Mei Ume

Really enjoyed dinner here, sadly don't have a picture of the lamb chops but they were cooked and seasoned to perfection and couldn't recommend them enough. Our favourite starters were the crispy salmon bites aabd the tuna tartare. Service is great here as you'd expect and if you go for a drink at any of the Connaught's bars they are happy to move your drinks and tab with you.

I hate writing this, but if management reads these, I think you should pay attention here! Your restaurant is beautiful and has nice views out the windows. The wine list is extensive, your menu looks great, and your team tries to provide great service. You have everything it takes to be great, but you're simply not. Highlights: your somm Veronica is truly exceptional, so is her colleague from France, but I did not get his name sadly. She made our visit one to remember. Talked openly about wines she loves, educated us, made us feel like family. She is your greatest asset currently. He also did a great job and let us try another dessert wine that he wanted to contrast with what we were drinking. Drinks and wines by the glass were great, food is good but not exceptional. Dining room is really pretty and nicely lit. Our server could not have been nicer, but he was clearly new at this and a bit out of his league. I realize we dined on a Monday night, but you should never have your B-team on site for dinner at a place with your reputation. Lowlights: Without any discussion of the menu and prior to us even receiving our drinks or any bread, the server asked "are you ready to order", I was honestly a bit taken aback! You did not give us any thoughts about the menu or ask if we had questions, nothing to help us along here. This was a big miss. Amuse came out and it was excellent, did not even clear that plate and our appetizers were delivered. Never bring food to the table before clearing the last course, this is common knowledge and far inferior restaurants do this better than you did. It also immediately made me feel rushed. Server trying to get our order quickly, then food showing up rapid fire. I had to ask for the entree to be slowed down and the server said he would wait 5-10 minutes to put it in. 25-30 minutes later he comes back and asks if he can fire our entrees? In my mind, I'm thinking we already agreed to this and I don't work here so don't bring me issues. Just do what we discussed, not hard. Finally, when your restaurant has few diners on a Monday night, don't seat all the customers next to each other. You seated 2 different parties of 2 across from us when there were 10 other tables you could have put them at. It created a bottleneck in that hallway and people were having trouble getting through there. Rookie mistake by the people who seat your customers, think it through, space people out, create a bit of privacy. I don't think we will be back, but we did enjoy certain aspects of the experience. Again, our server was very personable but is not ready for the job due to you not training him on what excellent service looks like. Thanks again to both Somms, they made it worth being there! It would have been a 3 star review otherwise.

We came for high tea and thoroughly enjoyed the service, ambience and scones. The sandwiches were dry and tea selection/taste very average - surprisingly as one would expect perfection knowing that high tea for 2 (we didn’t have the alcohol) cost 200£. Overall an interesting experience but wouldn’t be rushing back.