Ayllu — Restaurant in London

I am writing to express my disappointment with the service my party and I experienced during our recent visit on on my birthday on the 15/02/25 We were particularly let down by the behavior of one of your staff members, Morella, who was snappy from the bringing of the visit and rude to us at the end of our visit.

We arrived 5minutes early and was shown to our table, Morella then approached me and informed us quite hastily that at 5pm their is no more service and no matter how late our friends are they will not serve us. I explained that’s fine, our friends are on time and we were early. She seemed unhappy at this and huffed and puffed. On arrival I was asked if it was 8 of us I explained it two people were unfortunately ill and the hostess (not Morella) that, this was not an issue. When Morella served us she was shocked it was not 8 but explained “it’s better for me”. I laughed and put it to the side.

Additionally, we had booked the bottomless drinks offer from 3:30 to 5:00 PM, but due to extremely slow service, we received far fewer drinks than expected. This was frustrating, as we had specifically chosen this offer for the experience. We had to wait at least 10 - 15mins between asking for each drink which is not normal for bottomless, when I questioned why they were taking so long and they served the table next to us I was told “we have to check the time left on your table”. I do understand this but we were booked after all the other seated tables.

30 minutes before the end of our bottomless we received a drink, following this we asked for another to be told that we need to pay first before we get a drink. I questioned this and explained I would not pay the service charge, Morella rudely banged the bill on the table and said she will speak to the managers. I asked why, as we were still within the bottomless period, she again said she will speak to the managers. I was very confused as we were still within our period and they were serving other tables that had been there earlier. I’m not sure whether it was my race or colour as a half Indian man but she was pointing at me to other staff members. I can understand she was unhappy, but I spoke to her respectfully and laid out my concerns however she was just rude. I work in the service industry and I have never experienced behaviour like this. It has ruined my birthday celebration.

As a result of the poor service and the interaction with Morella, we made the decision not to pay the service charge. We had hoped for a more enjoyable visit, but unfortunately, the service did not meet expectations.

I hope you will take this feedback seriously to prevent similar experiences for future customers.

I have never had such a bad experience and Morella is not a nice woman, I don’t not believe she should work in the service industry. Morella ruined...

Worst experience we’ve ever had.

We asked for tap water and saw the waiter poor several left over jugs into one and bring it over. And this was only after we asked for it again having waited for ages for it.

We asked for the volume to go down as it was unbearable when we walked in and thankfully they did a little but it was still extremely loud. A waitress came to take our order and complained she couldn’t hear us, really not our problem when we’re shouting and pointing on the menu, perhaps bring the volume down?

We booked a table confirming vegetarians and they saved us beef instead of mushroom Bao Buns making my friends ill after they bit in them.

Other items were incorrect, such as the nigiri platter where she repeated after me that I wanted the one with 5 variety of fish but still, they brought the other one.

The quality of the fish is average, not bad but really not exceptional (for the very little I tasted). The staff was contradicting each other, some said the order had been lost? Then it was found. This probably explains the deplorable food we received.

At that point we still had no drinks, some of the food wasn’t there, the music had gone back up and some of our friends were actually sick. No staff came to apologise for feeding meat to vegetarians. This also concerns us with them most likely feeding allergens to customers who could have severe reactions if they pay this little attention.

We did specify we had a time limit, we appreciate this cannot always be accommodated and would have happily tailored our order if they had let us know they can’t have everything ready in the timeframe we have.

Considering they add a service charge automatically, this is no wonder that the service is so poor.

To add to this, the bathrooms aren’t clean, but if they don’t clean the water jugs, we can’t expect them to clean the toilets.

We ended up leaving and not eating there, the couple of bites we had already left enough of a bad taste in our mouths.

I wish I knew the name of the waitress who did try to help and was the only one who actually noticed that we still had nothing on the table as I would give her a thank you, the rest of the staff needs customer training at the very least.

• Do not go if you have any food allergies or dietary...

Food was sensational but service was poor. I chose this restaurant for my partner’s birthday because of the excellent reviews. I booked a couple of months in advance for the Macchu Pichu tasting menu and called closer to the date to confirm the menu.

We turned up on time to a manager who gave us the Al a Carte Menu. Keep in mind, this was for my partners birthday so I kind of wanted it to be a nice surprise. So I said to the manager ‘we don’t need these menu’s’ alluding to, we have a tasting menu booked. The manager then said: ‘remind me what tasting menu you booked?!’

Surprise ruined.

It got worse.

Taco’s were served first, not the guacamole.

I kindly asked the server ‘where is the Guacamole?’ And he said ‘the food comes out when it is ready’

I find this odd because I asked for a tasting menu - usually tasting menu’s are in order…. Order of what the chef chooses the menu to be. So does that mean if the chef makes the dessert it will come out first?????? Bizarre.

Food was spectacular except the Taco’s which we could give or take.

Service from the Myriad of various staff (stick to 1-2 staff per tasting menu, that is what I do at my pub) was poor. They didn’t keep our drinks filled, they had no idea what the order was re the tasting menu which I booked months in advance for my partners birthday which I repeatedly said was a special occasion.

I then got the bill and asked (for the first time in my life) for service to be taken off. As the service was un-coordinated, dysregulated and frankly extremely disjointed and poor. I asked for the service charge to be taken off and the waiter gave us the side eye, even though he had served us twice and obviously had no idea how terrible the service was.

I’ve been to PUBS where the service was excellent - I was expecting more from a highly rated establishment. I won’t be recommending to my friends. It is such a shame since the food is excellent and the chefs shouldn’t have to suffer due to poor front of house...