The Folio Bar & Kitchen — Restaurant in Cambridge

The afternoon tea here deserves 0 stars.

Our waitress was a middle-aged Asian lady with glasses (unfortunately I did not catch her name). She handed us the menu and asked us to decide what teas we wanted. The tea selection was very underwhelming. The restaurant wasn’t busy at all, yet it took our waitress over 20 minutes to come to the table and take our order. We were under the impression that you can try multiple different teas, but you can only order 1 tea per person. It took another 20 minutes for the tea to arrive. After serving us the tea, our waitress never paid any attention to our table and instead kept chatting with other guests. At one point she was having a conversation with someone for what seemed like 15 minutes! We had to get up and go to her directly to request for water and sugar for the table. She completely forgot that we asked, and we ended up asking 3 different waiters for water and sugar.

It took more than an hour for our food to arrive. All we received was a “sorry for the delay” with no explanation of why it took so long. There were other guests who arrived earlier than us and still hadn’t received their food, but they received apologies from two different waiters and were also given complimentary champagne and tea refills. We still hadn’t been provided with any water or sugar, and they also did not give us any plates for the food. Finally, the water and sugar arrived but the waitress who served us did not even provide us with glasses for the water.

The food was absolutely awful and I couldn’t eat most of it. The roasted vegetable sandwich in particular tasted horrible, the victoria sponge was dry, and the scones were barely warm. The chocolate cake and the mango panna cotta were alright though.

Overall, it was the worst afternoon tea experience of my life. The service was also the worst I have ever received. I would never come here again or recommend...

To be honest, it was disappointing, all the more because it was our Valentine dinner. I know, the venue was busy, but they kept messing our orders in any possible way. I have tried with all my might to not get upset, not make a scene, be polite because "oh well it happens", but after 3 hours to serve (clumsily) 8 courses we left the restaurant honestly exasperated. they dropped the amuse bouche they forgot that one of our pre-booked menu was vegan, and this delayed the second course of 40 minutes they served my husband second course along with my third course, I had to send him to the counter to protest and retrieve my second course the sorbet they served us was half in size compared with the portion of other tables my husband's wellington was clearly overcooked. I have seen dozens of wellingtons leaving the kitchen with a lovely pinkinsh and juicy centre, ours arrived dry my vegan wellington was the size of my thumb, and I get it, is fine dining, but after 8 courses I didn't expect to return home and make us two cheese sandwiches.

The desserts and the carrots with lentils were really nice, but too little to save the dinner. The staff offered their apologies on multiple occasions, but they kept making mistakes, and delays, and blunders, and this was not even cheap! And all this because for one night I didn't want to cook and wanted to treat spouse with something nice. Serves me well, I guess, next year a nice kebab from the van and we'll sort Valentine with a tenth...

We visited for a friend's birthday. Parking was tricky, but the restaurant itself was beautiful. The food was okay, though I’ve paid less for better. The cocktails were good! Unfortunately, the service was disappointing. We asked for table water but didn’t receive any. Our drinks arrived after two of us had already finished our mains, and two of the drinks were wrong. We also got the wrong sides and never received the correct ones. After waiting a long time for our plates to be cleared and for dessert to be offered, we gave up and asked for the bill, explaining we were unhappy. They offered 25% off our 4 drinks, which felt insulting. The waitress was trying to talk to the manager, who was avoiding the situation while cleaning tables. Eventually, we flagged him down and he offered 25% off the total bill. It’s a shame because we had high hopes for our first visit. The waitress was both warm and welcoming, but the service simply didn’t match...