The Courtyard Cafe — Restaurant in England

Visited today on a recommendation in town, told the cakes were great but unfortunately they didn’t have any of the three I asked for. The female waiter was quite abrupt and rude, when we asked her if a table was free and pointed at it, got quite annoyed at being questioned and directed us outside, we then waited for over 20 minutes whilst others who came after were served first by the same woman, she got other staff to serve us thereafter and made a point of ignoring us, not sure what we did to irk her other than asking of an empty table was free… but eventually after 30 minutes our coffees came, which were standard and 10 minutes later my friends tea cake arrived which again was standard. Very disappointed as the atmosphere and overall decor etc was very pleasant, shame the staff are not! Props the man who tried to be nicer and offer other cake they did have, unfortunately no vegan or dairy free options though so doesn’t cater for all needs, but is Dog friendly which is nice at least 🤭 in their defence they were busy and dish washer was broken, and it was only £5.70 in total but I worked in catering for 8+ years and customer service is key… we’d have bought lunch if we’d have...

IGNORED!

On a day trip to Somerton we explored the town and found this inviting cafe with a good menu with many selections. It was busy but we were found a table for four. Sadly that was just about as good as it got. We were each given a menu and we were told we'd be asked for our choices shortly. We made our selection and we waited. And waited. And waited. New arrivals came and they were served before us. We advised the staff THREE TIMES that we were ready to place our order and we were promised that we would be next. So we waited again. And again.

After FORTY MINUTES we'd had enough and left. The table next to us thought the service to us was appalling.

If they were happy to lose over £60 worth of business, fair enough, but we won't be going back to find out. We ended up at Wetherspoons in Street where we had our food within 5 minutes of ordering for half the price. Maybe not as good a quality as we might have had from them, but now we'll never know. And...

I have been here before, many times, a year or so ago and it was much nicer then. Maybe I called in on an off day. There were only a handful of other customers, But the staff were surly. No pleasant interaction or greeting. The man ignored me, even though I stood at the counter. 'Hello, won't be long' would have been nice. He actually stood right in front of me, and I didn't exist. My Latte coffee was fine. Hot and frothy. The cake, a scone, fell apart so much I couldn't cut it in half, and the knife was blunt. I ended up with a plate full of large crumbs. Which I dipped alternately, into cream and then Jam. Jam was nice, clotted cream was nice, but I didn't eat the halved strawberry as I had seen the waitress clutching it in her palm before serving. I write reviews for a living. I will return one day, to see how things are then. Maybe next time I can write...