The Botanist, Chester in Cheshire West and Chester

I came to the restaurant on Sunday and ordered the vegetarian option on the Sunday menu. After eating the majority of the food. I had realised there’s bits of pink in it which I’d complain to the waitress. The manager then came over to explain that a new chef in the kitchen had mixed bacon in with the only vegetarian option on the menu, I have been a vegetarian for almost 10 years, partly due to personal reasons and personal health reasons after this visit I had felt quite poorly and was overall really disappointed as the botanist was one of my favourite restaurants! The management had dealt the situation really well, but I was really disappointed that the head chef had not come out to apologise as it was a really big mistake to make by the time I’d eat ordered and eaten in the dish is was 14:30, assuming multiple vegetarian options had gone out with bacon in it unnoticed. I’m only giving this a one star review as the front of House staff managed the chefs poor mistakes and poor lack of accountability well. This photo was taken prior to me eating the meal and I and it’s gone to notice as it’s not a very lit up restaurant and I didn’t really think to check before eating the only vegetarian option on the menu.

This is amazing restaurant. I have been there tonight with my boyfriend. The front of house is very beautiful with plants and pictures of birds. I had chicken piri piri with coconut rice and he had kofta lamb. And this was delicious.

Food was a bit disappointing, but the cocktails were incredible.

Tasty food, expensive for what it is. Staff attitude - terrible.

The surrounding lovely as were the staff but food very disappointing indeed

Attitude of the staff stinks - food ok

We booked in her for a Saturday night meet up with our son. We were seated at a table right opposite the rear door which meant that every time someone came in or went out for a smoke the door opened and then took ages to close on the self closer. We asked if we could move but were told there were no other tables free. It was amazing that we had been given that table as we had booked 3 weeks in advance! The service was rather slow and lackluster, the food was okay, pretty much what you would expect from a chain, tasty enough and decent portion sizes. All in all it was okay, but just that, we wont be rushing back!

We called in earlier today at lunch time and it was really quiet. One of the two staff behind the bar went to find another member of staff to seat us and then proceeded to carry on talking whilst we were stood waiting. Why couldn't he have seated us? A. It wasn't busy and B. He wouldn't have been leaving the bar unattended. Safe to say we had a lovely meal at a pub a short walk away where nothing was too much trouble and we felt a lot more welcome.

Great atmosphere, our waitress was really attentive and all of our food was good. Glad we found it after a long day exploring Chester.

We really enjoyed our second visit to the Botanist. We flew in from Ireland and are staying in Chester for a few days- we previously visited in August and loved the food and cocktails. This time we met friends and had many cocktails and drinks there. We loved the cocktails and thought the price was really reasonable too. The live music was fab and we would def recommend and come again ☺️☺️

Dined here tonight. On hols from Scotland. First class service, food superb and ambience perfect. A perfect night out in Chester.

Lovely food and staff. It was empty because it was early, food came quick. No complaints.

A very nice bar and restaurant in a city centre location. On the pricey side, but the food was nice.

I never be come to this restaurant on before. If I will come back to here on next year 🙂😋 and I come back to the Botanist restaurant on since November. I was disappointed without my further partner 😔

I love going to The Botanist in Chester. It's a lovely environment with a fab menu (both food and drinks). Staff are always welcoming. Great in the daytime and in the evening.

Expensive food and small portions and not very tasty. Such a shame as a great location

Love this place , good service , great cocktails and very friendly atmosphere

Went here for mother's day with family. We all really enjoyed the food and the service was really good also

Nice ambience and nice service. Personally, I didn't think the price-performance ratio was that good. In other words: the hanging kebabs didn't fill me up. About 5 pieces of meat and a portion of fries, I thought it wasn't much for the price

Pouring with rain outside but a vibrant welcome inside - standard botanist menu well done - nice atmosphere. Good service

