Dirty French – Leading the Pack with Service Issues

I was excited to have breakfast at Dirty French last weekend, but never again. The space is super cute with lots of kitsch and neat ornamental features – promises of good things to come….empty promises, unfortunately.

Food was just okay. The blackened salmon on my bagel had an acrid off-putting flavor I couldn’t quite put my finger on, but when I sliced the charred bitter layer off, it was a decent bagel and “lox”. My husband’s omelet was fine but the eggs weren’t fluffy and light, like a French omelet should be. Coffee was strong, really strong. Perhaps something I would have enjoyed more on a morning-after kind of morning.

Service is really what killed it. There simply wasn’t any. Our waiter asked if we were familiar with the continental breakfast and started telling us, then stopped mid-sentence and asked if we were guests of the hotel, we said no, and he told us this breakfast wasn’t available to us. This set the tone for the rest of his “service” to us. Our food order taken 15 minutes later, food arrived 10 minutes after that, about 10 minutes after the last of our strong coffee was gone without an offer to refill. After waiting yet another 15 minutes for our check, to end the madness, and asking for it three times with various members of the staff, the manager came over to ask if there was anything wrong. I told her I’d be leaving in exactly 2 minutes whether I had a check or not to which she simply said breakfast was on her. She totally didn’t get it. I told her we wanted to pay for breakfast and to please, please bring me a check. She returns with a check with a zero balance. This might seem like a nice gesture but it just added to the bad experience and seemed to be a habitual replacement for actual service.

After leaving a gratuity, we left with promises to not return. Looking around at the nearly 10 tables waiting impatiently for a check with wallets on the table, I’m guessing we aren’t the only ones sharing the sentiment.

Cheers,

Veronique