Konnigans — Restaurant in London

Konnigans is a picturesque and cute establishment conveniently close to Wandsworth Town train station. A group of seven of us attended for a Sunday brunching, some coffee, and general gossip. The waiter resembled a reincarnation of Michelangelo's "David", but he may give the density of the statue a run for its money. After taking our order he repeated it back to us and all was good. Contently, we chatted away, until we were moved (although we had made a reservation) from our table to make way for a four top with a couple of prams which couldn't squeeze through to the back of the restaurant. Most of the drinks then arrived at our new, slightly more snug table and the water for the table was forgotten, no real issue as we had our others, so we asked for it again, yet it still failed to arrive. After some time, 5 of the 7 meals arrive to the table, to which another waiter turns and says to the people without food "are you guys not eating then?". She retook the order of a pancakes and an eggs Benedict and prefusely apologised. Soon after the eggs Benedict arrives and looked great, however, plates of pancakes were flying to other tables whilst we were still awaiting ours. We had to ask three times where they were and all three responses were "coming now". By the time they had arrived everyone had finished a comfortable ten minutes prior. It was a shame that the service was poor as the food was actually rather pleasant, yet the service charge was still very much expected to be paid.

Another small mistake that was made was that one order was to have fried eggs to be replaced by poached eggs, but when the Asian Bowl arrived it came with fried eggs still, and a side of poached eggs arriving as the last mouthful was consumed (that's a lot off eggs), which were subsequently charged for.

All in all, nice place, nice food,...

I want to prefix this with saying that I have visited this establishment with friends multiple times and never experienced any issues with the service mentioned by other reviewers. This morning however was different. When a friend and I requested a table for 2 we were curtly asked by a heavyset brunette woman had we booked despite the venue being almost empty. Never happened before.

Begrudgingly we were sat in the corner right in front of the window away from the one other customer in the cafe and promptly ignored. Customer after customer walked in and none were asked if they had booked but seated right away and some were even offered a tour of the very beautiful back, receiving an engagement and welcome noticeably absent from our interaction.

Food came, but there was never any inquiry as to our experience and we had to approach the waitresses to grab the bill. We walked out to silence, reassuring me we had made the right decision to take the service charge off. It's a shame that on the day we appeared not to be the right type of customer. It was made visibly clear that we weren't welcome here and not a priority, laughable with it being Wandsworth not Hampstead where the service is top notch.

It really is a great place, that serves great food but there appears to be a gatekeeping bourne of insecurity that only means it's shooting itself in the foot long term. I doubt this review will change anything or prompt reflection or further thought, but I will not come back here again, or bring any more friends. Instead I will explore other options in the area and support local businesses who want to meaningfully engage with their community no matter who they are. If you're on the fence on whether to go I would suggest somewhere...

Standards Slipping or Just a Very Bad Night?

Being regulars for the last 7/8 years we went tonight for my dads 70th birthday and it was such a let down, poor from start to finish. Hopefully it’s just a one-off bad night, but it was very very poor. Arriving with two kids at 6.45, thought we would be done and dusted by 8pm. Not to be, everything too ages, ordering a drink, getting kids menus, ordering food and then getting the main courses. After being told only one of us could have ribs because they were short on stock, the waitress forgot to circle around again to get the other two orders. My Halloumi starter order didn’t arrive at all, and again she had forgotten to bring that to the table. After waiting for what seemed an eternity, my main course (chicken curry) arrived and it was just plain revolting. It was swimming in a seal of oil, resembling a BP oil spill! One mouthful confirmed my fears, and had to send it back. Given we had already been there an hour and twenty minutes by this point, declined to order anything else. My dad kindly offered me some of his spare ribs, I wish he hadn’t. While the sauce was great, the meat was woefully over cooked and really tough to chew. Couldn’t get out fast enough. Will be sticking to the occasional breakfast/brunch...