The Preservatory Cafe — Restaurant in Christchurch

I thought hard about the scores I gave this place as I do go often and do recommend it to others too. The food is always yummy and you can find things in their pantry that you don't see in other local coffee places so it's nice for the.

The setting is probably the best it can be for it's buulding and that totally fine too.

The service isn't and has never been welcoming though. You never get a friendly hello or a smile. It isn't bad service at all but there is always what I'd call 'good' customer service missing which is a shame.

I will say that they do sit in an location where there's a lot of clientelle that acts as if they are more important than the rest of society. So maybe they are just over the less than friendly customer behaviour they can see in there too.

Try and smile a little though! It will make your...

Absolutely the worst cafe experience we have ever had. First meal arrived 40 minutes before the next (total of 65 minutes to deliver 3 childrens and 2 adults meals) 2x Omelettes, 1 sausage, 1 kids scrambled eggs, and 1 bagel with cream cheese. My vegetarian 'omelette' was more like an extremely sloppy excuse of open crepe - with 4 pieces of baby spinach and 1 diced mushroom - and was most obviously cooked in the dirty bacon fat covered frying pan used for my husbands bacon (vegetarians don't really appreciate that... thanks). Ridiculously small portion sizes, my daughters sausage was clearly cut in half! The service was appalling, the 1 and only staff member was unfriendly and totally unapologetic. And the chef was clearly incapable of delivering even the most basic of...

15/7/21. Ordered Chicken pie cold to take away. Appealing appearance, but I always remove the 'lid' and check the contents before heating/eating. Very disappointing! A few shreds of rather dry chicken meat had been sprinkled on the top of a rather sludgy thick layer of some vegetable goo - gravy/carrot/ other? Chicken content was nowhere near the 25% required in NZ Food Standards regulations. This should not be labelled/sold as a 'chicken' pie. I don't know if the beef pie has the same issue or not - a thick layer of nondescript gloop with a few scattered pieces of the supposed meat ingredient? Try it yourself next time you go there .. buy a pie to eat in or go, but ask to have a look under...