Old Bicycle Shop — Restaurant in Cambridge

Do not go on a Saturday around noon. The staff is clearly overwhelmed when the place is full.

I went to this place twice. Once for lunch on a weekday and once for lunch on a Saturday. Food is OK, although portion sizes vary radically between different items in the brunch menu despite the price being similar. The menu has no pictures, so it's hard to know what to expect. If you do go, be sure to check the size of the dish with the wait staff or estimate based on the calorie count. Service is relatively slow but this is not too bad on a weekday.

I made reservations both times I went. You can only book a table for 1 hour or 1 and half hours, which seems to me a bit tight, especially for a place where you may go for entries, mains, desert and coffee. On a Saturday they will enforce their slots, which seems rude to me, just charge me more for a longer reservation if anything, but at least give me the choice.

I went on a weekday and it was OK (I had steak and eggs, good portion) and the place had air conditioning which is rare in England, so I decided to take my family on a Saturday. When I went on a summer Saturday. It was a complete disaster. I made reservations for noon, so we would have access to both brunch and lunch menu. We happened to arrive 15 minutes early, so we went in to ask if we could get our table slightly before the time we had booked. We were happy to wait if not. The waitress was not very polite about it, she seemed a bit stressed and overwhelmed by her work. She just swapped us to another table and told us to follow her. Once we were by our table, she said to my wife something like: we moved you to this table, but you will need to leave at 1PM. I had originally made a reservation for one hour and a half, so she shortened our time there by 15 minutes without consulting us about it. I would have preferred to wait 15 minutes for my original table, I could even come back if needed. However, being there by the table, noticing her unpleasant attitude, disconsiderate attention, and having a 3-year-old with me; I did not want to re-start the process for 15 minutes more in a place where I was already not feeling comfortable.

I had also requested a high chair if they had one, for my 3-year old. Nothing was said to me about this, and wait staff were scarcely available for questions and requests. No one came to ask even once if things were OK (unlike on the weekday I had gone before).

My wife and I were already a bit annoyed at the time pressure and poor attention, and we only got more annoyed as time went by. They took 15 minutes to come take our order, and then 20 minutes to bring the coffee and some more to get the food. Leaving us with 40 minutes total to eat (being generous here). I originally wanted to order from the lunch menu but it was not offered to us at noon, nor did I feel like asking for it, seeing how pressed we were for time and how slow they were.

We both ordered coffee and something from the brunch menu. The portions were smaller than we expected (we estimated that it would be more plentiful given the price was similar to their full English breakfast which tends to be generous). Normally, we would have just ordered another menu item but we did not really have time to, nor did we wish to do so at this point.

I ordered mushrooms on toast with stilton and I added bacon. It was a single piece of toast with said toppings, the toppings tasted nicely but was a fairly small portion and the toast was partially burned. To my surprise, the bacon was American style (which I would have expected a menu in England to clarify).

When the place is full, is it super loud in there and nearly impossible to talk. The chairs are not comfortable and the booths are not very spacious.

The only thing that would make me return is that they have an air conditioner which is of some use on the weekdays when not too crowded, and when they seem to be able to manage their load...

I really wanted to like this place but sadly didn't. It's a nice atmosphere in there, industrial and quirky. As soon as we came in we were greeted and sat by a really nice guy, so far so good. Around 2 in the afternoon mid week it was slow when we came and most tables left just then, leaving us almost on our own in there. You'd have thought that this would have meant attentive and fast service, but unfortunately it was a case or the opposite. Staff, however polite and pretty friendly, are very laid back and fairly inattentive. Also menu knowledge could have been better. We asked about the orange juice, which on the menu is described as "Fresh Orange Juice", asked if it is indeed freshly squeezed, and got the answer that it was. Unfortunately it turned out not to be 🥲 Not sure what the disconnect was there 🤔 Maybe says "Freshly squeezed" on the box, cause it was definitely out of one.

We ordered a mushroom toast and an avocado toast, both with a fried egg. When food arrived, although presentation's nice, portions are on the smaller side. Also, bread pretty much un-toasted, and unfortunately both of our eggs overdone, yolk completely solidified and edges very crusty. We asked for them to be exchanged and after some time new eggs came, these were great but at that point we'd pretty much finished.

However, up until that point we were still feeling OK about the visit. When the food runner cleared our plates we asked for the bill. A few minutes later it was clear she'd forgotten (attending to other guests, clearing tables) and we tried getting the attention of the other staff. Another guy came over, we said we'd asked his colleague for the bill but it had been forgotten. His response: "Oh she's probably just taking some time with it...but if you want I can print it for you over here" How about "Oh sorry, she must have forgotten, I'll bring it to you now!" ? Bill was presented and at that time I decided that actually, I wasn't feeling good about paying a 12.5% service charge, and politely said as much. Frosty vibes after that and no "goodbye, thank you". Sorry but just not good...

We waited 30 minutes for a table we had pre booked. There was no apology, we were simply told to wait at the bar.

We struggled to get served as the staff were wondering around not knowing what they were doing. The manager then came over to us and was extremely rude to the customers we were waiting on, informing us that they were really slow eaters and then warned us not to be as long as them because he couldn’t take it. Again, there was still no apology just blame to the customers in a completely unprofessional manor.

When we finally sat down it took another 20 minutes for anyone to come and serve us. We had to go ask someone if we could order. The waiter had no knowledge of the menu, when I asked for a recommendation he simple said “errrrr they’re all quite nice.” There were loads of people working but none of them seemed to have any idea what they were doing.

A waitress then tried to take our starters away before we’d finished eating. We said we still wanted it and she looked confused and replied “but your mains are ready”. We told her they can bring them out now and we’ll eat them together. The food was awful. Bland and boring. I was grateful for the salt and pepper on the table because without it, it would have been inedible. My friends both had variations of the ‘posh kebab’, neither of them could eat it. A pile of what seemed like shop bought budget coleslaw with uncooked tofu chunks covered in bbq sauce. It was honestly disgusting. You’d find something better at an actual kebab shop, but this cost £15.

We asked for the bill and then we politely told our waiter how awful the experience had been from the incompetent service to the inedible food. He simple sighed and said “ok. Are you paying by card?” I’ve never experienced anything like it and implore everyone to avoid this place...