M&S Café — Restaurant in England

We have just visited this M&S cafe. Upon entering it was very busy, to be expected as it was a Sunday afternoon at the Mall. We went in past the new electronic ordering stations to see if there was a table for 4, as there was 3 of us. We were then confronted by a member of staff asking if we were ordering, we said we were just checking for a table. She rather rudely said she wouldnt have let us order if there wasn't room!! We proceeded to order and sit down with an electronic disc, however there were no tables for 4 available, and we couldn't pull 2 tables for two together because they had not been cleared - we had to resort to pulling another chair up to a cleared table for 2. However the staff then proceeded to keep bumping into the chair sticking out, despite there being space to walk around a different route. The staff were clearly not equipped for it to be slightly busy, not all the tables were filled, with managers shouting at members of staff across the restaurant, not very professional or a nice environment for a coffee and cake! When it eventually came out after us seeing it sitting on the pass going cold, the cakes were lovely, although the mocha was only so so. Not the best experience and would put me off coming again if they were even a...

Came in for afternoon tea last Friday to celebrate my wife's 50th birthday and ordered two 'Afternoon Teas' from the new ordering terminal. Shortly after ordering, a chap dropped two packets of sandwiches on our table and left. Next a girl came to our table to tell us they'd run out of seafood sandwiches and was confused to see two packs of the same already being consumed. She disappeared, then reappeared to say they'd now run out the 'Afternoon Tea' Cake/macaron selections - which was v.disappointing because that was the one thing we were looking forward to (and to see everything presented nicely altogether on a stand). She offered us a pastry or slice of cake instead, but had we known there were no Afternoon Tea cakes left we wouldn't have ordered them (new ordering system clearly doesn't work!). Eventually they managed to come up with two stands with a piece of cake and a scone each, but gave us regular tea instead of fruit/berry tea, forgot the completely separate piece of cake we'd ordered for our daughter and forgot to include any cutlery. Drinks arrived later than food which...

The food was amazing. It was a very busy place, but the service was fast. With high standards, impressive and fresh presentation, everything was so delicious. The matcha latte was lovely too. Despite the crowd, the place was very clean, and the staff worked really hard.

But it was freezing cold inside! If the food hadn’t been so good, I might not have even eaten and would’ve left feeling frozen! You know what it felt like? It was like having a rich relative with a fancy summer house in a hot country inviting you over — then turning the air conditioning all the way up, looking down on your shivering face with contempt and smirking to themselves. We’ve wiped our sweat and paid our dues,

M&S, you are the strong and eternal competitor to everyone else, but you’re like the sibling everyone envies who’s still the annoying little brother in...