Okka Restaurant (Harpenden) — Restaurant in St Albans

Food was good and ingredients fresh and tasty. Portions were filling and what we tasted generally felt very authentic (a rarity around the town of Harpenden, where it's hard to find eateries sticking to their avowed tradition, unadulterated by tweaks to suit the locals' palate). The only thing that slightly marred the experience was the very slow service. I'm usually not fussed by waiting a little and wouldn't comment on it had it not been an exceptionally long wait. Having languished at our table for nearly an hour after placing our orders, the waitress eventually took notice and came out; she informed us that an "issue with their machine" was causing the delay, but reassured us that the food was now on its way, and that to make up for the inconvenience we would get a 10% discount. We thought this was not very timely given we had been sitting around already for so long, but again were quite easygoing about it; however, our wait was far from over and it took another 20 minutes or so to finally get served. Perhaps a slightly bigger discount than 10% would have been in order at this point. So all in all, I would return as I enjoyed their food and it is as genuine as local options get around here, and having looked around at other tables I do believe this was an isolated incident as others seemed to be served quickly. It's just that a tad more attentiveness in our experience would easily have garnered this place one if not 2 extra stars. I look forward to a better one next...

Ordered a tea and bacon sandwich on white. I specifically asked for the bread to be buttered. First I asked this of the older chap serving behind the bar when he came over, and then of the waitress when she came over to take my order (again). When the sandwich arrived the bread was cheap dry sliced white bread such as Mother's Pride used to be, and guess what? No butter. The bacon was also overcooked and was not so much crispy as tough. In my view, unless otherwise stated or requested bacon should be soft with the fat well cooked. It's not difficult to do. To be fair, the gentleman who had come over first did see me checking and when asked brought some butter over for me to spread some on myself. I wonder why the waitress didn't bother checking, as it's her job to do so. The tea was nice, and the sandwhich came with a side salad with balsamic dressing which was unexpected but quite pleasant.

Overall though, I got the impression that the waitress didn't care much, the cook doesn't know how to cook bacon, and the owner has never had a decent bacon sandwich on good crusty white bread.

The price was ok for Harpenden, £6 for the sandwhich and £2.40 ish for the tea, but I really expected better quality...

Decent breakfast options but mains menu is lacking. Ordered a lamb shish which came out as a skewer of lamb on a bed of grilled tortilla and a side of rice. No sauce provided so was very dry but the lamb was tasty. At £18.45 for the dish I would expect at least some tzatziki or otherwise to come with and could be more generous with the meat portion as it was only 4 chunks of lamb.

More options available for the breakfast and brunch menus which the restaurant clearly does better at.

Service was a bit disappointing. Waiter pointed us to our table and didn't bring out enough water for the table when asked and was absent otherwise.

Coffee was also fine but felt like decaf.

The atmosphere was good, seems to be popular with locals at lunchtime.

Overall an ok experience, but considering the price of dishes I would expect larger portions or accompaniments for the mains. Either improve the mains options or cut from the menu and focus on...