Usually we love The Botanist's music bingo, it's always a hit amongst friends. But tonight it fell a little flat. We are regular attendees at music bingo and have always had a pleasant experience. However, tonight the new host made the evening slightly less fabulous. He was a bit odd, gave people bingo answers on the microphone, and thought he was really funny when he was not. Some people also found him a little bit uncomfortable. All other staff were wonderful, just not Kev. Maybe his jokes are best left in his head? We will definitely think twice before we visit music bingo again! (Mostly because we might get called a sl*g, which wouldn't be very funny coming from Kev x) Thank you, Emma

The hanging kebabs caught our eye on the menu and as we needed a dog-friendly place while we were still in town, popped in for an early tea. A friendly staff member appeared with water for our dog before we'd finished getting sorted at our table, which was a lovely welcome. The kebabs were nice enough, hot and well cooked. As with a lot of places these days, there was a distinct absence of vegetables unless we'd thought on to order a side.

A pretty disappointing visit to a chain which is usually our favourite! This was our first time in Chester and we thought we would stick to a reliable chain which is one of our firm favourites but we were left really disappointed. We booked a table for 2, arrived within the booking window, and were waiting for our table to be ready for 30 minutes. I completely understand being busy on a Friday night which is why we booked ahead of time. We waited by the bar while we had a few drinks, only to be surrounded by people vaping inside which wasn’t the best first impression. Once our table was ready we sat down and ordered food which was okay but not to the usual botanist standard. We have our go to dishes when we visit but it appeared they might have a reduced menu here as our dishes weren’t on the menu… We ordered drinks midway through the meal and the waitress knocked the drinks over whilst serving them. Something we really didn’t mind - accidents happen and we made sure to let the waitress know it was okay. The only thing that perhaps wasn’t okay was the waitress never returned with anything to clean the table up. We tried the best with our napkins but it would have been helpful if she had returned with some blue roll and a new drink but we never saw her again. We quickly finished our drinks/ food, paid and left. It just felt a bit dissapointing because the botanist never misses (other than this one).

Server was very polite and caring the entire service! Starters; The camenbert starter was cold, advised of this and received it back after having a trip to chef Mic (not edible after that). The floor manager then removed it from the bill due to this. Main; Had the Sunday Chicken roast with a side of salt and pepper wings and the Mrs had the halloumi kebab with the wings as well. The presentation was top quality! Sadly the Yorkshire pudding was black and clearly burnt and yet still sent out with the burnt baby Carrots (also completely black). The chef had also forgot to add seasoning to the wings as they were just fried and then added chilli and spring onion without the seasoning itself on them so had zero flavour. The halloumi kebab was much harder than previous visits with the fries being stone cold. We did not complain the second time as instead just wanted to leave without having chef mic be involved again. Our company enjoyed their chicken burger saying the choice in toppings is perfect for a burger and did not mind the cold fries. Probably won't come back again.

Nice place, excellent service. Photos of The Botanist must have been from a different one in the chain - no high circular ceiling with window light in the Chester one. Unusual way of serving food but thought it was overpriced.

Beautiful food, great ambience & 10/10 service!

This was an absolutely wonderful experience for my mum's 70th celebration. Our waitress Hayley was exceptional - she decorated the table with bunting and banners, unasked, then brought birthday cake, sang happy birthday, and to top it all off, deducted the wine from the bill - all unprompted! Meal was really delicious, service unparalleled - I can't recommend this place highly enough. Well done Botanist, you smashed it!

Brilliant afternoon spent in this lovely restaurant … excellent food and exceptional staff … highly, highly recommended … Maggy x

Good bar....drinks are well overpriced though...

We went for lunch here today, to celebrate my Mum's 70th. I had made a note in the booking that it was her birthday, but not contacted the restaurant specifically to make any additional arrangements. When we arrived, our waitress Hayley was putting the finishing touches to some decorations at the table; bunting, banners, and hand crafted, personalised paper decorations were all up waiting; complete surprise! Hayley couldn't do enough for us throughout the meal, and finished it off not only by bringing a chocolate brownie dessert and candle for Mum to blow out (and singing Happy Birthday while she did so!), but also by knocking off the cost of our wine from the bill. The meal itself (Sunday roast) was absolutely delicious, the service from all the team was first class, and it truly was an incredibly special birthday experience. Thank you Botanist, and thank you Hayley! We will definitely be back.

