The Evil Foodie

Often times there are good and bad sides of certain restaurants that make you love and hate them at the same time. If you follow me then you know that I have a love hate relationship with IHOP. I love the food but not necessarily at all of the franchises. That being said I have a new story and experience for you today and it revolves and involves a new restaurant in the area: Cora.

Recently this franchise expanded on this side of the country, which is a new experience for those who have not heard or been to a Cora before on the Eastern side of the country. Let me paint you a picture in case you have no idea of what I am talking about and you are too lazy to Google or perhaps still protesting SOPA (props to you).

Cora is a very brightly coloured and intricately organized breakfast place. I want to classify it as a restaurant but I am having trouble doing so probably because of how small it was. The Rogers store here went out of business, a video rental store, and you can imagine how big those are right? Well they took half of this Rogers and turned it into a “restaurant” in the size of a café… It is painted with every bright colour known to man - if you are not a highlighter then your colour is not welcome here. And every piece of the pictures and clippings are cartoons or drawings. Honestly, if you are waking up to go out for breakfast at an early hour of 7-8-9 ish and you have a choice between Cora, Dennys, and IHOP - I would choose Cora. It honestly just jolts your senses into existence and waking up. Dennys just doesn’t have the colour or the mood to make you want to stay awake that early in the day - it may have that affect at 3 in the morning however. And IHOP here… well… here it disappoints at bare minimum… if its even edible.

Back to Cora

The first time my partner and I went we were quite thrilled. It cost us around $35 for breakfast for two; mind you it was a hearty breakfast and both of us could not finish our plates. We both had a daily juice - which is a blend of different fruits, it changes every day so it’s always unique

- Although my partner and I have a running joke that it is made with the left over fruit from people’s plates. Cora always has extravagant fruit displays on your plate, and that is generally on top of the food you already have and so people generally eat what they ordered first: thus leaving an abundance of fruit! Why waste it! Blend it into the daily juice next day! - That’s disgusting and insanitary so I hope that they don’t do that but boy would it be hilarious. People would start getting sick when they heard that. Anyways.

First Time

The overall experience was good. I have a Raspberry 4 Lucie

- an excellent array of Raspberries and Sauce and English Cream and Crepes. Most delicious and I could not have been happier. The Food was dead on to what I expected from the menu and we were just absolutely brilliant.

The service was excellent for such new comers (it had only been open about a week) and everything was just amazing. The only thing I could complain about was that the tea kettles were so tiny that they are literally the smallest tea kettles I have ever seen.

You get exactly one cup: But not really one cup; ¾ of a cup so that you have room for an abundance of cream. AND THESE ARE TINY CUPS But remember… I said two experiences.

Second Time

This Second Time is why I am writing this painstakingly in my ARTH class. Not because we just watched an odd video about Beirut but because Cora has lit a fire in my like no other. Except maybe IHOP. Not only did we pay over $50 but the service was horrible. Absolutely gut wrenching. Now being that I have worked in the restaurant and serving industry I have a lot of lenience when it is busy or servers are new. But this server was horrible. This server knew absolutely nothing and visited our table maybe twice. Our food and drink - when they were remembered - were brought to us by someone else.

My partner ordered a type of omelette and then when asked he added Cheese ($3.5) and Mushrooms ($3). Now tell me this - when you have three kinds of Omelettes and a customer orders one and adds mushrooms and cheese for an additional $6.50 why would you not suggest the Omelette up from that which is only an additional $0.30 which already has mushrooms and cheese among other things that you could no additional fee to remove. When I was a server and I saw that opportunity I took it because as a human I understand that paying an additional $6.50 is ridiculous. I might as well bring my own mushrooms and chop them up for my partner. I know that attachments are great for any business but at the same time there is a limit and there is a branch where customer service is hindered because of ignorance or greed. Keep this in mind.

I got a mix of crepes and breakfast potatoes….

YOU’RE FOREWARNED THIS IS ABOUT TO GET BAD!

