The MAINE — Restaurant in London

The Maine…… not even a side dish!

Having heard so many great things about this restaurant it was time we went. Dinner for 4 people on the terrace.

The setting is lovely, stylish, elegant but it’s definitely style over substance.

Our first guest to arrive wanted to have a cigarette in the designated smoking area. However there was a private party happening and some of their guests were using the smoking area. This meant that she was told she couldn’t smoke there and was further instructed my the maitre d that “smoking is bad for your health anyway and if you want to smoke please do so in Hanover square”

We then arrived to the same overly friendly and familiar maitre d / guest vetter. We were given the customary look up and down and were waved through to our friend who was already seated.

The service, terribly confused, too many people doing the same thing which resulted in them not doing a great deal. Water for the table? Didn’t arrive. We then got our actual waiter (Eric) who asked the same thing, not his fault, we order water and some drinks. Our final guest then arrives, we are given menus and she orders a drink.

My drink arrives….. the lady who brings it leans right across our round table, accessible from all sides, to clumsily place my drink in front of me as it sloshes in its martini glass, placing her armpit next to our original guests head. I politely suggested that it would be better if she came around the table to deliver the drink.

She heads towards the bar to give a very animated tale of my feedback, where her colleague’s heads swivel in our direction. A gentleman in a white jacket approaches and asks if everything is ok. No, I don’t particularly like being served across a table and I don’t like being discussed in plain view. He announces that there’s nothing he can do as he’s “just a waiter” and suggests the manager comes over.

Eric approaches again, we explain what has happened. The smoking area, the drink serving, the staff gossip and before we arrived another waiter served bread and oil to our friend, with her thumb in the dish of oil. When told about this she just said “oh yeah” and wiped her thumb.

Eric is horrified, apologises, changes the oil etc. We said it wasn’t his fault and stressed that all we wanted was good service. He disappears and reappears with the Brasserie menu which has more choice than the terrace menu. Very kind of him

We order… the tuna tartare, very nice. The crab and avocado salad, good if you like tinned crab

The chicken, ok but a little dry. So far the food is very average. It’s fair to expect that something in Mayfair is going to be more than just a pretty venue with some good entertainment. Sadly not.

We order some dessert to share, Eric recommends the soft cookie, very nice and we order the sticky toffee pudding…… it was drier than the Sahara and cold, it was served with a small puddle of cold caramel sauce and something the menu referred to as “English Cream”, it was cold custard. If someone is going to translate Crème Anglais from French to English it isn’t literal! However it did provide a lighter moment along with the other typos “while wine mariner” to go with the mussels and “ganash” with the death by chocolate.

If it wasn’t for Eric we would’ve left. The staff are surly and rude, the food is rank average and other than a pretty facade it doesn’t have much else.

Given that Mayfair is crammed with great restaurants, go...

Where do I start! We booked this for a birthday meal, upon arrival we was greeted and sent downstairs to the restaurant area, we was told our table will be ready in a few minutes and to take a seat at the bar, we waited for almost 25 minutes before being seated.

We ordered a still bottle for water, our waiter poured the water however my glass had lipstick stains on it, so I asked for a new bottle of water and and a new glass, this took almost 15 minutes. As it happens the table next to us had the exact same issue (a pattern?)

On the three different occasions we had a drink waiter come to the table with drinks, only it wasn't our drinks so we kept getting interrupted.

We ordered a few cocktails, I specifically asked to have mine a little sweeter but was severed as normal. I asked it to be changed, waiter took it away and came back within a minute, straight away I knew they didn't make a new drink but just added some syrup and the waiter admitted it to me, however the manager overheard the conversation and sad it was a new drink made and I replied your waiter just told me it wasn't, so he basically just lied to my face! He then took the drink from the waiter and spoke to him in a passive aggressive manner, whice wasn't nice to witness, I appreciate it's a Saturday and it's busy. He did then change it and offered the drink on the house.

For starters we had the beef short rib, which absolutely amazing! Honestly I thought this was the beginning of a great start, I was wrong!

We ordered a 800g Ribeye steak to share, some fries and some sautéed onions. The steak arrives first, mind you this is a £145 steak. But I like to have my meal with everything I ordered for the main. Fries was placed on my plate only to find a HAIR in it, so I requested to speak to the manager that I spoke to previously in regards to the drink! I showed him the fries with hair and with a blank expression and silence for around 10-15 seconds he apologised and said I'll have it changed. I said what about my steak, he replied "you want me to change that as well" I said if you can get the fried out quickly I don't mind I just don't want my steak to go cold as it came sliced! He did get the fries straight away.

Now, the entertainment! We was seated around 9:30pm and there was live music which latest around 5 mins and then they came back on stage sometime after 11pm (which was a massive gap in between). However this time the music was so loud and not enjoyable at all, they need to do some mic (speaker) check, because the accustics was terrible!

Over all food wasn't the worst, service could be better I just think it's the lack of management skills to run a place as such. I think more experience staff is needed from management to waiters. I don't see myself returning nor can I recommend this place based on my experience, lack of car parking and it's very expensive for what...

I’m terribly sad to be writing a bad review however I’d never wish for anyone to have the same experience I did. I initially made a reservation for Saturday night and I was sent an email to say we wouldn’t be able to watch the performance (how I wish I kept the decision to be sat far from the band, never again will I ask to be sat there) having not had previous experience at this restaurant , I asked that they give us a good table to be able to watch the band , to which they then told me i had to pay £100 per guest in advance , which I did and my card was charged. Well upon arrival we were sat in a corner table close to the band however all we could see was their backs ( yes , I paid for very loud headache inducing drumming while watching the backs of the performers in the worst table in the room) the experience was very painful we couldn’t even proceed with desert not that they care about that because your card has already been charged , the waitress even came to tell us we would still be charged if we didn’t have desert ( how distasteful to be discussing money at table with guest around , all we said was no dessert due to excruciating noise and the fact we couldn’t see any performance nor have a conversation among ourselves, there was no point staying for dessert ,i didn’t care for the money , I was there for a good time which I didn’t have ,we had to endure a very loud drumming all through dinner and on top of that you’ve been placed on the worst table in the house. We couldn’t have a conversation among ourselves due to the extreme loud band nor could we watch any performance, so we sat there like fools starring at each other , it was too loud you couldn’t speak to anyone,this was genuinely the worst experience of dinning in my whole entire life. Think hard before you decide to be seated by the band , remember this is a band , you’re much much better off far away from it , i was misled by the reviews here, most people are never willing to write reviews of disappointment , im one of those but this was my worst experience and hope i save you the embarrassment, I had a headache from the noise and I regret the whole night . You’re better off at park chinois they don’t have loud drums and tables are perfectly placed you feel well taken care of , you’re not just dumped anywhere plus they don’t charge you in advance, the sitting arrangement is well thought out , park chinois have respect and trust in their clients, I honestly thought this place would be relatively similar to parkchinois, I hope management do something about how they treat guests , you can’t demand advance payment while claiming that guarantees you good seating to watch the band. The best seats are away...