Mina Steakhouse — Restaurant in Cambridge

Visited today with one other person after reading a few pleasant review about the establishment.

The restaurant itself is medium sized and probably sits around 50-60 guests, the decor is quite generic to what you see in 95% of restaurants at the moment which is flower walls, faux marble tables & single seater mini fabric chairs.

We were greeted by a friendly girl who promptly seated us and provided menus, she arrived approximately 6-7 mins later to see if we were ready to order food to which we wasn’t and we asked for 2 more minutes, we then went on to wait at least 15 more minutes as the staff became preoccupied in what it seemed like prepping items for the dinner service, it came to the point where I had to physically get the attention of one of the staff to take our food order.

We ordered the chicken tenders starter, tomahawk steak main, Korean chicken skewer main, a side of vegetables & 2 mocktails.

Firstly the tenders, these were definitely shop bought frozen tenders which were coated in a sauce by the chef, served with a blue cheese sauce, this was the most pleasant dish we were going to eat the whole experience as everything else was just average after wards.

The Korean chicken skewers were again guaranteed frozen ready made spicy chicken bites, the same stuff you get at your local fried chicken shop except these guys had glazed them very very lightly with a sauce, almost too lightly in fact, some pieces were not coated, the fact that these are frozen bites made us very disappointed indeed because the dish there advertising is very easy to make yet the chefs lack the motivation or passion to make it properly, flavour was average and a 6/10 at best.

My £60 tomahawk steak requested medium rare was presented awfully with foil still attached on the bone, it was served in a horrible mass catering style looking silver dish with generic boring salad and a few whole cherry tomatoes thrown on top, not even the slightest effort to cut them up or add a few interesting elements like red onions, peppers, cucumbers etc to the salad to make it half decent, it was also served with a huge portions of fried drizzled with what looked like Algerian sauce or nacho cheese sauce out of a tin, I didn’t try them as I’m not currently eating any fried foods. The steak arrived well done, it was bland, not seasoned at all as if salt & pepper is illegal in that kitchen, no real char flavour from the grill & most disappointingly because it was well done it was CHEWY, very chewy.

A waitress did come and ask us about our food about 5 mins after it was served to which I made her aware my steak which I requested med rare was well overdone, she did ask if I’d like anything else who which I objected as we’d already waited 30 minutes for mains, we don’t mind waiting for food if it’s cooked correctly as per our request, we will be unhappy if we wait a long time and it comes out wrong especially when paying £60 for a single main course. The steak was served with 3 sauces: garlic mushroom, peppercorn & a spicy vinegar style dressing, all 3 were embarrassingly awful, none had real depth of flavour, the mushroom sauce & peppercorn sauce tasted like double cream with some powdered flavourings thrown in, the spicy dressing was poorly matched & overpowering in chilli, there was absolutely NO harmony in this dish at all.

The vegetable side which consisted of 1 baby carrot, a few tenderstem broccoli & asparagus were all raw and under seasoned, I know what al dente is but these were RAW, especially the carrot.

Our mocktails were the coconut daiquiri & virgin mojito, again both were average and nothing special about them, the coconut daiquiri although decent it would be 10/10 if it had a splash more of sugar syrup, a squeeze of lime juice & some fresh lime zest on top for colour as it’s just pure white in colour.

Very poor experience, very poor quality of food, they also charge a 12.5% fixed service charge, remember you’re not legally obliged...

I actually came down from London for my birthday with high hopes. I must say I am a fair person when it comes to reviewing places and I give credit when it's due.

Positives -We was greated by a male waiter who showed us our seats. -Décor is lovely. I believe they did a great job. Atmosphere was great. A young female waiter came to our table and took our orders and was very accommodating. Starter platter was amazing so was on to a great start. can park right outside the restaurant

Negatives majority of the food was ready made what we initially wanted for mains everything was out of stock so we had to revert to second options. This is due to a late delivery. How can a restaurant be running with their inventory so low? the ribs were hideous and hard the jalapeno bites were served on what felt like school dinners Mac and cheese was 95% cheese and there was nothing Mac about this dish whatsoever, too overpowering

On to the mains I decided to get a buffalo chicken fillet burger.

I expected a large fillet burger to match the price tag. Instead I got what seems like a steak burger. I was confused as to what was on my plate. When I took a bite I was certain this wasn't a fillet burger and if was why is it so far off what you'd find in a chicken shop at a fraction of the price.

We then asked one of the female waitress who asked the chefs and confirmed it was a steak burger.

When the female manager was confronted she disagreed and clearly has not taken into consideration the customer is always right. She was adamant it was fillet and then claimed she asked her suppliers who were delivering the goods at this very moment. If you are so confident what is the need to ask them? We mentioned the other waitress has already confirmed that it is steak and she then tried to belittle the knowledge of her staff and went on to say 'shes new she doesn't know and is undergoing training'.

We just wanted it off the bill at this point as a £15 chicken steak burger is beyond unreasonable. We were shocked at the attitude of the manager who was wearing non managerial clothing topped with a headband. We stopped arguing with her as she just didnt seem to get it. We paid and as food reviewers and critics we thought we would post a honest review of our experience.

We spent just under £100 for average food enhanced with a bit of smoke. Next time we will just stick to the London restaurants. Worth the price tag.

If you are thinking of going Mina I would say don't but if you have no other choice the only thing worth ordering is the starter platter.

Will not...

Really dissapointed to write this review. Visited Mina Steakhouse as part of our Bank Holiday plans, travelling from Birmingham. The restaurant looked amazing aesthetically and that is where the plus points ended for me sadly. We were greeted with a "have you booked?if not you have to wait till tables were cleared". Which is fair enough we didn't book we were happy to wait, we then were seated to a pretty empty restaurant. Barring us just a couple with children and a group of diners. Not sure what tables needed cleaning, as there was ample that were fine to dine on. We then had an overly efficient waitress who didn't give us a chance to even finish our sentence, who only offered large bottled water. Never been asked this as soon as we are seated. A drink perhaps or given a drinks menu but never a forceful assumption we should purchase their bottled water. We knew at this point the experience will be interesting. I ordered the salmon, it was over cooked and for the price paid it was a very tiny portion. The grilled vegetables some broccoli stems and asparagus were not seasoned properly and flash fried,so were quite hard to chew. My partners burger looked great as did my food presentation wise but again was very bland. The burger was not seasoned properly and was probably one of the most bland burgers we have consumed. We had the waitress come over to ask if we were finished, after a few minutes of the food arriving, again bizarre. The plates were not even half empty, so not sure how that was a prompt. I understand hospitality industry has been challenged of late, however it does not make it acceptable to charge these prices with below than average / standard of food. It is a great shame as I personally wouldn't recommend to friends or family. Visit if you wish it is your perogative, but there are better halal places to get tasty food and more value for money in Cambridge. The decor is very high end but essentially you visit a restaurant for the food and not just for the aesthetics. Sorry Mina Steakhouse big thumbs down for us. The service charge I felt was not justified with our experience, not a huge sum but not worthy of the service and quality and portion of food we ad received. We are very fortunate to reside in Birmingham with some great Steakhouses, which provide tasty dishes, great atmosphere/service and more importantly with the financial climate value for money. I am glad we did not order starters, additional...