Café Engel — Restaurant in Helsinki sub-region

Very disappointed by my recent dine-in experience here. In summary, the service was excellent, but the food was not good.

I read previous reviews mentioning that the cakes here were good, so I ordered a mango cheesecake. It was surprisingly bad! It was quite obvious that the cake had been sitting out for a very long time. The top layer was supposed to be a supple mango gelatin, but the texture was rough like a dehydrated fruit. The cheesecake component itself was very dense, dry, and crumbly. The bottom layer of the crust was hard. It was very difficult to cut through with my fork. After my first bite and having other people at my table confirm my observations, I ended up sending it back to the kitchen. For the price (it was nearly 9€) it was definitely not worth it!

However, the staff were very nice and offered me a different cake from the display and a full refund. I will give them high marks for customer service. I chose the Runeberg torte as my replacement, however that was disappointingly dry and hard as well.

The banana chocolate cake my friend chose was much better than the cakes I ordered, and moist. The carrot cake was also decent.

However for the price of the cakes, and with the historical reputation of this cafe, I expected a much higher quality. My hope is that the cafe will do a quality control check of their food offerings before selling it to the public.

The cafe itself has nice views of the Helsinki cathedral. Seating can be quite cramped, as there are a lot of tables squished close together. This makes it hard to navigate during the winter, when lots of people have...

My gosh, what a beautiful place! Café Engel truly embodies the magnificence of European charm, offering not only a cozy retreat but a stunning view of the plaza and a prime central location in Helsinki’s Old City. The interior is gorgeous, full of character and elegance—definitely the kind of spot you’ll want to visit during the off-peak seasons or times to really soak in the peaceful atmosphere.

We were thrilled to discover they offer gluten-free options. The hot chocolate was an absolute highlight—made with almond milk and special requests, it was perfectly balanced, not too sweet, and oh-so-delicious. The cake we tried was equally delightful, and while some of the other offerings were a little gluten-heavy for us personally, we still enjoyed everything for what it was. What really made our experience stand out, though, was the wonderful server who took our order and accommodated our special request. She was a very centered, balanced, and welcoming individual—originally from mixed heritage, as we learned—and her warmth truly added a personal touch to our visit. In a city where people are generally friendly but can sometimes seem a bit reserved, she was one of the most genuinely warm people we encountered in Helsinki.

Café Engel feels like the perfect spot for both travelers and locals alike. It’s clear the staff are professional and care deeply about providing an excellent experience. Overall, a fantastic visit, and I’d highly recommend it for anyone...

I have been here a few times before. Love the food. But started to see a decrease in customer service. There was a brunette waitress girl who was discriminative. I am Asian but I do speak perfect finnish. I came to the counter speaking Finnish but she acted so confused, for a second I thought she doesn’t speak Finnish so we started to talk in English. My friend did the reservation for us. She wrote in the reservation — window seat (this I didn’t know). She led me then to a corner seat next to the toilet when there were clearly better empty seats as well as window seats in the restaurant. When my friend arrived (Finnish) arrived, she asked why didn’t we have window seat and the waitress was clearly embarrassed telling that not all the wishes would be fulfilled. And she did reply in Finnish so she probably just didn’t want to speak Finnish to me. But the explanation was so arrogant, why we would have needed to reserve seats in the first place? There were lots of empty seats in the resultants. That being said, I won’t recommend this restaurant to foreigners or tourist, even if I think this is the main stream of the income for this restaurant.

Update: As I wrote, there were lots of free seat including window seats with no reservation signed since the moment I entered until when I left. But we were placed next to the toilet. Just check your employee next time when you hire, at least making sure there not crazy rascist...