Brasserie La Chicorée — Restaurant in Lille

We recently went there in a group of 3 at 10 pm and stayed for 2 hours, but experienced multiple sub-par French dishes. Our starter was the French onion soup, which was lukewarm and the broth was very bland (more like water mixed with cheese and onion, instead of a broth from onions). We requested to make it hotter (which they did - the servers were friendly), but it took at least 15 minutes, and was now packed with the bread fillings and cheese instead of any soup. We were disappointed but continued on to our main dishes, which were 2 steak menu and a salmon fillet. The salmon fillet was fine - not bad, but not too special, just mediocre. However, we requested 1 steak to be medium-rare, but it was well done, borderline burnt. We requested the other steak to be medium, but it was rare, and the inside was borderline raw (literally). We wanted to give a final try and ordered a beef tartar, which was mediocre at best, because it was drenched in mustard sauce, and we couldn't even go through half of it because the taste was too strong. The tasty things in the dishes we ordered were the fries, the bread, the sauce with the main dish, and the wine, but since all the starters and main dish were really letting down (we were hungry and didn't even have high expectations), I can't really give anything better than 1 star. In their defence, we don't speak any French and we only know the briefs of the French cuisine culture. The servers were friendly however (the frontman... not the most) and the salmon fillet was edible. We walked in thinking, "what kind of idiot orders a burger in a French restaurant?", but after experiencing what we went through, and realising the French couple next to us ordered a burger instead (which looked and smelled really good), it was a bit of a surprise. We don't know anything about the seafood however, maybe...

This place was terrible, despite it seeming to be a tourist driven establishment. We had a native speaker with us and that didn’t seem to help with how we were treated at this restaurant. We ordered our drinks and they were wrong, which is fine since there is still a language barrier. Once that happened service came to a halt for us. We waited 1 hour for our food. Three tables nearby who had sat 10-20 minutes after us got their food before us. When we asked for our food the waiter told us he would get our food as if he knew it was already there. If he knew it was there, why not bring it out? By the time we got it, it was clear it had been sitting out for a while. We ate because we were starving by that time, but we paid 120€ for old food essentially. Do yourself a favor, go to one of the local places outside of the tourist traps like this, support the ones who actually care about food and polite service. And if you do go here anyway definitely don’t get the French onion soup. It wasn’t the delicate soup we were expecting. It was...

Not great experience overall.

(-) It took ~20 minutes for them to even give me a menu. The food was alright (I expected better for the price).

(+) The location is very good.

The real problem was when I wanted to pay: they charged me a double drink (which I did not consume) and a double dish (which I did consume but I was unaware it wasn’t what I ordered). I think it’s a nice, well-located restaurant, that does not have to resort to that kind of mischievous behavior to make a coin. Fair enough it was a somewhat busy hour when I was there, and there may not have been much staff (3 waiters served me during the time I was there) but it’s ridiculous that they serve you what they want and not what you order. Worst of all is that it took another ~15 minutes to “rectify” the check, and their only response was to make it up offering a cup coffee (No, thank you, I don’t know if you are going to charge me for this too). I would avoid it, and if it’s not possible I would double check everything...