Softbite | Soufflé Pancakes — Restaurant in New York

I almost never write reviews but am making an exception for this place. Horrible service and mid food. Came with my boyfriend and ordered the chicken karaage as an appetizer, the gyudon and prosciutto eggs Benedict as mains, the matcha soufflé pancakes, and the strawberry matcha latte and iced latte.

Upon arriving, we were seated and the waitress set our table but neglected to provide my boyfriend with a spoon. My water cup was dirty so i had to ask for another. I also noticed my fork was dirty too but the waitress was hard to flag down so I just gave up and wiped it on a napkin. After we ordered, the Karaage and gyudon came out first. The karaage was decent, but the gyudon was an extremely small portion with basically 60% rice, 30% onions and 10% meat. My boyfriends coffee was filled to overflowing so when he stirred it a little went on to the table so we asked for more napkins, and the waitress returned with 2 very small and thin napkins. Like how are we supposed to clean up the coffee with these napkins that resemble 1 square of toilet paper.

I waited a very long time for my eggs benedict (at this point we had finished the karaage and gyudon) and I asked the waitress about it and she said she’d get back to me (she never did). Eventually the matcha soufflé pancakes came out, it they didn’t bring us a knife so we had to ask for one. I was annoyed that the item we had ordered for dessert was coming out before my main dish. My boyfriend and I ate most of the matcha pancakes, saving some for the end. At this point I asked about my eggs benedict again. They said it would come out in 3 minutes. Five minutes later, a salmon eggs Benedict arrived. I pointed out I had ordered prosciutto. They waiter took it back and I heard a loud “fuck!” from the area where they were assembling food and then later I saw the same plate go back out and be served to another table. No one came to follow up with me about the status of my dish. About 10-15ish minutes later (we had finished all our drinks and the other dishes and the dessert and had been sitting there doing nothing for while now) the correct eggs Benedict finally arrived. While it was on the counter about to be picked up by the waiter and served to me, I saw one of the employees who was wearing a shirt with long ribbons lean on the counter and her ribbons touched my food. I didn’t complain because I just wanted to leave at this point. When the waiter delivered my eggs Benedict he tried to take away our matcha pancakes when they were clearly not done. I tried the eggs Benedict and it was just ok — not anything special and I was grossed out by the clothing touching it so I left most of it behind.

We were served by literally 4 different waiters/waitresses and everything was so disorganized and not very sanitary. Some of the employees don’t even know how to pronounce the items on the menu. I hoped that they would acknowledge the delays and issues at least a little or maybe offer to comp our appetizer or a drink or some small token of apology, but there was nothing and the minimum tip option on the checkout machine was 18% lmao. Total cost for this lunch for 2 ppl was a bit over $100 for dirty dishes, people’s clothes in my food, slow and disorganized service, and...

I was excited to try out this new place in the neighborhood. However, this was such a disappointing experience. I came here on a nice and sunny sunday morning for brunch with a little pep in my steps, little did I know this place would spoil my mood with horrible service from their ignorant employees and underwhelming food.

My friend and I first sat down at a table and had to wait about 20 minutes until someone would come to take our order, then had to ask thrice just to get a glass of water- fine. I have to mention both the waiter and waitress were extremely lax, there would be times where the waitress is behind counter and the waiter downstairs nowhere to be seen leaving the entire dining room without service.

Then we were served our appetizer.. without any utensils- we tried to get the staff’s attention multiple times then decided it would be more efficient if we had just walked up to the counter to asked “Would it be ok if i grab some utensils?” Staff replied a mere “ok”. No apologies. Then the nice barista guy had to come and serve me my food personally bc again there was a pile of food/drinks waiting to be served at the counter and two waiters staring into the space.

That was just the service alone, not to mention the food was just… subpar. We didnt order pancake dishes rather just hot food dishes. The mentaiko pasta came out extremely soggy, and the curry bowl just tasted like.. ready made frozen meal, came out lukewarm btw.

I wouldve been ok with the food, but not the bad attitude from the staff….

Anyways, thats my two cents. Would not personally come back here but try at your...

Walked in and was greeted fairly quickly, but we were then told there would be a slight wait. Not a big deal for Sunday brunch. No more than 5 seconds later another server greeted us and offered for us to sit at the bar.

After we sat we didn’t receive any attention from either of the first two employees. A third person, one of two baristas, came to us after about 20 minutes at the bar. We put in our orders immediately (an espresso and a latte for my partner plus some pancakes for each of us). The barista immediately returned to making other orders, but never acknowledged us again. Mind you he was right in front of us. Cue the first person who greeted us at the door who asked us if we are ready to order.

After about another 10 minutes a girl walked in and over to the bar and placed an order with another barista. Imagine my surprise when this diner got to watch the barista prepare her cafe affagado right in front of her. Never once breaking conversation. Mind you this was trimmed out with ice cream, ice cream cone, and a drizzle of caramel (in addition to an espresso i.e. my order with more steps). I guess flirty singles get priority, but that makes sense since there didn’t seem to be any management leading the ship.

No harm. We walked right out losing only 40 minute of our time, but it sure was disappointing that this hot new local spot was so grossly mismanaged. I’m just glad we got out before we gave...