Cote Avis 

Cotes is now overpriced poor quality small portions and rude uninterested staff. We spent £300 in Cotes Soho this evening and when we asked if we could have our loyalty card stamped the manager refused telling us we should have mentioned it before paying our bill. He was unhelpful and quite rude. I used to visit cotes a lot but since the takeover the service food and customer care has declined enormously I certainly won’t be going back and especially to the Soho restaurant

So pleased that you have actually listened to your customers over the last 8 months, since you changed ownership, and have gone back to the regular, popular dishes on your menu as from today.
Hopefully your reviews will once again be more positive. It would be a shame to lose Cote from the high street.

Another disappointing visit to Cote. Esher this time.
Manager of Cote Esher wouldn't accept a passport ID, which I had a photograph of on my phone, for my 18yr old to have a small glass of wine with a 3 course meal. Which was annoying but much more offensive than that was his aggressive response when I said that it's a government issue ID it's accepted by everyone, he replied '"WELL I DON'T!"

The Law: In the UK, it is legal for 16 and 17-year-olds to drink beer, wine, or cider with a table meal if accompanied by an adult. However, the adult must purchase the alcohol, and spirits are strictly prohibited. For anyone under 16, or for younger teens having other types of drinks, it is not permitted.

As well as the unnecessarily aggressive response to the I.D. was that some of the food was sub-standard. The chicken liver parfait is like slop and both people who had it didn't eat it. Dont bother ordering. It is no longer the delicious firm pate it was pre 2025. The king prawn starter doesn't contain king prawns and is swimming in oil. The crab starter and onion soup were apparently delicious. The main courses were good especially the sea bream. One positive thing is that instead of the new stodgy oven chips they tried they've gone back to proper French fries, which were good.
The desserts were ok but they didn't have the best one -creme caramel and they didn't have chocolate ice cream. The chocolate mousse, (similar to the liver parfait) is not firm enough and is served with salt, frozen raspberry bits, hazelnuts, olive oil and salty biscuits. It felt gimmicky and the extra bits weren't enjoyed by the 3 people who had them. The extras with the mousse are largely a waste of time and money and not eaten. The chocolate mousse itself was reported as ok.
In conclusion, having been customers of Cote for as long as it's been open in Wimbledon Village and then Cobham and Esher over the years, we are no longer confident of a good experience. The staff are not as friendly, the food is not as reliably good and eating out is so expensive it is an easy choice not to go. Sadly the changes in the menu and staff has made Cote an unreliable no go area. Not a success story for Steve Allen. Goodbye Cote.

Very disappointed with my recent experience at Côte Chelmsford and, if I'm honest, even more disappointed with the way the complaint has been handled.
I visited on 6th June and experienced poor service on arrival, a dismissive attitude from the manager, and food that was well below the standard I would expect. Credit where it is due, Ben who served me was excellent and deserves recognition.
I wasn't looking for compensation and simply wanted to provide feedback and hopefully restore some confidence in the brand. Unfortunately, this turned into a lengthy back-and-forth with the Guest Excellence team, with an initial £10 gesture which I felt did not reflect the experience or inconvenience caused.
When I explained that I would have little option but to share my experience publicly and with others if we could not reach a satisfactory conclusion, I was disappointed to be told that "we do not respond to threats". This was never intended as a threat, merely a statement that, after exhausting the complaints process, customers are entitled to share honest feedback and their genuine experiences.
Whilst a refund was eventually offered, the handling of the complaint itself has left me with little confidence in returning with my family, which is a shame as I had previously held Côte in high regard.
I hope this feedback is taken in the spirit intended and that others receive a better experience than I did.

