Scorch O Rama — Restaurant in North Island

I’ve been coming to Scorch-O-Rama since 2021 and always loved the quirky vibes, beautiful location, and brunch options, which is why I’ve recommended this place to friends and returned several times. But after my recent visit with three other friends, I’m genuinely disappointed and feel compelled to share our awful experience.

We understand the place is usually busy, especially on a public holiday, but that shouldn’t be an excuse for poor service. When we arrived, the waiter looked nervous, and one of my friends, who is strictly vegetarian, politely asked if her nachos toppings could be served separately. Instead of simply saying yes or no, the waiter told us, “I’ll try but the chef might get angry as it’s busy.” Honestly, as customers, we do not need to hear that internal drama — it’s unprofessional and made us feel extremely uncomfortable.

The food took over 40 minutes to arrive — we expected some delay but hoped the quality would make up for it. Unfortunately, it didn’t. One of the lattes we ordered was ice cold, and when we tried to request a bottle of water from a staff member who brought out our drinks, she just said, “I’m not a waitress,” and pointed to someone else. No one ever came back to assist us. The overall attitude of the staff felt cold, passive-aggressive, and dismissive.

The most basic sides fries we ordered came uncooked when we asked waiter he asked us what he should be doing about that.

When we went to pay, we kindly shared our feedback with the cashier, who was actually lovely and understanding. She said she’d call the manager — which we appreciated — but the manager’s response left us shocked. Instead of acknowledging our poor experience, she justified the waiter’s comments by saying, “That’s how the chef is, and the waiter is new.” As someone who works in hospitality, I get that things can go wrong, but the way this was handled was deeply unprofessional.

No real apology, no proper solution. They only took one latte and nachos off the bill and made us feel awkward in front of other customers by saying, “You’ve eaten half the food, so you still need to pay.” We NEVER refused to pay — we just expected our concerns to be handled with care and professionalism. Instead, we left disappointed, disrespected, and cold — literally and figuratively.

Sadly, this place has completely lost its charm for us. What used to be a favorite brunch spot is now a reminder of how poor management and untrained staff can ruin a great establishment. We won’t...

After dining at this establishment today I was left very frustrated with the poor communication from wait staff and unprofessionalism from who I assume to be a young manager or supervisor.

The young manager or supervisor (assumption) was yelling in front of customers about issues arising within the staff. At one point she yelled from one side of the road to the other aggressively asking her team why there weren’t any tables. This behaviour continued throughout our dining experience and made me feel very uncomfortable.

The girl at the till told a customer next to us who was concerned about how busy it was that “this isn’t busy, you should see summer”. She continued to say that they were used to it and not to worry.

When we were seated, the young girl was quick to take our order. She did not, however, warn us of any wait time. My partner and I could see it was a full house and were understanding of that, so we assumed around a 25-30 minute wait.

We assumed this because 1. The girl at the front said that it wasn’t busy and they’re used to this. 2. NO ONE told us otherwise.

After 30 minutes we flagged a different waitress down who said that it would be awhile because 2 large tables had ordered ahead of us. This was not communicated to us at all previously.

We say okay, she leaves. 15 minutes go by and we realise neither of the larger tables have their food. No one has stopped by to communicate with us, no one has offered apologies. In fact, we were mostly ignored.

At this point it’s been over an hour and we’re ready to leave. We flag someone down AGAIN and ask if she can get an estimate for us. She comes back and says “awhile” and says she’ll talk to someone about it. She never came back to communicate what that conversation entailed.

FINALLY the food arrives. Again, no apology. By this point, both my partner and I are fed up. The food did not improve our moods. I got the steak and my partner got scrambled eggs, bacon, hashbrowns and toasted bread. It was average.

Overall, the experience was extremely poor. I don’t often leave reviews, but as someone who worked in wait staff from the ages of 15-21, I suggest you teach your staff how to communicate with their customers. The staff I encountered today found even basic communication difficult.

Honestly, the experience ruined mine and my...

Don’t go if your time in the weekend is precious to you. We waited over an hour for a table only to find out that we’ve been forgotten… (yes I did asked during the hour if we have been forgotten as several groups of people who came after us had got tables, and we got told that they were just busy). Eventually we worked out what happened and sat down only to find that food was another 45 minutes away. I looked around us, most tables didn’t yet have food (we were outside), perhaps everyone hadn’t sat for long. To put it into context - we were there after 12:15pm and wouldn’t have got food until 14:00. We didn’t want to wait another 45 min and left after 1.5 hour of wait. Very disorganised. One thing to note was that while we were waiting for our table, I saw two motorcyclists ordered takeaway food and drinks which they got pretty fast, and they just went across the road and found themselves a table and sat down. No one asked them to leave - perhaps this was a hack… They finished their food well before we got a table anyway. This was supposed to be a treat us but it was far from it. Maybe manager was too busy to care even when I asked if we were forgotten. We literally stood in front of her for the entire hour. So if you have time to kill - go. If your weekend is precious like...