First Watch — Restaurant in Melbourne

I love this chain restaurant, this is the first location I have ever had a bad experience, and it was so horrible I will never go again (to this location). I want to believe the problems we saw were just because they recently opened (couple months) and there is just a lack of training to standards yet, but I just can't bring myself to endure that place again.

First they screwed up my order, the wrap clearly had turkey in it from taste, look, and smell even though I asked for chicken and the server confirmed. I moonlight as a chef, so, no doubt. On top of that it wasn't even fully wrapped you pick it up the shell was cut in half and placed over the top?!?!?! I never send food back, rather just pay, and never come back again, this though wasn't edible, so did it. I didn't trust the kitchen to do it right, so changed the order to something else (chicken club) which came out not that great either but at least had chicken this time.

First the server came back and said the kitchen re-assured him it was chicken, he shrugged his shoulders in a way that indicated to us he though kitchen was crazy. Then the hostess for some bizzare reason came over and started to get all angry with us saying it was clearly chicken, even brought the plate back to show us, who does that, and it even had the color of darker turkey sliced and smell of it like it was old turkey sitting out when she brought it back. She laughed in a grimace way at us when she walked away. She was so angry and belittling, we were in shock and never even said a word to her. Honestly who treats customers like that, whether it was incorrect or not why would you do that?!?!?! Also you can clearly see what they served was wrong and a hot mess since it wasn't even wrapped properly and looked horrible, I would be ashamed to bring that plate back out from the kitchen either time.

Top it off, I had the biscuits and turkey gravy as a side, had this before at other locations, it was so bland here, almost no flavor, and the turkey had a chewy texture like it was boiled for hours. The potatoes, which I normally love, tasted like they forgot the normal seasoning, and they had been sitting out under a heat lamp or microwaved again, like chewy on the edges that should be crispy.

There was a 25min wait to get seated, so I don't understand why the food tasted like it was made a week ago and they forgot to use the herbs and spices seasonings, it should have been constantly fresh prepped with that throughput of a busy restaurant. Just indicates how lazy kitchen management is with the corner cutting. The wait staff should pick a different industry as well cause clearly they don't like people or food.

I truly hope the franchise owner steps in and re-evalutes staff and training at...

I want to start out by saying that my whole family has always liked First Watch! It was my grandmas favorite brunch place and we’ve been to restaurants in Ohio and FL and always had delicious food and great experiences! With that said, I have developed an egg “allergy” (not anaphylactic, tho) in the past couple years so I’m learning to experience the same restaurants but with a different point of view. That is where I’m coming from with this review. I met a friend there for lunch, I haven’t been there since my allergy developed because breakfast is usually a very difficult meal for me to avoid eggs 😂. But I can usually have salads and sometimes sandwiches at brunch places so I was game to meet my friend there. Unfortunately, the First Watch in Melbourne was a little difficult to eat at. The waitress was somewhat nice but extremely hurried so she didn’t have much time to answer any allergy questions - their online menu indicated I could have some of the salads (if you leave the egg out if it) but I always double check at the restaurant. She told me that every single salad dressing they have had egg in it, so i am not sure why that contradicted the online menu but I wasn’t going to chance it. She didn’t have time to answer any other food questions other than whether their sourdough bread had eggs (it didn’t) so by guessing it seemed the only things opened to me was a dry sandwich (to avoid eggs in the condiments) and soup. The soup was “vegetable” which is one of my favorites, so I got that and a half sandwich on sourdough. The soup was more like a spicy marinara when it came out so that was a Little disappointing, I didn’t have much of it (but the sandwich was good! It was dry, but again that’s my fault cuz I can’t have mayo or most “honey mustards” because they have egg in them and I now didn’t trust the online allergy menu to match what they had in the restaurant so I just skipped all condiments to be safe since they were busy and I didn’t want to add more stress to the poor wait staff by continuously asking to check). So just be aware, if you have an allergy, this particular location may be difficult to eat at because their offerings don’t seem to match the allergen content of their online menu. But with that said, my friend had a delicious lunch with Belgian waffles that looked and smelled amazing, and they seated us quickly! The restaurant has beautiful high ceilings so, even though it was full, we could easily hear each other talk and parking was very easy! There were several people waiting for carry out orders so they seem to do a booming business there too! Overall, I think this is a great chain and well worth the visit, just be wary and plan extra time if you have any food allergies or...

My wife and I went to this location for lunch. It appears to be a nice place, we didn’t’ wait very long to get seated and the staff seemed nice. Our waitress name was Hayley and she was very nice and attentive. I got the classic Benedict ($13.79) and my wife got the Bacado ($13.29). We loved the food very much and have no complaints, other than my wife said the coffee was very weak and ended up having tea instead. We will surely return.

Returned Feb, 2025 because the food is always good and the service is usually o.k. This day was an exception for service. We were met by Antonio who took our drink and food order. Our food was delivered, however, it was missing a side of Avocado, as well as jam for my wife’s toast. My wife asked another server to bring some jam, which she did. It took forever for our waiter to return to the area, he acted surprised about the Avocado, but did bring it to us eventually. A few minutes after that he placed the check on our table stating, “no rush”. It was nowhere near closing time, and we’d barely started eating, so I thought that was odd, but it would be ok if he’d planned to continue checking on us. However, he never returned to see how we were doing. My drink ran dry so I flagged another server down and she said she would take care of it. A few more minutes went by and I saw that same server walking around not doing much. I then grabbed my empty drink and stood at the kitchen thoroughfare. It was very odd, I was definitely out of place by standing there with an empty cup but no one acknowledged me. It wasn’t very busy, about average. Then, the server that originally said she would take care of it told me that they have to put in drink orders and only the drink making person can make drinks, but she walked behind the counter and grabbed my drink anyway. I guess they have a process about making drinks but it seems weird to me. Then my drink went dry again so I figured I would just get one to go. I don’t mind paying $3 or $4 for a tea if there are free refills but my server only served me one, I had to practically beg for the 2nd. I do not understand how a little attention to your table is...