Three of us ate at Côte in Shrewsbury on Saturday night because our favourite Italian Restaurant was full. Côte was quiet. We needed to eat quickly as we had a theatre booking about an hour after arriving. The meals arrived quickly and were delicious and beautifully presented. The portions were sensible. My salade niçoise looked and tasted wonderful. My husband's steak was perfect and our friend's meal was great too. The wines were enjoyed. There was nothing to fault with Côte. The standard was better than the branch in Birmingham that that I used to frequent. My only (very slight) criticism was that the service wasn't sparkling. it was polite, it was efficient and all that it should be other than being slightly flat and distracted. A little more warmth would have made the experience an 11 out of ten. Otherwise - well done, Côte. You've definitely earned our repeat custom.

I eat at Cote quite a bit, and I appreciate the consistent quality. Breakfast is good. Please bring back the duck confit.

Best crème caramel I. Lon
But... tiny and at £9.50 it's highly overpriced

V slow service (over 30 mins for our order to arrive) & 5 mistakes with the bill

The Salad Nicoise that Cote served until a year or so ago was exceptional - quite the best obtainable anywhere, including Nice! Now it is just ordinary. What made it exceptional was the anchovy sauce at the bottom of the plate, then nicely dressed salad with two half eggs and at least two anchovies, then the piece de la resistance - the thick layer of black tapenade on top of the grilled tuna. Wonderful! The anchovy sauce and the tapenade are no more and you are lucky to get two more than a hint of salad dressing.
Please restore this fine dish to how it was and increase the price as necessary.

Went to cote last week had a lovely time with the family although my steak came out slightly undercooked staff were very nice about the issue and fixed it quickly.

We had the most glorious night at Cote in Ealing. The food was superb as always. I had the beef bourguignon and my partner the burger. Both first class.

But the biggest highlight for us both was the simply extraordinary service from Paulo. He is, without doubt, a walking masterclass of a visitor's experience. Always there but never intruding, glasses were filled when no one was looking and he was funny, police and charming. If not for the food, we'll be going back to see him. Utterly wonderful evening from start to finish. Thank you Paulo!!

The service I received at cote was appalling. I was overcharged on my order and had to argue with the “manager” explaining to him that he had charged me twice for the same item. I had ordered refill fries and I believe knowingly charged me for 2 separate servings based on his attitude and the waitress had looked very uncomfortable when giving me the bill and later when I enquired about the double charging so I’m fairly sure she had been asked to do it. Eventually he agreed he had made an error and refund me. He then offered to refund me twice (I had already paid as I hadn’t noticed the over charging) there appeared to be an error with the refund and I tried to confirm with him that I hadn’t been charged twice instead of refunded. He assured me I hadn’t, however when checking my bank statement the next day I could see that I had in fact been charged twice for the already inflated bill. I called to ask for a refund and ended up speaking to the same person. He assured very rude and told me it would take a few days to resolve, and when I asked to have the details for the complaints team he hung up the call. (When I was at the restaurant he had immediately admitted I had been overcharged and offered me a refund when I had asked for the complaints number. Overall I’m disgusted that a company would hire someone who not only tries to scam their customers to compensate for a quiet night, was so rude, and tried to stop customers from
make complaints. I also heard some of the staff members calling him a “prick” as they left 😂 so I guess I’m not the only one who thought he was awful. The food isn’t that great either.

We visited Cote in Bury St Edmunds on 15th May having booked a table several weeks in advance. When we arrived and said we had a booking the lady who greeted us immediately greeted me by name which is very unusual as lots of restaurants almost seem surprised that you have booked.
Initially our order was taken by one member of staff and then another took over, this staff member was called Emily N and what a star. She was young, confident but not cocky, knew about the food and was 100% professional - if I ran a business in Bury St Edmunds I would have offered her a job and if she's not manager at this branch very soon I would be surprised!
We had a great meal, well served, I was very confident that food that needed to be was gluten free too.
Emily N was particularly helpful when I asked her about the app and having downloaded it I achieved a reduction on the bill - always good.
I think the 10% service charge added to the bill is rather "London style" and would encourage Cote to pay there staff better - however I was very happy to pay it as we had excellent service and great food but if it had not been added I would have left more as a tip!

