wagamama watford woodside — Restaurant in Watford

update from september 2025 This place has fully been turn around by a new manager and 90% of staff who have joined recently. They were speedy, attentive and went out of the way to make my mam's birthday super special (one of the staff members- Misha ran around to find a lighter and light a candle for my mam). There was a new girl there- Abby, it was her first shift and ahe was equally as attentive and brilliant. So lovely to see 😊

summer 2024 This is a recently opened Waga near my mother's home, so we were hugely hopeful to be regulars. I am writing this in August 2024 and I can honestly say we have been put off by the experience for a long time. If the service at this establishment doesn't improve the restaurant will shut down before it even hit the 1 year mark.

We arrived as a party of 4 at the restaurant at about 5pm on a Sunday afternoon. We were sat outside and out of a party of 4, the table was set for 2. Not an issue, if the waiter/waitress comes back promptly with napkins and cutlery, but not in this instance.....after 15 minutes of no contact I went inside and asked if anyone is serving outside, a manager (tall, blond lady in her late 20s) came to take our order. Within a few minutes we had a serving of gyoza and 1 kids' meal, still no chopsticks to enjoy the food. After the 2nd kids' meal arrived, I pointed out to the waitress that we would prefer to eat together and I got a snarky comment that all meals are cooked at different stations and they will arrive and different times. I asked to speak to the floor manager (Omar) who explained that while the food is cooked at different stations they do try and keep it together as much as possible and he apologised for the delay and offer us desserts.

The food was the usual Waga standard, we finished it up, but clearing took ages, so we promptly ordered desserts when staff arrived to clear our table, learning from the experience of waiting for a long time. After another 20 minute wait a waiter arrived with 3 servings of ice cream and 1 cheesecake with 2 spoons. He promised to go back in for 2 more spoons, but he never did so we had melted ice cream after I went inside for more spoons.....when I raised this again to Omar I was told staff are new and he apologised again for the service.

The icing on the cake was the bill.....we got charged for an extra kids' meal and noone could explain where did it come from..... I also had to ask 3 times for our table number as the one we were given for online payments....

Overall we were at the restaurant for over 2 hours and I do not think we will be back...

I have always been a loyal waga customer (despite the absolute greedy prices out of them now) however my last two experiences at this restaurant have just made me wake up! Last time I visited the services was so bad. All the desserts came out a different times (I am aware this is how they work) but 20minutes apart??? For a scoop of ice cream! It’s just a scoop of ice cream, the restaurant was not busy, there was about 3 tables and it still took that long. If it was really busy ok but it was DEAD! I still can’t get my head around how long it took. Anyway all that aside I just thought it was some teething as the restaurant isn’t open long so I went again yesterday and it was worse. This time round not only was the service again shocking but the food wasn’t good. My rice was raw, not even undercooked just straight up raw. Also got dumplings which were tasteless. They were as dry as Moses sandals in the desert. Ordered rice for my son and it went to the table behind me. I got that tables pickles so we just swapped amongst ourselves because it wasn’t worth the hassel to call someone because there was nobody about. The server did apologise for the food and brought me a new bowl but it didn’t have sticky rice as stated on the menu, they just gave me normal rice instead. All they had to say was “we don’t have sticky rice ready can we give you normal rice”. I know it’s not the end of the world but i ordered the dish for the sticky rice. The prices are already so overpriced for what you get so when I go i expect to get what I order from the menu, not a variation. I couldn’t be arsed complaining a second time about the rice so just paid and left. Not even anything knocked off the bill as an apology. Not coming here again, much better places to eat that aren’t so overpriced. Hate leaving bad reviews but Wagamama, you...

We ordered a click + collect order for 8:30pm on a Monday. We arrived around 5 minutes early and were asked to wait at the side. We continued to wait for OVER an hour for our food. We spoke to 3 different staff members, 2 of which were incredibly rude, all of the other front-of-house employees moved around us or just ignored us as we stood for over an hour waiting for our food. We were then greeted by the manager who explained a system error had occurred, meaning that our whole order wasn’t processed or prepared. We were offered three free drinks and a starter to make up for the mistake but it was pointless as the restaurant was incredibly busy, the staff were rude and it was uncomfortable overall. Not only did it take an incredibly extended amount of time to prepare our food, but we could see our dishes sitting on the side of the pass without a lid on on labelled and increasingly getting colder. This is so disappointing as I am a Wagamama obsessive. It is my favourite restaurant and I am even more disappointed as I used to be an employee of Wagamama. It was sad to see the majority of the staff behaving rudely and the restaurant desperately unclean. We were greeted with a smile from the person who was hosting but for the rest of the time we waited, we were ignored and when I tried to raise my concern for the food which we later found out wasn’t even being prepared, the supervisor/team leader turned around and pulled a face at us. It was a really sad evening, especially as we had spent over £100 on a collection order that we didn’t have the...