Beans & Bites — Restaurant in London

This place is OVERRATED. Halal brunch but not many options and alternatives. Went around lunchtime, thankfully there was no que however the caf was full inside. Asked the ladies at the front counter how long for the next table they say ‘I don’t know’. Now thats frustrating to hear, at least find out how long till the next table we people travel from far to get to this cafe were not locals, only to hear ‘I don’t know’ - first let down they’re not bothered they need to practice customer service skills, no manners they did not even greet us, tarnishing their own reputation. Then I mentioned there’s only 2 of us, and luckily there was space for two in the garden area. Garden area quite small but manageable. We requested for an alternative instead of the turkey rashers we wanted chips, they said no. Second let down. They only serve beef sausages and no chicken sausage - third letdown. After ordering we were told food will take half an hour to arrive. That is far too long, if you know your gonna be a busy cafe, serving halal food, on a weekend, in a busy area, and despite of being viral on social media with all the food aesthetically pleasing, maybe you should work on keeping the food cooking on a roll? There’s no excuse of being busy because you know you are for all the reasons so therefore keep that on top? Food should take max 15 mins to arrive, we’re already hungry as it is. Technically an hours wait by the time your seated and ordering your food - fourth let down. After 35 minutes of torture, the food arrived but, it was given to the wrong people. The plates were given to another table then taken back, it began to get more frustrating. Fifth let down, I SUGGEST, you start adding table numbers to avoid confusion. This is me as a customer making suggestions to better your place so you’ll see a difference. They finally served our food after about 40 mins, and no cutlery was provided :( how embarrassing, my friend had to ask another table to nick the knifes and forks, then we was short of one fork so she had to then go to another table to get her a fork, yikes! We had to do the same with the sauces, nick from another table cos we didn’t have any -sixth letdown! I personally, I didn’t like the choice of fruits they gave, not everyone eats melons and grapefruit, also the orange was cut in a strange way too you can’t bite into it, maybe slicing it in half would make sense? Seventh letdown. The sausage was not nice, had a strange smell to it, again, it may be cause I don’t like beef sausage so what a let down that they don’t have alternatives like chicken. The turkey rashers I didn’t eat at all, makes me sick and instead I had the extra portion of chips that I ordered as a extra side to pay. I didn’t wanna kick up a fuss there as I came with a friend. The pancakes maple syrup (I’m guessing) had an awful smell to it, very strong it put me off and unfortunately I could not finish this either. Eighth letdown. Total came up to £38, which I think was not worth it at all. The 1 star goes towards the halal option they have in Hackney, but the food does not taste nice. Not coming back here - People be wary please don’t fall for these instagrammable/TikTok friendly videos, it’s only liable for food bloggers. Also, by looking at the response from the owners on other Google reviews about them, the owners seem rather defensive instead of being sympathetic in their lack of customer care. If it’s too busy, do us a favour and get more staff then, after all you are making...

!! RUDE STAFF !! POOR FOOD QUALITY!! ZERO MANNERISM !!

We ordered the vegetarian frenchtoast and as i have been came to this place twice before i was very disappointed and went to the waitress ( as they didn’t come to check on the food ) and mentioned the beans were cold and the french toast was awful especially because it wasn’t at all a FRENCH TOAST IT WAS JUST SOAKED IN MAPLE SYRUP and dry inside and without even letting me or my friend finish the waitress is in denial of what i am saying and very rudely mentioned “ IT IS EXACTLY WHAT IT SHOULD BE “ she has zero apology on her attitude and didn’t understand at all what we trying to saying because she wouldn’t even let us talk. Fact she continues saying we do same thing everyday what do you want me to do about it … It took me a alot of patience to see that attitude of hers and calmly explained her the French toast expectations again. She got us another toast and IT WAS 3 times soaked in syrup just a brioche bun in syrup and calling it a day with dryness inside We left the food went to the till for 2nd or 3rd time as they never came back to check. She continue to show attitude and your bill is this. Upto that we mentioned about the french toast and also the poor service the waitress answers “ CHECK ON YOU FOR WHAT ? “ we replied “ to check if the food is alright? “ she continues to to be super mean facial expressions to my friend and says “ check on the you FOR WHAT “ . Meanwhile she offered to take off the price of the french toast. We asked to speak to the manager of the restaurant seeing the staff unacceptable behaviour and he was MORE RUDE and says “ we can’t give you free food “ WE DIDNT EVEN ASK FOR FREE FOOD ? We didn’t even start saying about the experience and he called someone on phone and says “ WE HAVE CCTV Footage”. We were very disgusted on their conversation i also mentioned “ hear us first and what are gonna do this cctv footage i mean what is the point “ ? Absolutely rubbish behaviour and poor service. We paid off the entire bill without the french toast. Plus it was worthless talking to mannerless people. It wasn’t about the money it was their ugly disgusting behaviour also body language towards a customer and zero sense of humbleness and empathy. Learn some mannerisms ITS FREE might help in future. TO AVOID A BAD STARTING OF THE DAY PLEASE DONT COME TO THIS SHOP ESPECIALLY FOR DRY...

We went on Saturday 11 January at around 14:00 and ordered the Super French and Eggs Royale as pictured. The Super French was presented well but was nothing remarkable in terms of taste. The French toast was also just a slice of brioche soaked in maple syrup - not exactly what I’d describe as French toast.

The main problem though was with the salmon from the Eggs Royale which was off. As we were sat at the back of the restaurant, I had to go to the front to call one of the waitresses who rarely came to the back. She claimed that the salmon was fresh and that that’s how their salmon was! When we told her the taste was off as well, she maintained that their salmon was fresh.

It was only when she overheard the lady at the table next to us enquiring what was wrong that she came back and offered replacement items within the salmon dish or a new dish. We opted for a new dish and she later came back to tell us we’d be fully charged for the Eggs Royale and half for the new dish which was a chicken wrap. We were quite surprised by this because we expected no charge for the Eggs Royale, given the dodgy salmon.

Although not all the dishes were bad, I’d stay well clear of this place due to the abysmal customer service. It looks like they spend more time marketing on Instagram rather than training their staff.

Update: Wow, really surprised at the arrogance of the keyboard warrior who is responding to these reviews. Your lack of professionalism is quite evident and I’d like to wish you all the best in retaining customers who are not fooled by your Instagram marketing. And for the record - I’ve tried enough salmon to know that what you served was far from...