Oranj — Restaurant in London

I visited Oranj yesterday with a group of friends. The food was delicious, and I love the concept of having different chefs showcase their dishes each month, it's a unique and exciting idea. However, as much as good food is necessary, it needs to be paired with good service, and unfortunately, that fell short.

There were only three staff members working on a Friday night, and it felt like they were completely overwhelmed. They were rushing around without any sense of organisation, resulting in slow order-taking (with no notepad, which was surprising), missing items, and even serving the wrong dishes to our table. There was also no effort to offer additional drinks, and my friends and I would have gladly ordered more if we'd been given the opportunity. Catching someone's attention to make a request was frustrating, and when we asked for the bill, we watched all three staff members stand at the bar eating. Instead of getting the bill. It just felt unprofessional.

If you're charging premium prices, I expect premium service. While the wine knowledge was impressive, the overall service was lacking. We were tempted to skip the service charge but ultimately decided not to make a fuss, especially since the food was so good.

I really hope Oranj consider providing better staff training, as this experience has made put me...

My daughter fancied going here so we managed to book a last minute spot. I say spot, because it was two seats, beside a skinny bench on the wall, which meant we were staring at a blank white wall. The bar was dingy and lacked any real atmosphere. We ordered 3 small plates, which would have been enough normally, but to say the portions were microscopic, is almost being too generous. There were crispy 10p sized shells with baby Purée and a hint of a pice of Mackeral on the top. There were the 6-8 hilarious mini carrots with more baby purée , this time a bit more buttery with 3 sad little naked mussels. The crowning glory was the overcooked squid ink spaghetti that had been lovingly slopped onto the 3 side plate. It was a mess. The best bit was the Spicy Margarita that we ordered but even that had a Titanic sized ice cube in the heart of it, and as the tumbler it came in was also Toddler sized, the passing joy of something actually tasting nice, was soon over. Oranj is the kind of place that comedians could do a good sketch about. It is pretentious and lacking in every single department. We had to go and have some Oysters in Covent Garden to wipe out the memory of the most monumentally underwhelming meal, of my 54 years on this planet. Save your money, unless you don’t actually want to eat and drink but are on a very...

Wildly disappointed. Such a shame as I feel like I'd been recommended Oranj/seen a lot of excitement online but unfortunately it just did not live up to expectations.

The portions were unbelievably small for the prices, and although the cured trout was delicious, we weren't that impressed by any of the other dishes we had.

Service, for such an expensive restaurant, was terrible. The minute we walked in the atmosphere was snooty and judgey, not one dish was explained to us as it was brought out (and when you're paying £26 for a tiny selection of 4 pieces of grilled squid, it would be nice to have a little talk through at the table), we also paid £64 for a bottle of wine, that came to the table after our first dish because the wine service was that slow.

I normally do not leave negative reviews at all, but London has so many amazing restaurants and places, and this had the potential to be absolutely lovely, I wouldn't want anyone to go and be disappointed.

I really hope after some recent negative reviews it can switch things up...