The crepes that came with my food - part of my breakfast platter - were plain and so I incorrectly assumed that they would give you a choice of toppings included I the price similar to IHOP’s Passport Breakfast. You know what I mean? Where included in the cost is Berries and Cream, Lemon and Cream, or something else that I can’t take time to remember because we aren’t going on about IHOP. Anyways it cost me an additional $4 for this cream that I asked for… this here is my fault but I feel like she should have mentioned it was an additional cost because the way she listed them it felt like they were offered. Like type of toast. You know? Ignorance. Oh, and those juices that use up the fruit from the day before *snicker* they cost $5 each. Might as well have a beer for that cost in the morning.

So we have gone over the cost and service what is missing to make this a masterpiece visit. You guessed it. The Food: it was horrible. I could not have been more disappointed with anything in my life except for the overwhelming hatred I have for the IHOP here. Besides the fact that I had paid an arm for the cream to come with my breakfast the only thing memorable was the cream. I am actually quite glad that I paid for it because at least I had something to almost make the crepes bearable. I am fully aware that there are different kinds of crepes: thick and thin. But let me tell you something. When you make crepe batter for crepes that are meant to be thin - but for some stupid ass reason you insist on cooking them half an inch thick…. *UGH* GUESS WHAT IDIOT!!! THEY DON’T COOK !!!! So instead of crepes with English Cream, I had thick as hell wannabe gigantic pancakes of dough. Uncooked Dough. I could not eat it. So I passed on them. And I went over to my breakfast potatoes which were good until I found A HAIR! It was definitely not my day.

My partner, being the way he is, insisted on us telling the server so that she and the kitchen were aware for future guests. Fine. Whatever. I think its embarrassing to the nines but in this case I suppose its necessary. Curb the n00bs before they turn another franchise into an IHOP.

Needless to say we went out of our way to be extremely quiet about it and calmly told the waitress how we felt. And we said that she should let the kitchen know and whatever. So I took the opportunity to point out how the crepes were overly thick, how they tasted like pure uncooked dough. And she proceeds to argue with me. Now I agree I am not a master of crepes, but let me tell you something lady - should you ever read this - YOU SHOULD NOT BE SERVING INEDIBLE FOOD. You can argue with me about thick crepes for however long you want but don’t serve me shit. Don’t serve me food that I cannot eat. “There are thicker crepes that are not the thin crepes” Thanks tips. I didn’t know life included variety.

To top off this fantastic visit our bill was over $50 AND she did not bother to tell her manager at the front AND she did not offer us or take off any sort of discount. I am sorry but I could not eat my food that you were supposed to prepare correctly and let me tell you something. I will probably never eat at your restaurant again because of the shitty service. If you feed me a breakfast with a hair in it that means that the food was cooked with it which means mine, and maybe someone elses breakfast potatoes are all potentially ruined or contaminated. Jesus. I don’t think that I should have to start yelling at you to get some sort of discount. Take my fucking cream off for all I care but do something!! You just served me something completely inedible in every since! Dough and Hair! Great! Thanks! I’ll definitely be back to another franchise but not the one here that’s for sure.

Disappointed is not the half of it. I’m angry. I am -write a letter- angry. So perhaps I will.

Dear Cora - Your shitty servers argued with me about how inedible food is the standard for your company. I will be notifying the proper authorities. -TheEvilFoodie

Lets get down to the break down shall we. Should I do two separate ones for the different experiences? After all that is really what I am trying to get at here. That a restaurant deserves second chances to some extent - and some don’t. All restaurants need about three visits to build a big ideal around it. But even more still you can never really have one opinion on a place. I mean of course you can but restaurants will always have at least some positive aspect or another. Needless to say - if the letter has a response that is positive I will probably go back at least one more time to form a real opinion but for now this is my overall feeling of this place.

Break It Down.

• Ambiance: 9/10 due to the colours and cartoons
• Food: 5/10 due to the fact that everything is generally okay…. generally
• Service: 2/10 due to the fact that it could get etter but I don’t have a lot of hope when servers argue with you and no one does anything about hair in your food.

No more explanations. Done.

Farewell Evil Foodies.

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