Interesting place the decor is fascinating, the service was very good but my Sunday roast was cold and short on beef.

Had lunch here today and I cannot fault the food. It was all really nice. The only reason for 3 stars is the staff. Unfortunately our experience was ruined by a rude member of staff. We booked two time slots as we knew we wouldn’t be finished with in the allocated time. We had ten minutes left of our first booking when a guy come over quite abruptly telling us we basically needed to hurry up. We explained we were waiting on our second round of drinks which still hadn’t arrived and was looking to have dessert. Not to mention the fact we still had food on the table we hadn’t finished. We explained how we had booked out the table as a double slot. To which he told us they can’t afford us to keep the table any if we are only buying desserts. We understand the need for the table however, it wasn’t only desserts and there is no need to speak to people in the manor we were spoken to. He then said he would check the booking and never returned. Such a shame as it ruined a lovely afternoon. And to top it off the second round of drinks never arrived …

First time visit. We called in here for drinks, we managed to get seated downstairs and ended up staying for over 3 hours as we were enjoying it so much. It had a great vibe and got busy. We liked the old hits that were being played, not too loud and added to the atmosphere. The staff work really hard. It looked like there must have been an offer on cocktails, as that seemed to be what most people were drinking. We didn't ask as we are not cocktail drinkers, but the did look good. Live music started at 8 and was great, but saldly we left early because of people, blatantly vaping indoors, without any regard for others. It really affects my chest so we decided to leave. People eat here aswell, it is so disrespectful. Other than this I would have given this place a 5 out of 5. We could not see any no smoking or vaping signs..... and if there were any, we didn't see them, and they obviously didn't stop people anyway. Would we return? Yes.......maybe there will be some noticable smoking or vaping signs up by then:)

Had an amazing evening meal here. Staff were pleasant and attentive and food was great - best veg side I think I’ve ever had. This place is great!

Great atmosphere with live music. Cocktails were very good. Slight problem with the food was corrected immediately. Delicious!

We really liked this quirky place. The venue is a really interesting old building, wood & iron railings & a sophisticated ladies loo! The food was good! I'd have liked more mixed greens in the mixed green side but it was tasty. The staff are very lovely. We'd recommend it!

A very disappointing visit during Christmas break. We booked a table prior to our visit, however no one acknowledged our arrival to the restaurant (which was half full). 20 minutes later we finally ordered drinks and food. Drink arrived fairly fast, yet we waited an hour for the food. After more than one hour of wait we checked in with the waitress who said that due to the shift change our order was lost, and she had just sent it to the kitchen. We didn't want to wait another hour for the food so we left, hungry and angry. A disastrous ending to a fantastic day. Won't be back, won't recommend either.

Had a great time what made.it for me was how nice and friendly and helpful the staff were. Nothing was a problem and they are genuinely very nice. We stayed fro drinks , had champagne and cocktails, live band playing music we like it was great atmosphere

Visited for lunch whilst in Chester for the day. Staff were very polite, friendly and attentive. Brought water for our dogs as we sat at a table before we could ask. Gave space and time to settle and then went through the menu and options. My wife suffers a number of food intolerances we asked about a dish and its contents the waitress wasn’t entirely sure. So went and asked the chefs. They offered a special one off dish based on the one we asked about for my wife which we gladly agreed on. Both meals were fresh, well cooked, well presented and delicious. The service provided was definitely beyond the extra mile. The drinks were also spot on. A great experience and not our first or our last.

Disappointing both our meals arrived cold I sent both chips back and I got refries !!my chicken was a bit measly compared to other times. My meal was knocked of the bill. The couple next to me weren’t very happy either they probably had the same problem.

Great food and great drinks. They do a great lager from rebel. Portion sizes not huge but great food and ambience

Best Fish and Chips I've ever had in a pub restaurant. The waitress explained about the 10% service change and asked us if we wanted it removing from the bill, which I thought was nice.

