when they’re not busy. I mean, that’s literally their job. If they’re not there to help me get an order, why are they there? Is it just to scowl and look angry and behave as if I’m an inconvenience? If I weren’t there to eat they wouldn’t have a job.

Some people shouldn’t work in the service industry. It’s easy to know when you’re one of them - you don’t enjoy interacting with the customers. The two new servers seem to really struggle with this.

If this were my business first I wouldn’t schedule them together because they seem to like to hide in the kitchen talking and ignore tables who need service, and second, I’d have them shadow one of the experienced servers, so they can learn how to treat customers.

Been coming here for many years and will turn around and leave when I see the new staff. There are many other options within a few hundred meters where I get friendly service...

Ordered 1/2 corned beef sandwich on rye with potato salad. Sandwich good. Potato salad was mostly inedible, had to leave over half uneaten since the majority was 2 very large hunks of potato with no dressing or flavour. Told serving waitress and waitress who removed finished plates, about it, with no response from them other than a sorry comment. At payment time, I asked the till person to remove that portion of the food order from the bill. Till person checked with both waitresses, and came back and said she would remove that charge. Bill total remained the same and when I questioned it, she said that they couldn't alter the bill amount since the potato salad was part of an order (and I guess, not the whole order?). My husband's chicken schnitzel in the Illegal Curve sandwich was tough and dry and like a reheated leftover. However he never complained about it.

We also had an issue earlier this year when we were overcharged on all the items we had ordered. When I mentioned this at the till, I was told that the menus had been changed and we must have been given a menu that hadn't been updated yet. Continued to charge us the increased prices, instead of the prices shown in our menu. Pretty sketchy behaviour.

We usually eat here several times a year, but after this we won't...