Town Hall — Restaurant in New Delhi

A predominantly Japanese restaurant although, being India, it also does Chinese and pizza!!! I stuck only to the Japanese food although I was worried about authenticity. My starter of tuna sashimi was authentic enough but was at the very limit of freshness - it wouldn't have survived another 30 minutes and really should have been discarded. I nervously waited for my main course of baked unagi on rice but it did not disappoint in the least. It was exactly what I would have expected and redeemed the restaurant in my eyes. The only off note was the wasabi and ginger served on the side of the bowl which seems to be a sophisticated to the expectations of people who do not know authentic Japanese cuisine and assume wasabi and ginger comes with everything. My companions were both vegetarians and stuck to the Chinese side of the menu and we're very happy except for the baos which was more pitta like and less bun like. The drinks list was excellent but, true to form for India, there were drinks listed that were not available. We're not talking exotic fare but things like Bombay Sapphire! But we nonetheless ordered some signature cocktails which were excellent. We didn't order dessert. Through it all the service was superlative. The wait staff were very observant and seemed to anticipate a lot of our needs. There were also nice touches like extra straws (eco-friendly paper ones!) being brought in a napkin. The staff deserve a special hurrah! The space itself was really nice and the overall ambience was really good. I am deducting one star for missing drinks and the almost...

Two years ago I gave 5 stars.

After tonight's experience, I am forced to revise it to 3. Tonight we were a group of 4 adults, (all science doctorates who lived in EU+US for over a decade, so we have a minimum benchmark) and one kid for a short drinks break between Lodhi Garden and our drive home. Point one - we had to repeatedly ask for water and then someone to take our order. Water came, but the server filled three glasses out of five on the table, so, we had to ask for more. This was just the first fill, not refill, which never came. Far cry from what can be termed as the global minimum standard for restaurant customer service. Point two - the general consensus was that the service was rude to the point that after settling our bill, when we were sitting and chatting, waiting for our friend to return from the washroom, one server, brushed against me with his backside twice. I did point it out to him that he could have easily taken a longer but unobstructed route. He did verbally apologize, but quite nonchalantly. They could have just asked us to vacate the table, although, the place was at 50% capacity at max. You don't need a top ranked business degree to know that in the service business, every customer should be treated like a king/queen since you never know how/when directly/indirectly they can catalyze high value. Highly unprofessional customer service in our humble opinion. Not premium upscale retail commercial quality for sure.

Deeply...

Terrible service. I'm sorry to say this about what seems like an amazing place otherwise. Got there.. asked for a table.. they showed us one in the corner.. said it'll take a few minutes. We decide to start at the bar itself and order drinks. Ten minutes later we see another couple being seated there. Then staff comes to us.. take our names. 10 minutes later.. they ask us if we want a table in the next room.. we go have a look and say okay.. we take our drinks and shift there.. staff comes rushing.. says sorry.. someone is sitting here.. takes us to a crappy messy table in another room which we don't like.. no worries we say and carry our drinks back to the bar.. where they have given our seats away. All this in less than 2 minutes. We are now left standing in the middle of all these tables for another 10 minutes with no one to attend to us, drinks in hand. We finally sit down on one empty table.. these two women come up to us and say.. get up.. this is reserved ! We are still polite and say okay, we plan to leave in 5 as our drinks are almost over and were quite annoyed by then. But no.. get up right now as it's reserved. We were like.. there is no one here and we aren't using the table... for God's sake.. just let us be for 5 ! No they say.. get up ? Wow ! Of course.. we paid and left ! Wouldn't go...