EL&N London — Restaurant in London

A Disappointing Experience at Selfridges London food hall

I recently visited Selfridges in London to purchase some French butter and English cheddar cheese. While picking up the butter was straightforward, my experience at the cheese counter left me deeply frustrated and disappointed.

I approached the counter and asked if I could taste the cheddar cheese, as they offer two varieties, and I often like to switch based on flavor. To my surprise, the assistant informed me that tastings were not allowed because the counter had been cleaned and they were preparing to close. He added that they no longer offer tasting portions, as all cheeses are pre-cut and packaged.

This response left me stunned. I’ve been a loyal Selfridges customer for nearly 40 years, and this was the first time I’ve ever been refused a tasting. The assistant claimed this has been the policy for a while but I find this hard to believe. Even if it is a new policy, it’s unreasonable to expect customers to spend £40-60 per kilo on cheese without sampling it first. This isn’t the level of service I associate with Selfridges—it feels more like a budget supermarket than a luxury department store.

When I asked to speak with a manager, the assistant was reluctant but eventually called someone over. The manager explained that the policy of pre-portioning cheese was implemented to reduce waste and maintain margins. While I understand the need for efficiency, this approach compromises quality and customer experience. On a previous visit, I noticed that their pre-packaged Parmesan cheese was moldy, and I made sure to inform the staff as I was passing by. It’s clear that their new packaging methods are not preserving the cheese properly, which is unacceptable for a store of Selfridges’ caliber.

The manager did offer me a tiny sliver of cheese to taste—no larger than a quarter of a matchstick—but this gesture felt more like an afterthought than genuine customer care.

Unfortunately, this experience is emblematic of a broader decline in standards at Selfridges. Over the past 4-6 months, I’ve noticed subpar service, dirty counters, frequently out-of-order escalators, and disabled doors that never seem to work. The food hall, once a highlight, now feels understaffed and poorly managed. The staff often appear disheveled and disengaged, and the overall atmosphere is far from the luxury experience Selfridges is known for.

It’s worth noting that the new owners need to put in a much stronger effort to halt this decline under their management As a long-time customer, it’s disheartening to see such a beloved institution...

Won’t be back

After having the Jellycat Afternoon Tea Experience at EL&N in Selfridges, I am disappointed to say that it was unfortunately the worst afternoon tea experience I’ve ever had. After seeing various posts on social media, I hoped that this experience would be as good as it looked online but sadly it wasn’t.

We were sat down pretty much straight away, but we were left with no drinks menus and it took 20 minutes for them to take our drinks orders. We had to ask for them to take our orders ourselves as the servers were being very inattentive even though it seemed like they weren’t doing anything. I saw them just standing around socialising with the baristas while we were sat literally opposite them waiting for a drink. It was very hard to get their attention which is why it took so long for us to order. When we finished these drinks we weren’t asked if we wanted more and had to ask ourselves. When I ordered another drink and very clearly said what I wanted and had it repeated back to me correctly, the wrong drink came out which usually wouldn’t bother me but combined with other issues it did irritate me quite a bit especially as they made it so slowly. The servers didn’t seem to care at all about our experience.

It took half an hour after sitting down for us to be given our afternoon tea and drinks (the drinks came after the afternoon tea). The afternoon tea we both found to be of low quality. This is because the sandwiches had barely any filling and we found the cakes to be way too sickly with awful flavour. The scones were very small and we were initially given a dirty cream pot that had only a tiny bit of cream in it which I had to ask to be exchanged for a clean one.

However, although I had issues with the afternoon tea itself, I did appreciate the decor and found the general atmosphere to be quite pleasing. It’s just a shame that the food and service did not meet expectations. I love Jellycats, but this experience definitely damaged my perception of the brand. The price certainly does not match the quality and I left feeling rather sick both physically from the overly-sickly pastries and mentally at the thought of the money I wasted on an...

This was my first visit to an EL&N cafe after viewing much about the chain on social media. My goodness it is just a pretty face.

I think this cafe is a fairly new addition to the selfridges dining spot, so maybe there are just some teething problems, but i definitely won't rush back there when there are so many nicer cafes in the area.

So on arrival the front of house staff seated us promptly, nd offered us the 'nice area' (being the more photogenic area), or the regular area. We chose the regular area as we just wanted a quiet cup of coffee. Everything looked clean and tidy, and tables were spread out well, complyin to social distancing.

Food: we were goven the menu but everything we selected was sold out! They literally had no chcoclatey items available and werent planning on restocking at all. We visited on a Saturday afternoon, but nott particularly late in the day. We ended up ordering a pistachio swirl pastry and a 'pink cookie'. The pistachio swirl pastry was stale and had no flavour. It tasted like it was 2 days old. The pink cookie looked like it had been decorated by a 5 year old. Just 2 chocolate cookies, sandwiched together with 'hazelnut ganache', and drizzled in pink and silver sprinkles. I highly dount that the ganache was anything more than Carnatiin caramel -it tasted as such.

Drinks:we ordered a mojito lemonade and a latte. The latte was fine, it had a cute cat on it as latte arr. The mojito was served in a really smelly glass - you know the kind that has not been washed properly...grim. the stench of the glass ruined the experience of the entire drink.

Service: our server was pleasant enough when guiding us through everything that had been sold out lol. But there was hardly any attention served to the regular area - in fact it took us 40minutes to get someone's attention to just pay the bill.

There is hand sanitiser available when waiting for a table.

The bill includes a discretionary contribution to a charity and also 12.5%...