Upstairs — Restaurant in London

Awful… We went for a special occasion with our hopes very high as everyone told us that it was an excellent place to dine, but we were disappointed…

You go for a restaurant for two things mainly, the service and the food, and both of them were not up to standards.

When we got there, the kitchen looked super disorganised (like the cook, was not in control of anything) and there was an awful smell of burned vegetables and smoke, windows were opened… we thought that it was a one-time only, but no (just bear with me on this one).

We were seated and we got there before a group of Spanish people, and we ordered before them. But it happened that the waiter was a Spanish speaker, and somehow all the orders from the other table arrived first… we ordered our drinks first and somehow the other table got theirs first. We ordered the food first, and you guessed it, the other table got it first. Even though we were a party of two people and they were a group of four…

Regarding food, I think a good Wetherspoons can do the deal. At the beginning we were informed that there was no specific order to the food, it comes as it goes. You can expect that from a tapas place, but not from a restaurant that has mains… we went with the flow and the disappointment did not end. The focaccia was dry, the humus was less than the one you can find in a deli. The arancini and the comte croquette were average but with their size and taste, it was a robbery. The normal size of arancini is at least the size of an orange, but these were the size of a grape… Do you remember the smoke, burned vegetables and disorganised kitchen? Well, that continued during our visit. We hoped that it would not be one of our meals, but it was. Large bits of the cale and broccoli were burned (one of the limited vegetarian options), and to not mention that their chips were straight from the freezer. Nothing special… Just to end the night and see the level of the dessert, we asked for a cheesecake and it was not good. The size, the texture, and the coulis were straight out of a supermarket freezer…

If you want to spend a lot of money on food,...

Good food, deplorable service

Friday 12th we went for the first time to upstairs, we came in and we’re welcomed with surprise (even though we had a reservation). Sat at a hightable facing the window, we asked for sparkling water but got still water.

The waiters came to see us after 40MIN and many head turns on our part to take our order (food or drinks). We ordered all of our food and drinks in one go, our starters were actually delicious. This followed by a shared seabass. At that point my partner asked twice for a wine menu to have a glass of wine, nobody came to take our order. Our plates were not changed from the shared starters. We got a whole fish, no plate to put the bones. The server dropped fries when putting our fries on our table and said I’m sorry I’ll bring more. Ofcourse, they did not come back with new fries. Again the food was actually really good. Flakey fish lots of taste.

At the end of our meal they did not even ask if we enjoyed our meal. I believe this is even standard practice at Nando’s, I assumed this would be the case at an affiliate Michelin restaurant.

We had good food but it was ruined by the service. It was almost like the stuff...

Came here for a meal with family before moving to another country, and had a phenomenal experience. The food itself was divine and each dish was extraordinarly well out together - the focaccia was fluffy, the comte croquettes delightfully crunchy and soft at the same time, the confit leg of chicken succulent, the bonito crudo full of flavour, the burrata creamy, the broccoli crispy and giving back the right amount of bite, the monkfish light, the bavette perfectly cooked and melt in your mouth, and the tiramisu amongst the best I've had. On top of the outstanding food, the service by Mike and the team was impeccable and made us feel entirely at home, as if we'd known them for years. The only small piece of feedback would be making clear which dishes are vegetarian on the menu - while we ordered something thinking it was vegetarian, the team made sure that they accommodated a separate portion for the vegetarian guest when they were made aware of the requirement after the dish had been served. We had an amazing experience on all fronts and I would highly...