Le Pain Quotidien — Restaurant in New York

Poor experience from beginning to end. We sat down and were not provided with menus or waters. After 15 minutes, a server provided menus after I asked for one. We grabbed glasses and a bottle of water for ourself, since they were not provided. Eventually a server asked us if we “wanted anything else” as though we had already ordered and consumed something.

We ordered a small espresso and lemon tart, which require minimal and no preparation, respectively (the tarts are pre-made, in a display cabinet). This took approximately 7-8 minutes to arrive. The espresso was sour, and tasted / seemed more like a small drip coffee. The lemon tart was great.

Receiving the check took an absurd amount of time. We had moved all of our items to the edge of the table and put the napkins on top to indicate we were finished. 15 minutes later, after watching multiple servers unnecessarily re-arrange water bottles, we stood up, said we needed to leave, and asked for the check. The server simply said “yes,” without acknowledging, let alone apologizing for, the long wait.

Throughout, the restaurant was not particularly busy and the servers were all apathetic, bordering on rude. We observed multiple other patrons complain. One cancelled their order due to it taking too long. Another had watched their order sit on a counter for 15 minutes untouched.

Not sure if this is a temporal / seasonal issue; just a couple of days prior we had a bad experience at the Bryant Park, NYC location. Typically I have had fine experiences at Le Pain. Sad to have had a few bad...

If I wanted to a pathetic, overpriced sandwich I’d go to Fyre Festival. If you enjoy being underwhelmed and overcharged, then by all means, order the ham and Gruyère sandwich from Le Pain Quotidien. I was foolish enough to expect a hearty, satisfying meal based on the advertised image. What arrived instead was a pitiful excuse for a sandwich—an anorexic sliver of bread barely concealing a whisper of ham and a ghost of Gruyère.

The mustard? A trace. A mere suggestion, as if someone waved a mustard bottle in the general direction of the sandwich and called it a day. The gherkins were laughably small—tiny slices that looked like they’d been scraped from the bottom of a jar and rationed as though they were rare truffles. I would’ve had better luck finding pickles in a salt mine.

To Le Pain’s credit, the bread was decent—crusty, fresh, and genuinely pleasant. It’s a shame everything inside it felt like a cruel joke.

And as for the “side salad” that was listed? Nonexistent. Not even a leaf of wilted arugula to round out this tragic meal.

This was not a sandwich—it was a bread delivery with a light seasoning of disappointment....

Why offer sit down if you can’t service it? Came for breakfast as a group of 4 - they tell us to sit down anywhere we want. We sit and… wait, and wait and wait for a menu. We come inside double checking if there is table service or if we should order from the counter (which we’re totally ok doing). We’re assured they will come by. Once they finally do, everything takes forever. We wait to place and order, our food takes forever to come out (got a yogurt parfait, and avocado toast and 2 of the farro egg breakfast bowls). Our coffee somehow comes after our food and they only have skim milk or almond milk for the coffee. The food was ok - no complaints, but not stellar either. Breakfast at this “fast casual” breakfast bakery somehow took 1.5 hours. The worst part is, I felt bad for the servers - the management really did them a disservice. Mental note for next time - I’d you see a bunch of tables that have not been cleared off even if it’s obvious that the previous customers left a while ago - the service staff is probably...