Poor food, and small portion. Sharing kebab would have struggled to feed one person. Overpriced and over rated.

Visited Botanist Chester on Wednesday with a few friends for drinks and was greeted by Elin who took our order. She was very polite and professionally and helped with finding a nice mocktail and chose to have food while we were there.

On a short city break this was without doubt the best dinner. Great ambience, very friendly staff, and good food. Eschewed starters to leave room for dessert. Kebab skewers and coconut rice, with excellent green salad. I was persuaded to try the dessert special- a cookie dough concoction with biscoff. Had to google cookie dough. Tasted great though. My wife had a sundae with (unexpectedly) vegan ice cream ( which she said should be outlawed). She did finish it - hilarious.

Insanely small portion sizes for the price. 16 quid for a kid sized kebab was very disappointing. The drinks were normally priced but filled with so much ice as to be nowhere near the pint I ordered. Left rather disappointed and hungry.

First time eating here and I was not disappointed! Went for my friend's 40th and were greeted with balloons and table confetti which I thought was so lovely. Best Katsu curry I've ever had and the cocktails were delicious. I highly recommend this place and I hope to visit again soon.

We all ordered hanging kebabs & they were supposed to be different flavours, they looked very unappetising when they came & there was no difference in the flavours. We had chips, rice & salad to accompany them & it was all cold. When we complained about food our feedback was not welcomed & all food was taken away, still waiting on our replacement hot chips! Very disappointing as the menu looks very appealing.

Folliwing recommendation we booked table for 2 for 7.30. Decor and atmosphere really suited our taste and we were very much looking forward to our evening. However, although we arrived in plenty of time, to our huge disappointment, our table was not ready until just after 8pm, despite there being plenty of empty tables in view. Two parties of 2 and 4, who arrived after us, were even seated and served before we even got to our table. Once seated the servers were friendly and helpful, but once again another wait for our food, which arrived at 8.40. A real disappointment when we were expecting great things for our long awaited date night. I have since revisited , at a different time of day, mid afternoon, and had a completely different experience. It was lovely. Same great atmosphere, but the level of service, length of waiting time and quality of food couldn't have been any better. We will be returning again.

Great atmosphere and the live music was good. The staff were lovely but the food was poor

We can’t say enough about the food & excellent service we got from our server Molly, nothing was too much trouble for her & she gave us good advice as to what we were after on the menu, food was fantastic as well.

Another lovely visit to the Botanist.. really cannot fault this place.. great atmosphere wonderful food... We will be back.. shout out to a great waitress Hayley.. great service with a smile

Went with a group of 13 people, they forgot my food (which was on the normal menu so not an exception or substitution) and I received my main when everyone then had finished theirs and had their plates cleared for dessert.

Had a great at the botanist,and it's all thank to Hayley. will be going again. pleasant atmosphere and a good time. would recommend

Fantastic service! Popped in on the off chance of getting a table. Was greeted by a host who sat us at a lovely table. The service was fantastic and the food was something else 😍 shout out to Molly whose recommendations were spot on made...

food was lovely, would definitely go again soon and dessert was to die for 😋 Service was A++ from Hayley very fast and pleasant young lady .

Came in this evening on a whim and had a delightful evening! Hayley our server was amazing! She couldn’t do enough for us! Thankyou for a lovely evening!

We had an amazing time the other lunch here in Chester. We were served by the lovely Amy and Saff. We had the chicken kebabs and it is so worth upgrading the chips to sweet chilli!! They are to die for! Thank you again for...

Wow. This place is amazing!! We had amazing service from Amy, who is a credit to the company! We will be definitely be back again soon to try some new items!

The 5 of us nearly missed this place and we were so glad we doubled back and went in. We were welcomed by the bar staff who directed us upstairs to the restaurant. We were shown to our table in this very quirky setting by...

