108 Brasserie — Restaurant in London

This was our 4th time in 108 Brasserie during Christmas and we were expecting an enjoyable time. Sadly this wasn’t the case and I am sorry to say but we won’t come back again. First of all, despite we booked the table on the 21st of November, we were sat in the bar area rather than in the dining area. The tables in the bar area weren’t prepared at all, they didn’t even have a table cloth, very odd in a restaurant of this price level. Second of all, the quality of the service was terribly disappointing, probably because we weren’t seated in the correct area. For instance, we asked for a glass of wine. The waiter came with a bottle of wine we have asked for and he served one glass. When he was about to leave the bottle on the table, we reminded him we only wanted one glass, then he took the bottle and the glass, to bring a new glass of the same wine with the same quantity than the first glass he served. That was something we never experienced before. Third of all, we ordered Caesar salad to share before the mains. When the mains came, we told the waiter there was a salad it should have come but we didn’t want it with the mains. Apparently he didn’t understand us, because he went to order it. When we said that in reality we didn’t want it, he reacted with unnecessary haughtiness. The overall experience has been very dissapointing, at a point that as it was said before, we won’t come back anymore. I’ll also share this feedback with my friends and collagues to...

A slightly more upmarket Pizza Express commanding the prices of The Ivy

For the price, I expected a whole lot more. The food was good but the ambience was sorely missing. A relatively sterile and bland, colourless interior with a lot of hard surfaces, no table cloths, no curtains, no acoustic insulation meant that the conversations of people several tables away could be heard quite clearly, drowning our own conversation. It was not relaxing and didn’t feel like the quality atmosphere that the prices would normally command (£25 for a fillet of salmon?!). This places it into the Ivy bracket, yet the experience there is so much better (it’s always booked up). I’m fine to pay high prices once the food and the atmosphere really deserve it. If I’m just paying to be fed, I’ll go to my local pizza place or curry house and pay a fraction of the price. You have three broad levels of sit-in dining: ££ - ‘Feed me reliable good food’ (Franco Manca / Honest Burger) £££ - ‘Give me a great time in a great place’ (The Ivy / Dean Street Townhouse - this is where 108 is trying to fit but they’re missing the essential ingredient here - ‘the great place’) ££££ - ‘Blow my brains inspire me’ (Sketch Fine Dining / Alain Ducasse Dorchester) In the end, we kept our dinner short and ran out, fed up...

Well, there were a few issues with our visit.

When taking our order we weren’t instructed that there was the option of small or large portions. We weren't asked what we wanted either in regards to that, so we ended up paying more than expected, which was annoying.

In addition to this the waiter was quite abrupt and didn’t seem to have adequate training - he leant over one of the guests to serve items we ordered as opposed to walking around to serve on their left. He was quite abrupt and appeared bored and disinterested making us feel as though we’d annoyed him in some way. It was those little details which ruined the experience.

The food we ordered was not great. We ordered waffles which had been saturated in syrup - a mini jug would have sufficed to give us the option to choose how much we wanted. In addition no one came over to check if the food was ok.

There was also a 30 wait to have plates removed and for top ups to our refreshments. Which l, considering the restaurant was pretty empty seemed unreasonable.

Overall it wasnt the best experience I’ve had dining out. Yes the glitzy atmosphere and fabulous decor was great, menu options were great. But it was let down by the service provided which...