The Deli — Restaurant in Chelmsford

We took our toddler for a walk around Hylands house and gardens yesterday and fancied a hot drink and something small to eat whilst walking so decided to ‘pop’ into the cafe there. We spent at least half an hour, maybe more just queuing and when my husband got to the til, he was told hot drinks will be a 20 minute wait!! So he decided not to order any and just got one panini and one piece of cake. We ended up waiting for these for another half an hour at least, but we’re never told they would also take a long time when ordering! We had to keep asking where they were and were then told there was no cake left, even though we’d paid for it! However it turned out the young girl got it wrong and there was actually some of the cake we ordered left.. absolutely appalling service and organisation. This is the second time we’ve experienced slow and chaotic service there, we thought the first time was a one off but clearly they don’t know how to run the place. Our poor toddler was so bored and hungry! We saw plenty of people walking in and straight back out again so the cafe is losing customers. They need to get better organised and perhaps get the hot drinks out first - how can it take 20+ minutes to make a hot drink?! We definitely won’t be returning and I’m sure a lot of other people feel the same. Time is precious when you have a toddler and have to time their lunch and nap right and we feel like we wasted an hour just standing around. Very...

We waited nearly 30 minutes to be told at the till that they had no bread and 2 jacket potatoes. They have a limited menu anyway and so we settled for panini instead which took 30 further minutes to come out and hadn't been cooked long enough for the cheese to melt. A nice waitress had a few minutes before ordering advised me that they could do 'cheese and beans' even though it was either or on the menu but didn't say that they were running out of spuds. The tables were cluttered but cleared by the nice waitress on her break but they weren't wiped. We had 3 sets of salt and pepper, one of which had pieces of the nice quirky flowers stuck in the top, presumably by a previous customer but nevertheless put me off using. Finally, the cutlery was dirty and so we opted for the disposable version which I was pleased to see was biodegradable, there were no napkins left. Seriously... Next time send someone to tesco to pick up some bread! There were a lot of fillings on the side to do sandwiches for many many people which will presumably...

I have been to this cafe twice, first time service was fantastic, food was good pricing is reasonable!

However going this past bank holiday they simply could not keep up with the demand, the staff here is good and friendly....but the kitchen can not simply keep up with the demand and there was arguments between staff due to this reason

Whatever you do take a PICNIC, we waited for 45 minutes, 4 other customers where in the same boat as us! and to make things worse they brought out our order wrong...by this time we where just fed up but won't be coming back to the cafe!

Also there is only 2 child seats available which is unfortunate as they need more.

Whoever is in charge I hope your reading this, you have good staff who are over runned with demand and you need more staff and a bigger kitchen to keep...