Café Van Leeuwen — Restaurant in Amsterdam

So this is a place I both love and hate.

I love the van Leeuwen burger, I love their caeser salad (especially when they add extra chicken and bacon for me) and I love that they have a great beer selection. I love the quiet upstairs that I can look on to the canal, or in the summer, I love the terrace out front.

What I hate is how a lot of their waiting staff simply ignore you. You could be standing at the bar whilst the bar tender is pouring a beer and wait upwards of 5 mins before he even turns around and acknowledges you. How difficult is it for him to say "I'll be right with you", and is it really that difficult to take an order AND pour a beer at the same time? I guess they don't hire staff who can multi-task.

On top of that, when I ate there for dinner one evening, I sat upstairs. Not once did anyone come up to take my order, and each time I needed a refill, I had to walk back down to the bar myself. I know for a fact they wait tables upstairs, They've done it before at lunchtime. But the clown they had working that evening clearly had other ideas.

There is ONLY ONE member of staff who knows what she's doing. She's Brazilian/Dutch, very friendly, very fast and always up for a chat. The rest of them are your usual no-clue millenials only there for a wage cheque at the end of the month. It's a shame really, but it has so much potential, and the chef clearly knows what...

If I could give 0 stars I would. Came to this cafe and ordered bar snacks as they’d stopped lunch and not started dinner. Ordered spring rolls and olives. 40 minutes later we asked a waitress where our food was. She said the kitchen is busy. The table next to us (who arrived 5 mins before we asked where our food was) then got their food. We waited aasked again. Was then told the waitress who took our order had finished shift and never put the order through?!? We were told the snacks would be 5 minutes. Food arrives but the spring rolls, there are only 6 of them, the menu says 8 spring rolls. I tell the waitress when she brings the bill and she said “sorry but we have different menus” ?!?!? The bill was fully charged for the food we ordered; we begrudgingly paid it but this is honestly the worst service I’ve ever...

Today I ordered a falafel burger. On the menu it said it would come with yoghurt-mint dressing and it came also with nuts. The nuts were not mentioned in the menu so i told the waiter that i am allergic to nuts and it was not mentioned in the menu. Instead of giving me a new one for free the waiter demanded that I pay this one and refused to give me a new one for free because he said that I should’ve informed them in advance for my nut allergy. I simply didn’t because it was not mentioned on the menu that the falafel burger contains nuts. Someone can f*kind die because of that... people need to understand that allergies are a serious thing. I will demand a refund and look for my rights regarding this. Very disappointed of this place and it looked very...