Terrible slow service. Food cold. Second coffee took 15 mins to arrive. Charged for avo which never arrived.

Nice and friendly staff with great ambience. Has been my go to place for coffee and food options are great and flavourful. I would like to see more vegetarian options but no complaints!

The quality of the service and the food is extremely high at the Grounds. All of the staff are welcoming, efficient and pleasant.
Can be a little noisy, however not enough to detract from all of the other qualities of this restaurant.

Great lunch spot! Reduced Covid menu is still great - downsides - online ordering from the table glitch so we couldn’t use it! Also - have some loos please!

I love going to the grounds, the people are so friendly and they have amazing cakes.

Service was enthusiastic without being pushy. Food was excellent as usual.

Great ambience and friendly staff. Would go back again!

Lovely lunch with a friend on our first time visiting the cafe. We were not disappointed and enjoyed our time there. Great atmosphere with a lovely vibe. The food was quite nice, limited menu choices, more vegetarian options perhaps. Otherwise, very good.

The overall dining experience was good, food is good, well presented, however right after we finished eating, the waitstaff asked us immediately if we wanted to get the bill. Just felt like we were hurried out. The restaurant was not full, the bar area alone was empty and there were no long lines outside. Will not be coming back because of this, you can get better food and better service someplace else.

Awesome diner in the middle of the CBD. I have always just walked past this place over the years not giving it a second thought and I regret that now as it's such a funky and happening cafe with very energetic vibe.

Next time I will have a proper breakfast instead of just coffee as the atmosphere is well and truly worthy of this experience. The only downside is that their menu was a bit limited.

Wonderful ambience, excellent service ... very organized with Covid protocols. We will be back!

We had a lovely breakfast at The Grounds of the City. The service and food were fantastic and they followed Covid Safe Procedures very well which made me feel very comfortable dining there.

Fantastic service, very friendly and helpful. Lovely salad, decent amount of time at the table, given covid, and procescco, will be back!

The wait staff made us feel very rushed and almost unwelcome. The lady who asked us to sign in before we sat down bordered on rude. We had a booking already and walked in to be shown to our table as one of the guests were already there.

No thanks as it’s annoying that we have to review when we don’t really want to

Great place in the city to catch up with friends to dine and have a drink. My only complaint is it’s so dark inside. I would have preferred to seat outside.

Gorgeous deco inside. Food was great with great service

the ambience of this place is amazing, its like being transported back in time to another era. our dining session was
short however coz of covid restrictions. not the restaurants fault, but i only wish i could have stayed longer. definitely worth a visit if you have never been. il most definitely return again in the future.

ambience: 10/10
food: 8/10
service: 9/10
price: 5/10 (average price for city)

Hidden gem
Staff are lovely!
Will be back on the regular.

All 3 of us has

Great food and service, in a unique restaurant. I recommend a visit

Everything was great especially the food. Will be coming back and recommending to friends.

Very pleasant - quaint, atmospheric. Food only ‘okay’ I’d say but overall a good experience

Food and service are excellent! Music is bit loud. Recommend it!

Review was written and filed whilst we were sitting in the restaurant, during our 1 hour wait for the food which was never put through the system.

The European girl who served us which I believe was the supervisor in the blazer and checkered skirt never smiled, was quite blunt when we asked her questions about our food and got defensive after our one hour wait and check in with her to see where our food was.

I think she could later sense that we were probably pretty unhappy with the service, and tried to offer us cake and more drink to make up for it. But to be honest it’s not really the cake we cared about, it’s the fact that we came to your store, spent money as consumers and all we got was her attitude.

Should anyone have checked in with us during the 1 hour wait or had she even just been polite and apologized to say “sorry I forgot to put your order though” instead of trying to tell us we’ve never ordered food when we literally ordered through her within 2mins of seating down when she approached us, we would have been fine to put this unintentional mistake behind us.

The fact that she came to us with blame and attitude, sorry to say but I will never come back again although that was my first visit. Not interested in spending money to buy attitude from your staff.

coffees were cold, seemed like they’ve been sitting forever in coffee counter and the waitress forgot to bring them to our table. Staffs were okay but seemed eager to hurry everyone, not a good place to sit and relax. Ambience was also poor with noise level up the roof.

Lovely venue and food. Croque monsieur was delicious and the coffee is always great!

Love the ambience at this cafe! Great coffee! The menu is restrictive, but does the job for a casual work or a personal catch-up.

I love the vibe of The Grounds Of The City! It gets quite loud on the weekend but the aesthetic is amazing, the food is delicious and the service is great.

The food is amazing, nice ambience and great service. Such a shame if your lactose intolerant as there is no lactose free milk on offer with your coffee.

Great location and brilliant atmosphere and decor.
Health bowl I had was fantastic.

Service was slow and the wait staff were not attentive.

I am always a fan of the Grounds. However with the Covid-19 happening I didnt feel safe at all. The place was jampacked and no social distancing was in place. My friend and I was just too hungry and tired to walk away. Tables were all occupied, in such a small space. The staff were just moving around everywhere from table to table without precautions or any safety at all. No single staff member were wearing any masks and they just jump from aisle to aisle passing water and items and equipments. I did not feel safe at all. There are small restaurants that I have gone through where I would feel safe. But during my visit, we eat fast because we didn’t want to stay for too long. However food as always is exceptional.

The waitress was very charming and efficient. The food was just as good as Grounds of Alexandria.

Amazing coffee, food and great staff! :) - Highly recommend!

Food was much better pre-covid. There are less options and menu items have been simplified (e.g. the steak sandwich which was previously my favourite is now a bit meh). Completely understandable given the circumstances however you do notice these changes. service was a little slow and times and incorrect meals were brought out so i'm assume staff has been decreased as well (but we did go on a sunday).
I'll be back when things are back to normal.

Love their cakes however I was disappointed how they didn’t have the ice longblack with the rectangular ice anymore 😞 other than that the staff are always friendly and professional.

Outstanding food presentation, nice vibe and excellent service. Will be back!

Every time we go there, we go for the cakes and drinks (tea, coffee, or alcohol) and every single time, we leave not disappointed. The cakes are fresh and delicious and the service is so quick! The ambiance is so nice and feels like an escape when down town Sydney. I highly recommend you check it out. But be sure to book in as it’s a popular spot!

Food could be better very ordinary need to improve does not have a wow factor or special