I go to Cotes as the standard and quality is usually consistent. Not today. I ordered the bacon baguette from the rapide menu. It was described as ‘bacon Baguette (warm freshly baked baguette, French bacon, Brittany salt butter, and red onion jam). It was not warm or fresh but toasted and hard, no butter and not enough bacon, could not finish it far too dry. When I complained, no apology. I was told they put the butter on before toasting!!! Who out there butters their bread before toasting? As a regular its really put me off going back, not just the disappointing food but also the service which seems to have dropped.

Avoid Côte Reigate.

We booked this meal weeks in advance for a birthday celebration and honestly wish we had gone literally anywhere else. The restaurant was virtually empty, which makes the dreadful food and poor service even harder to excuse.

Both mains were completely inedible and had to be sent back.

The “sirloin steak” arrived looking like dog food — full of gristle, tough, chewy and impossible to eat. When challenged, the manager, Ivan, actually defended it by saying sirloin is “supposed to be gristly and tough.” That response alone tells you everything about the standards here.

My salmon was equally appalling — tiny portion, massively overcooked, missing the advertised béarnaise sauce and instead covered with a random drizzle of hollandaise. The broccoli was mouldy, the plate was dumped with piles of rocket, and the whole dish looked like something thrown together with complete indifference.

What made the evening even worse was the attitude from management. Ivan appeared totally uninterested, openly admitted they’d already received complaints from other diners, and then bizarrely recommended we try a nearby Italian restaurant instead because the food there was “excellent.” Imagine paying restaurant prices only to be told by the manager to eat somewhere else.

This was supposed to be a special occasion. Instead, it turned into one of the worst dining experiences we’ve had in years — poor-quality food, defensive management and absolutely no sense of care or professionalism.

Customer services later offered us £30 off another visit. After this experience, there is zero chance of that happening.

People work hard for their money and dining out should feel like a treat. Côte Reigate completely failed on every level.

Would never return.

What an appalling expensive my friend and I made yesterday.
Staff rude, uninterested in, couldn't be bothered...

My friend and ordered the Steak Frites

2/3 were fat and gristle

The frites were cold and apparently there was endless frites accordingly to the menu.

The green salad was completely wilted and inedible, wilted leave doused in oil. Was gross

Then when the came to collect our plates and saw everything left

He said so sorry not our standard the meat is fatty, grisly and overcooked !

His words!

He then intimated that his manager was offering desert as compensation

That was not the case

When then bill arrived I was charged
£9.75 for a glass of 125ml however when I checked the bill I had been charged for 175
Awful food awful service and deception over bill

Cote do not care at Waterloo branch as it a transition trade their will no return business

But I know not go to my local Cote's based on our experience last night

Disgusting horrible food, which we did point out but they were to busy having a fag and gathered in a huddle
Awful Awful Awful
Do not go!

We vistied Cote in Sloane Square in Chelsea and were served by Helena - she made us feel very comfortable, advised us well on the menu options and checked that everything was Ok . we had ordered tea to come with our dessert and often restaurants bring 1 before the other - she ensured that both came togther. I told her that we were served by Helena the greek Goddess as she was so nice
The food was good too !

Food delicious today
Guys serving us charming
Hostess who greeted us on arrival and took our order needs to be more customer friendly.
I made my booking on line which was acknowledged - offering my party à welcome drink. She was oblivious to this which was embarrassing ……spoilt it for me …..
You’ve just requested my email address !!!!!

Agree with most reviews. We had dinner in Cambridge Cote on Friday night. Very poor presentation. Over priced at £200 for four of us. Not once asked if we were happy with the food and service. Not even sure a manager was on duty. Very disappointing as Cote always been one of our favourites.

I was there with my friend Saturday 9/5-26. Nadeem and Mosharaf were very welcoming, kind and just gave us an outstanding service all in all.