The Cosy Cafe — Restaurant in Wales

I've previously reviewed The Cosy Cafe and gave it 5 star but after today's visit I need to reassess this to 3 stars.

The food is delicious and the decor and space itself is delightful.

However, after today's visit the service and logistics need to improve dramatically.

We ordered a tea with oat milk, soup and a sandwich. Firstly, you have to wait to be served rather than go to the till so we waited 10-15 minutes just to have our order taken. My tea arrived around 10 minutes later, just a black tea plonked on the table. I had to go up and ask for the milk. The soup meal and sandwich meal then came to us (after we chased it up) around 30 minutes later. I then decided to order a crepe as they have always been delicious here. Another 30-40 minute wait. I was with another diner and had highly recommended the cafe before arriving and was thoroughly embarrassed by the long waits. The person I was with drinks decaf coffee and they actually decided not to order a drink as based on how disorganised the service was couldn't be sure that the coffee would be decaf and didn't want to run the risk of it not being. The wait for the crepe was that long that I said to the person I was with to go and explore the bookshops of Hay, so as not to waste the afternoon waiting anymore. So (again after chasing up) I ate my crepe on my own once it arrived.

I appreciate the kitchen is small, although there seemed to be a lot of team members on shift so they didn't seem short of hands, but something just isn't working here. It makes literally no business sense for customers to wait so long to order, so long for a drink, so long for their food. We could have been in and out in an hour and more customers could come to take our place = more revenue for the cafe.

There seems to be a distinct lack of leadership from anyone guiding the team, working the floor to check people have been served, have received their order in good time (and the right order - another table sent their food back because they got given the wrong order) and just generally ensuring that things are ticking over well.

When I came to pay I hoped someone might have acknowledged the excessive wait but honestly I don't think they even realised which once again highlights the lack of leadership that no one truly seemed to be taking any responsibility.

Honestly, I won't be dining in again or recommending. I may use the take away hatch on the outside to grab a drink if everywhere else is busy. A real shame, I have been a big fan.

On reading other reviews it seems that many others have experienced slow service here. I don't understand why this hasn't been put right unless there is a complete lack of interest...

Decided to come here with the family for a cup tea and maybe a cake or two. As soon as we arrived it took a while to be served. There were plenty of staff behind the counter but they all seemed more interested in chatting than coming to take our order. Our table was still full of dirty plates and cups and we had to ask twice for someone to clear the plates and wipe the table, we shouldn’t have to have asked more than once.

We ordered two decaf teas and a mojito mint tea. When they arrived the teas were just cups of tea, no saucers, no spoons and one small milk between two people. The tea was also earl grey so not decaf and the mint tea was just a black tea. We had to ask for the mint tea to be redone. We asked for water and we’re told that there was a water station the other side of the cafe. The glasses at the watering station were still wet and dirty and the water took ages to come out of the water station.

The restaurant looked like it needed a good clean and also the staff were handling cakes and desserts with their bare hands. Their uniforms were also quite dirty.

Unfortunately I won’t be bringing my family back here and to be honest we shouldn’t have stayed. I wouldn’t recommend this to anyone...

Looked really lovely, nice drinks but the food let it down so badly which is so unfortunate. I had the nourish bowl "our choice of seasonal veggies packed with nourishment". Sounded fab Unfortunately it was spinach leaves topped with very wet chickpeas. They were so watery my bowl was left nearly a quarter full with water. The chickpea /tomato/onion mix was heavily coated harissa and no other flavours, it wasn't seasoned and you couldn't taste anything but wet spice. The little wrap/bread that came with it was nice but the meal was really disappointing and not at all as described. My partner had the ham sandwich, the bread was okay but the cheese was cheap, the ham wasn't great and the chutney was very strong. The children had cheese and ham crepes which were okay but the biggest disappointment was the nourish bowl. The cakes looked lovely but we didn't try them because we were too disappointed. Let the serve know when we paid that we were unhappy and there were no "seasonal veggies" in the bowl nd she was less than concerned....