Ansal Plaza is situated in the heart of South Delhi. Geoffrey’s is the multi-cuisine restaurant on the ground floor of the beautiful plaza. The ambience and the decor is eye-appealing and quite chic. The problem starts right after that. You enter, are escorted to a table of your liking and then forgotten. The waiter refuses to wait on you and makes sure that you wait for him. The buffet is supposed to be applicable till 4 pm, but Surprise, surprise! The waiter informs you that the buffet is over at 3.45 pm. Has no explanation- why? You order the beer. Rather you try to. The menu boasts of pints which are not available, of brands which are again not available. For the over priced menu, the least they can do is keep stocks of what is printed. Well anyways, settle down to long wait for the ’chilled’ beer.
They actually chill it while you wait. (Maybe import it as well, in the mean time). We place dthe main course orders, so that it would not take too long. Ask for the non-veg soup of the day. Something which is not even pronounceable is offered (Chicken). I was with a couple of my foreign friends (in mid -50s, well travelled around the world). I requested a taster, which was thankfully brought over. I’m yet to taste anything better. Very good and seemed to be freshly made- still hot and steaming. We requested a bowl each for all of us. Within 15 minutes we were brought the soups. Somehow the stam had fizzed out. Anyways, hungry as we were, dove into it. Some spoons down, realization dawned.
The soup was laden with mushrooms and the ’chicken’ had flown away. It is almost impossible to attract any waiters attention at all, forget our own one’s. I had to go into the kitchen and request him to replace the soups or simply add some chicken pieces to our respective soups. The bowls were whisked away and we saw the soups brought back to us in 25 minutes flat. No apologies. They had to prepare the soups again. Fair enough. This time there were some strange ’chicken pieces floating in the soup and the mushrooms had disappeared. After another 25-30 minutes, during which we finished the soups and the beer and almost everything that was to be discussed, our ’waiter’ walked over to ask us if we would like to have the main course. No! That should have been the answer. But since we were very hungry, I said yes.
The waiter took offence (probably). The dishes were served and to be truthful, the food tasted excellent. But that was actually the last that we saw of the waiter. We finished our food and were waiting for the waiter to come, clear the table, give us lemon bowls to clean our hands and give us the bill and collect the outstanding from us. But he seemed to have washed his hands off us altogether. Another 15-20 minute wait. Nothing, can’t catch anyone else’s eyes as well. Had to go to the counter and request for the bill. Bill was produced, and the payment collected by someone else. On questioning the good fella the secret of the day was revealed to me. Our waiter had left for the day, his shift had gotten over. Ridiculous. No Apologies, No Words of comfort. Disgusted, I left. Didnt want to create a scene in front of the foriegners. I saved the Indian spirit and hospitality and came out of the stuffy place called ’Geoffrey’s’
I request all to boycott such a place where the food and everything rates as high as possible but the service sucks worse than the suckers of an Octopus.