Café du Centre — Restaurant in Geneva

The food is quite good. The service is NOT. This place is enticing for a tourist on the go: Near the river, and the Jet, full of people, have vacant tables and is open until midnight which is not the case for most restaurants. Looking for a place to celebrate our 5th anniversary we walked stopped and asked for a table. In hindsight, we probably would have faired better elsewhere. Initially, it looked good. The waiter was nice and even spoke some English. He took our orders fairly quickly, and the wine arrived fast as well. The entre was good and also arrived pretty fast. Then it took forever for the main courses to come. At least 30 minutes. When we asked for the mineral water we ordered, the answer was that it is coming "it takes time to prepare the drinks" (??? open a bottle of water?). Eventually, we caught the attention of another waiter and things started to move. My fisherman's stew arrived, then a salad that didn't look at all like a King Prawns on guacamole. We called the first waiter to ask him if this is the right dish, he assured us that it is, and that the guacamole is at the bottom. A careful archaeological dig and eat by my wife found no prone, nor guacamole. Only some sweet potatoes and artichoke. So we again called on the second waiter that confirmed that this is indeed the wrong dish, and that he will take care of it. Which he did. The right dish arrived just about when I finished my stew. It had big prominent prawns on top and indeed there was guacamole under it. Waiter two continued to serve us in a way that made me almost forgive waiter one for his mistake (until he came over trying to explain to me why we ordered the wrong dish, which is a stupid thing to do in any circumstances, and especially when clearly he himself didn't recognize the dish he served as he told us that it was the one with guacamole inside). I sent him off with "we had a misunderstanding" since I didn't want to waste my evening arguing with a waiter. However, the clincher was when we asked for the check, which added up to 146 SF (160 USD) and were told that they charged us for half of the wrong salad and full charge for the one we asked for in the first place. I think waiter #two had no say in it. He looked and acted like he really cared for good service, but as far as I am concerned, this place proved unfit to serve customers. If they value their 14 SF (for a dish they shouldn't have served us in the first place) over their customers satisfaction, fine. I didn't waste my time arguing. I have an anniversary to celebrate. I just took the time to write this story here to warn others, and I do think it will end up costing them wayyyyy more than the lousy 14 SF. A finale thought for the owner to ponder - I don't come just for your food. I come to enjoy an experience. You spoiled my entire experience. Not just the 14 SF. You tainted the entire meal by a sour taste of disappointment. (I add the picture of the two dishes just to point out how different they look and how glaring waiter # 1...

We visited Café du Centre in Geneva for drinks before dinner. We ordered 3 glasses of red wine and ice cream. The server who seated us at the table without table linen, which we felt was reasonable since we were not dining on a full meal.

The same server then took our drink order. We also requested 3 glasses of water. We noticed that many restaurants in Geneva automatically assume guests will want to order bottled water, but we found the local tap water to be fresh and drinkable, as is typical in Switzerland. It's a good idea to specify if you would like tap water to avoid being charged for bottled water unnecessarily.

When our order arrived, a different server brought us a half-filled 30 cl carafe of wine along with 2 wine glasses. We were surprised by the small wine servings, as we had ordered 3 individual glasses. We informed the server that there were 3 of us and we had ordered 3 glasses of wine. She promptly brought us a third wine glass, but we ended up having to share the half carafe, essentially getting a "wine tasting" portion rather than our requested 3 full glasses.

When asked for the bill with the first server who had taken our order, we raised our concern about the wine servings. She insisted that the 30 cl carafe was a full portion and appropriate for 3 glasses. Since we had finished the wine, there was no point in further argument. We left feeling unhappy with the experience and the dismissive attitude of the server when we tried to provide feedback.

Overall, the service at Café du Centre fell short of our expectations, with issues around the wine servings and the server's response when we politely tried to resolve the problem. We would recommend that the restaurant review their wine service procedures and train staff to be more attentive and accommodating when customers raise...

During a recent family lunch outing, we decided to try out a restaurant that had great Google ratings, a good location, and a promising atmosphere. However, our experience turned out to be quite disappointing.

Right from the beginning, it was evident that something was amiss. After a short wait to be seated, the waiter's first words to us were, "we do not have pizza!!!" I couldn't understand why he would choose to start our interaction on such a negative note. What puzzled me even more was whether his abrupt statement was somehow related to the fact that I was with my child or something else. I found his manners to be extremely poor and unwelcoming. Despite this initial interaction, we decided to give the place a chance. However, the disrespect and lack of courtesy continued. After my initial response, the waiter simply turned his back without saying anything, leaving me standing there in disbelief as he walked away. He eventually gestured for us to follow him to our table in a manner that I found to be rude and degrading.

The menu was entirely in French, lacking any translations, which gave the impression that this establishment catered exclusively to French-speaking customers. This made it incredibly difficult for non-French speakers like us to navigate the menu and make informed choices.

To top it off, the food we ordered was unsatisfactory, served cold, and did not taste good. The service left a lot to be desired, and given the overall experience, we found that the prices were unjustifiable.

In summary, everything about our visit to this restaurant fell short of our expectations. I sincerely hope that no one else has to endure the same kind of disappointing experience...