Awful from start to finish, I sent a contact form in on Monday and haven't even received a reply

A friend was visiting me from US and we ended up here because this was the only place that had “scotch eggs” on their menu - an English delicacy my friend really wanted to try. The place was bustling with people and was very full at 4:30 pm on a rainy Saturday. The servers were overwhelmed with the sheer number of people they had to serve. We asked for a table for two but were refused a place citing that they were fully booked. The waitress motioned for us to find a table near the bar and wait for us to be served there. Having found a table with great difficulty, my friend looked for the food menu and after having waited for almost 20 minutes were told that we won’t be served food in the waiting area. We could have been told this right at the start instead, we would have just left. Duttons did a good job at that - informed us that we’d only be served drinks. That level of communication and proactiveness from the staff was lacking. Hence why the adverse rating. Would have loved to comment on the food but I don’t think I’m going there again.

Just wanted to thank Saff, a lovely manager at The Botonist who gave my friends and I great service on Saturday.

Great service and the food was excellent. We had the chicken and lamb kebabs, with a house salad. The dressing on the salad was beautiful.

Love this place can't fault food, service, live music. Great place to go.

Arrived for a booked table early (6 adults 2 children) and was asked to get a drink at the bar. Bar was full of people and also dirty glasses, with only 1 person serving. Eventually got served at the time our table was booked for. Person who served us was lovely though, and they were all evening when serving drinks to us at our table too. Sat down, ordered and ended up waiting nearly an hour for our starters. Hot board was not particularly hot, more a mix of average starters than what it actually sounded like on the menu, poutine with no cheese? Rest of the starters pretty average overall, teriyaki skewers were the standout amongst the group. Mains were OK overall, no major complaints from anyone on the group, but also nothing outstanding. Person serving us was very polite and apologetic for delays. Wasn’t the worst restaurant experience, however for the price of everything, would expect it to be a lot better. Food was below average overall, service was good in general from the waiting staff. We also had an allocated time slot of 2 hours, and having had an hour of this taken up waiting for our starters we were then given the bill during dessert as they needed the table back, which was slightly disappointing. Overall, just an average experience and won’t rush to return unfortunately.

We waited a long time for our starters to come out and then when the mains came out, we kinda stared at it in disbelief at the portion size for what they charged for it. The chicken kebab must of had 6 small cubes on it and a small pot of chips. Then after all this an automated tip of £12.95 was added onto the bill with no explanation that we can choose to take it off. Very disappointed and a complete waste of money. Won't be returning

Arrived for a booked table early (6 adults 2 children) and was asked to get a drink at the bar. Bar was full of people and also dirty glasses, with only 1 person serving. Eventually got served at the time our table was booked for....

Lovely place to visit when out in chester. The drinks were amazing and staff were very helpful. Will be coming back next time we are here.

Great restaurant! Great food and environment. Very friendly and polite staff. Thank you for everything.

Went for my birthday. The atmosphere was a lovely cosy place but the food was average. The burger bun wasn't brioche, tasted like a supermarket roll. The lamb kofte was yummy but the coconut rice didn't taste of coconut, more like boil in the bag. The steak was good. Booked for the cocktails which were disappointing, they didn't have any plum so couldn't do some of the cocktails on the menu. Other places in Chester can make off menu cocktails. Blackberry cocktail tasted like cranberry juice. Cookie dough desserts tasted like Betty Crocker packet mix. Nobody asked us how our food was. The live band was nice but shame about the food and drink. We had 3 servers, one of our servers was friendly but another it seemed was new and couldn't answer our simple questions such as, "what's the pie of the day?" so we had to wait for them to find out the answer and come back to us before ordering. Overall disappointing, wouldn't book again for evening. I also pre-ordered a craft beer bucket for £60 disappointed these were 12 330ml cans which you can buy in Tesco for less then £20. We had to ask for the ice buckets and glasses as they came on a tray. To top it off when the bill arrived we had to ask for the preorder to be removed as not to pay twice, maybe they thought we'd be drunk and wouldn't notice. We actually took some cans home as the band finished shortly after our meal. Perhaps they were on a break but we weren't willing to sit around to find out.

