Toast — Restaurant in City of Edinburgh

I have been eating at Toast for over three years and the food is very good. I think the attitude that I encountered on my last visit was a case of familiarity breeds contempt which should be cause for serious concern.

I went to Toast for lunch. My meal was served with a very large Ciabatta roll. As I am on a strict weight loss eating plan, I asked if there was a weighing scales in the kitchen and enquired if a Ciabatta roll could be weighed so that I could calculate the calorific value. The waitress who served me was quite happy to do this and she returned to my table looking highly embarrassed. She told me, " They won't weigh the roll for you; I am sure you could google it." I explained that this would be difficult because I did not know how large the roll was in volume. The calorific values on the internet are usually expressed per 100 grams. This charming girl obviously detected my raised eyebrow and she told me that the small scales in the kitchen was broken and it would mean the chefs having to use the bigger scales.

The Kitchen Staff at Toast need to drop the attitude. In the current economic climate, no business can afford to treat any customer in this contemptuous way. If a business wants to survive in this worst ever recession, the business must do as much as possible for the customer. At the prices that this place charges, a request for some additional information from a regular customer should not have caused the kitchen staff any difficulty.

I shall now vote with my feet and spend my hard earned cash in businesses that appreciate the privilege of my custom.

UPDATE: The owner's response is disappointing and has had the effect of pouring oil on fire. His pathetic suggestion that there would have been delays to other customers if his kitchen staff had spent around thirty seconds weighing a bread roll is disingenuous . When I ordered my meal, I expected to be served a standard size ciabatta roll. I know the calorific value of a standard ciabatta roll.I suppose he will now suggest that I did not have to eat all of the bread roll that was served. To suggest that I am welcome to return is...

First off I have to say this café is very popular. We arrived at about 15:00 and most of the tables were full with everyone eating cooked food not just cakes as you may expect at this time of day. We stood by the "wait to be seated" notice but I immediately decided that I wanted to be outside,

The internals were too stark, unwelcoming {for me}. We had a decaf flat white and a normal flat white accompanied by a slice of banana & chocolate cake.

The decaf was close to a flat white but the normal flat white was just a milky coffee {and less than warm}. Too much cold milk, no foam, no velvet texture, no layers ... I think you get the picture.

The cake, the slice was generous but the texture a bit dry; not stale but probably needing a bit more banana to add moisture.

We did sit outside; the seating is just across the cobbled road from the river but it seems to be a main bus route. The surrounding buildings are very unattractive.

The waitress who took our order was good; polite and friendly.

The Croque Madam at £12.50 looked interesting and the customer was tucking into it was great glee. I don't know if this contained sourdough bread which sadly, is on offer with other dishes.

Would I go again ? No, there are too many other places offering better coffee and cakes with more appealing inside &...

As someone who lives very local, I’ve enjoyed brunch here in the past and have recommended it to friends who want some brunch near The Shore. I haven’t been in a while but decided to bring the family along this morning. Our food took about 25 mins to come and our drinks didn’t arrive until afterwards either. The bacon ciabatta was extremely dry (to be fair, we didn’t want any sauce but we were expecting it to be buttered). The poached eggs on avocado toast were far too over cooked, both yolks were like chalk. The smoked haddock and sweetcorn chowder had an extremely thin milk base with loads of sweet corn at the bottom (I’ve never had chowder like this, usually it’s partially blended to thicken it up a bit.) The saving grace was their cold pressed juices which were actually very tasty.

Very disappointed with the food and slow service today, especially considering how expensive the prices are compared to similar cafes/restaurants in the area. They blamed the service on the fact they were busy (however, they’re always busy on a Sunday morning so surely staffing should be upped to help with this?) In fairness, the girl who served us was lovely and she wasn’t to blame at all, it was clear she was stretched too thin, which was the only thing stopping us from taking off the...