Whispers Cafe — Restaurant in Manawatū-Whanganui

3/10

What a disappointment. The staff are friendly the environment is nice and the music is tolerable. As long as you're only going for some croissant and juice you're fine. Get any coffee beverages and here's where it all falls over. I haven't tasted anything so bland since my last drink of water. Talk about revolting. It was as though someone had foamed some milk then dusted some instant coffee powder on the top before shaking vigorously like a Bond martini. The brew itself I'd say scored a 1/10 for shear non-flavour and being luke warm to boot. This café (and I use the term lightly) only scored 3/10 because of the other factors mentioned earlier. The problem with Levin is there's simply not enough competitive drive, not enough nearby cafe's to challenge this loser to up its anti & get back to basics; tampering the milk; capturing those flavors from the extraction without over doing it or in this case UNDER-doing it. The other pro lem tbat extends from tbis is that the locals o ly have the one place to go hence would remember what a real coffee tastes like and thus they keep doing business, all it needs is some healthy competition and boom sink or swim. Until then... The wait time was rediculous for the tripe I received and the end result was like asking for a mocaccino and receiving someone's left over milk from their morning breakfast cereal. Would I go again? No. Wait for Levin to get a real properly-trained café (or drive several kilometers to the nea rest neighboring town) instead of this bakery/restaurant that's dabbling in coffee as a piss-poor side activity to see how many green faces they can produce for their own comical...

If I could put 0 stars I would. Me and my partner ordered at the counter and they didn't give us a order number. We didn't receive our drinks until we went up to the counter 30 minutes later and complained to the manager. They said they'd give us a number and be right out, took us going up AGAIN. We didn't receive our food until going up to complain after an HOUR AND 20 MINUTES of nothing. Manager barely just got us our food because I was after a refund for waiting SO long, we just wanted to go home. The staff provided NOTHING. There was no table checking, no food checks, no drink checks. I had to ask for a someone to come wipe the table that me and partner removed the plates from just so we'd have somewhere clean to sit. Seemed like all the staff just avoided doing their jobs and no wonder with the manager that runs the place. If you're looking for terrible service and mediocre food Whispers...

Our friend the Christian took the Professor and I to Whispers. I was hoping for a religious experience but was disappointed. The Professor was not happy with her cappuccino as there was too much milk and there was only a hint of crema on both long blacks. The scones and mini bacon and egg pie were good. Not enough dates in the date scone but good. The apple and walnut mini cake was stodgy. The kicker was the service. It reminded me of a family run business where the family is more important than the customer. The coffees took there time getting to us. The scones were served by a male who appeared to have no concept of hospitality. The last part of our order did not get to us. The Professor had to ask and brought out the goods. The staff appear to be busy doing something else and had put the goods on a plate but forgot the customer had paid for service. Small town location is not excuse for...