Lovely atmosphere, delicious food, definitely will be back xx

Good visit. Nice food. Sadly no one farming down a argument in bar area. Overall a great visit and entertaining Smell of smoke from outside not a nice thing to smell when eating

Pleasant atmosphere , nice staff, I enjoyed it.

Me and my partner came for food here back during the summer and have waiting for the chance to come back. We were sat near enough to where we were the last time and had the same waitress (I think her name was Helen) serve...

Great atmosphere great place for cocktails.

Loved it, great food, great atmosphere. Staff very friendly and welcoming

The food drinks and services was truly amazing, first time ever eating here and was doing a group booking for a work social so there was alot of pressure. But honestly the whole process was amazing the food was wonderful and the drinks were delicious and the staff was absolutely incredible thank you so much for a wonderful night. Will definitely be going here again.

Had another Fantastic Sunday roast at the botanist. We love this place because they are so welcoming to our dog . The food is first class and the waitress was brilliant..couldnt do enough for us ..the atmosphere and decor are also top motch .

We visited here as part of a large group. The food service was slow, which can be expected on a Saturday evening so will give them benefit of the doubt. The food however was below average. I had the Katsu curry and the chicken was...

Lovely food, great atmosphere, friendly staff. We even got free prosecco as we were celebrating our wedding anniversary.

Was a lovely Atmosphere, staff were very helpful and the food was great, will definitely be calling in again

Great selection of cocktails, food okay but unfortunately the smell is a bit unpleasant especially in and near bathrooms

Food was good excellent choice and its dog friendly but the place felt cold so deducting a star for that.

First visit, great place! We had the vegan sharing board and it was very nice, full of flavour and lots of choice. The cocktails were nice too, went down a bit too easy 😆 We will definitely be back next time we are in Chester.

Food and atmosphere was amazing, bit pricey thou

Soooo good!! Their cocktails are spot on. Great bartender.

Food was amazing but for some reason they didn’t remove the empty glasses from our table the whole time we were there.

One of our favourite places but unfortunately this visit wasn't up to standard. 1st round of drinks came after the food the service was that slow. Struggled to get the bill, we was then left with the bill with no means of paying and no staff upstairs. After a long wait we had to go downstairs to the booking in computer to pay but that was also unmanned...we had to ask at the main bar who eventually sent someone over.. the restaurant wasn't even busy..will tru somewhere else on our next visit to Chester.

terrible service, dont waste your time.

Terrible, the worst eating out experience I have ever had. Rude staff, terrible food and a birthday meal ruined.

Had a great meal at The Botanist in Chester, Ellen was our server and she was really friendly and despite it being quite busy it was service with a smile! Thanks Ellen x We really enjoyed the live music afterwards too.

The restaurant area we were in was very cold

Such a nice dinner… we’d just got engaged and my mum had rang up to tell them… the girls serving us were SO SO lovely … I’m also 36 weeks pregnant so rather than champagne they offered me a mocktail and my partner a drink of his choice! Food was great and everyone was happy to help!

After reading the reviews I was not expecting much and had prepared for the worst...but luckily they proved me wrong! The service was good...the food when came was absolutely delicious everbody in our party said the same...burger was the best ive had actually...calmari starter was...

Amazing food and the staff were great. They went the extra mile to make it special for my boyfriends 30th. Thank you, was a great night!! X

Quite, so choice of seats. Good cocktail menu. Lovely drinks served well.

Lovely food. Enjoyed a great lunch.

Impressive restaurant. Decor, music, atmosphere and staff are brilliant. Food most importantly is exceptional. We had the sharing kebab which was plenty between the two of us. The meat was cooked perfectly, extremely tender and flavourful, the sauces they came with were all matched very well. Chips are crispy and fluffy on the inside as they should be! Definitely recommend

Tried to book for New Year back in November saw an advertisement on the website, stating dinner drinks and entertainment called up and tried to book over. The phone. Was then told I had to book over the website but there was no facility to...