Restaurant Review

Date: 06 August 2008

' I was so disappointed when I called to book my lunch table the other week to find out that The Lemon Tree is only open at the weekends now. The lady on the phone said something about scaling down during the 'low' season and my heart sank.

The Lemon Tree is an old favourite of mine and I continue to go back because... nothing else really compares. So I postponed my lunch for a few days and turned up on Friday evening at around 8pm. The place had its usual buzz and the staff were as charming as ever and my partner and I were immediately seated. I expressed my sympathy for the staff having, as they do, to function in a place that is only alive half of the time.

Despite the 'scaling down' or however one wishes to describe it - we had another lovely meal and the food was excellent. Please come back to us full time - you are truly missed! '

Reviewed by: Juliet

Date: 05 August 2008

' I don't usually leave comments on pages like this but having stumbled across this one in particular I must take the opportunity to disagree with the comments below.

I have used the The Lemon Tree for various meetings, drinks and meals since I moved to Oxford five years ago and continue to do so. In my experience the atmosphere is always warm, the staff have always been welcoming and on the one occasion when our food was slow to arrive I was made aware of the difficulty and looked after accordingly.

Comparing The Lemon Tree to McDonalds is a low blow. Take my advice - don't be influenced by malicious comments but rather try The Lemon Tree out for yourself. Then if it is anywhere near as good as I have always found it to be, you will not be disappointed. '

Reviewed by: Nicolas

Date: 02 December 2007

' The worst service I have ever experienced, they treat you better at McDonalds!!

I've given this place 3 chances and I can safely say there won't be a 4th. Each visit the wait for service got longer, no one here seems familiar with concept of meal checks to see if everything is ok, or you to see that you are not choking for more drinks. Getting the bill is a total 30minute test of patience.

I complained to the manager who used the excuse we are busy this evening. As I looked around and saw empty tables and I know of people who have contacted the Lemon Tree and told there are no vacancies I find this kind of excuse downright insulting. After wasting so much of time in waiting and complaining i was offered no form of gesture and a weak apology.

Greedy management charging a premium and skimping on service. Im furious and I am sure there are many customers as disapppointed as I.

Overall the decor is great, food is good and the service is non exsistant. A real cheek to charge a charge a 12.5% 'optional service charge' seems to make the staff here lazy.

A piece of advice for Lemon Tree... Appreciate your customers during the busy times, as you'll sure wish you did during the quiet times. '

Reviewed by: Never going back

Date: 04 Sep 2007

' I have been here once before and had a fair meal, but on my second visit just recently I found it had all changed. The decor was still the same which is great as it has been set out very nicely, but the service had all but gone, we sat down for our meal and waited a while before our order was taken which is fine as we were busy talking, but once we had ordered and received our starter still nobody had taken our wine order I had to call someone over to take the order, but the waiter forgot and finally brought our wine at the same time as our mains came out. This was an issue for me as there were only 3 other tables in the resturant. After our meal we ordered a taxi and waited in the seating area a driver came in and not one staff member came to talk to him so us and another table had to figure out whose taxi it was. When our taxi came we were not said goodbye to as we walked through the garden path we found most of the staff out of uniform smoking by the entrance to the resturant. The food was fine but something should be done about the staffing here. '

Reviewed by: Anonymous

Date: 10 June 2006

' Food great, staff great, place great '

Reviewed by: Matt

Date: November 5, 2006

' Had dinner here with my husband and two sons on Saturday and must say this is the worst food I've tasted in a long time. Service was friendly but lacking a little in professionalism. My husband and I had prawn cocktail, a tasteless concoction of 3 large prawns on a mound of little gem lettuce, some "noodles" and an orange coloured gloopy sauce which had no flavour, neither did the prawns. This was served in a tall-stemmed cocktail glass which meant it was too high up to eat very easily so we tipped it onto our side-plates to eat. Left most of it as it was so tasteless. One of my sons had soup (spinach) which he said was bland. My other son had pigeon salad which he said was ok but nothing special. For main courses we all had fillet steak apart from my husband who had the burger. The fillet steak had NO TASTE. How can this be !! It was served with one small artichoke plus mushrooms and again a gloopy tasteless sauce. Not one of us enjoyed it. Burger was just about ok. Didn't bother with puddings as we were afraid of being disappointed again. Coffee was good (esSpressos). The white wine we had was a pinot gris which tasted as if it might have cost around £2.99 in Tescos and was plonked on the table without a cooler or ice-bucket. Our red wine was passable. We didn't complain as we had gone there to visit our son who is studying at the University and he had recommended it having read a good review in a university restaurant guide. Don't waste your money here, go to Quod or Gee's, much better. The prices are mid-range but not good value AT ALL !! '

Reviewed by: Jane

Date: September 13, 2006

' I recently went to The Lemon Tree for a special anniversary dinner with my husband. I was impressed from the moment we walked in the door. The decor was lovely - modern, but very tasteful, with extremely large palm trees, beautiful mosaic tiles, interesting light fixtures, and a beautiful glass roof section that allowed the last of the day's natural light in the room. The meal started with very fresh bread. We shared the vine tomato and parmesan tart with basil pesto, which was slightly disappointing. My husband had the seared tuna with coriander, cumin and lime, pak choi and red onion salsa, and I had the tagliatelle with fresh mixed mushrooms, garlic, porcini and white wine sauce. Both meals were very large, and very delicious. My only concern was the lack of vegetarian options on the menu, aside from the pasta. Too stuffed for dessert, we vowed to skip the starter next time and save room for pudding. I highly recommend this restaurant to anyone wanting a lovely meal with very good service in an impressive setting.'

Reviewed by: Anonymous

Want to share your own experience with this or another restaurant in Oxford? Write a restaurant review:

* The Fine Print:
Oxford City Guide reserves the right to not post your review. We reserve the right to edit your review if we feel your punctuation is worse than ours, or if you use language that prevents us from being able to call ourselves 'family friendly'. We can not guarantee how long your review will stay on the site. We will not publish reviews that we feel are hostile or mean, or intended to ruin someone's business. Oxford City Guide accepts no responsibility and assumes no liability for any reviews posted on this site.