brasserie TORTUE — Restaurant in Hamburg

Excellent kitchen, very nice interior, value for money is not balanced – all impression are subjective.

Value for money We had dinner and breakfast there. Dinner was 169€ for 2 people, 1 alcoholic drink each, we shared one starter and both had a main meal, our daughter had steamed veggies. Breakfast was delicious and again too small of a volume for the money. Refer to my 2. point regarding hot beverages. Check the picture of your breakfast bill for details. Hotel guests pay 39€ per person for the breakfast buffet if you book breakfast directly upon arrival or you pay 55€ per person when you book the breakfast buffet spontaneously on the very morning itself. Or you go for á la carte, as we did.

Why do I deduct 2 stars? Well because to me the price as too high for the volume of food. I’d suppose that each dish as to pay for the very excellently made interior. But still it was too expensive when I compare it with equally well designed and some sort of budget restaurants in other major cities in Germany.

Value for money of hot beverages – focus on coffee My more “sever” complaint is about the coffee. It’s pricey, of ok quality and most importantly not made from a barista style portafilter machine. Why do I say barista style? Well, there are so many half automatic and fully manual machines on the market that can offer the performance that’s required in gastronomy. The Brasserie Tortue just had a regular fully automatic machine. I do understand that the speed to pump out the sheer volume of coffee does not allow for compromises. Yet, if you ask 6€ for a café crema I expect that to be delicious – and it wasn’t. It was ok, about for “ok” I’d be willing to pay 2-3€.

Oh and the green tee my wife had as served in the same cup size as my café crema. So it had about 200-250ml which for a tea is too little – again my subjective perspective.

My conclusion on point 2.: A place like that which asks the prices it does would take great pleasure in operating and showcasing a barista machine – I’m sure.

Atmosphere & interior The place was buzzing on Friday morning for breakfast – it was a bank holiday “Day of German Unity” which was Thursday 03.10. I overheard a conversation of the staff. They said that you need to book up to 6 weeks in advance.

The atmosphere was very nice. Lovely decoration, lovely arrangement of the buffet. Staff was friendly and welcoming.

The interior is classis French brasserie – just very accommodating with a chic touch.

Kid-friendly environment A clear and straight yes without constraints. They were kind and cute with our little one. They offered a high chair and rearrange tables for us so we had a comfortable experience with the space...

Totally different experience as non-guest. Watch out!

I had been here multiple times before for dinner and breakfast, as I live next door and my family/friends stay here when visiting me (as recently as 3 weeks ago). Last weekend, I went with a friend for breakfast after highly recommending the breakfast, and was extremely disappointed at how they treat non-guests as second class.

There is a separate menu (with fewer items but the same price!) if you are not a guest and they are not transparent or honest about it (they only show the full menu on their website to trick you). Even basics like French toast and omelette have been removed. They have a tiny selection of open face sandwiches (I think 4 varieties) and a giant bowl of muesli, which they leave out to dry for hours. The fruit salad was already turning brown. Poached and scrambled eggs as well as crepes are made to order. I didn't take a photo because it was beyond underwhelming.

They also had all their heaters on when it was around 20 degrees and we were sitting outside.

Cannot recommend this to anyone and after this dishonest experience, will even tell my family and friends to stay at another hotel. For 49 Euros per person, you can eat much...

Absolute worst service of my life to a point where I truly believe this restaurant is racist against people of color. They managed to sit all white people in front of us even though we have reserved (my German wife’s name) and arrived 20 minutes in advance, but as soon as I (instead of my wife) show up to tell them we arrived early, our table is not ready and we have to wait 5 minutes. We were told to wait in the lobby where we were eventually going to be called. That turned into another 30 minutes of waiting for her to pick us up, which predictably never happened.

When we were finally seated (after I went back in to let my presence known), all the other guests around us were served while we were tended to last and our mains were served 1.5 hours after we were seated. The table next to us who were seated half an hour later than us were always tended to and served first all through out the apps/mains/deserts (they were a party of 3 to our 4).

Furthermore, they “forgot” our wine order, drink order- my steak was extremely over cooked.

I usually make a point of not leaving public reviews, but I need to make sure people are aware and be properly warned about...