The best restaurants in Castle Colchester East of England

My favourite little spot in Colchester, big up Baz and all the team! Love the vibe, the quirkiness and the experience. Personally my best night out in Colchester and all the people are always the right crowd! Well done Baz, Adam and all the team! You always deliver the best vibes

Invited here for Grandmother’s birthday meal. Thankfully we did our research beforehand and realised that parking was limited so car shared with others. One guest got so frustrated with trying to find a space that she gave up and drove home again! The place wasn’t big enough for all of us so we were sat on 3 big separate tables, not their fault but hardly a ‘family’ meal when you’re all sat separately... Table(s) was booked well in advanced, yet food choices were limited because they’d run out of certain meats. The food was beautiful and the portions were generous but the service was slow and some people had finished their meal by the time others arrived! Pudding was limited, there was no actual menu and the waitress didn’t really know what they had or what was in it so we didn’t bother in the end. Prices were reasonable & the facilities were clean. Overall, I just don’t think it was a great choice of venue for so many of us but that isn’t their fault and they tried very hard to make us all feel welcome. Would return again with a smaller group.

Food and drinks are OK. What you would expect from a tiny kitchen in a small venue. Good enough for quick sandwich-based meals. Quite nice for tea/coffee though. It used to be an excellent venue for families with small children and breastfeed, but they remove all that area to expand the second-hand bussiness. Bad move in my opinion.

Staff were very friendly and helpful, great little shop right in the middle of town and open till 1am

I am a local so been here a good few times including today. All staff is always lovely and especially Thelma who always seems to be doing a lot to maintain an amazing atmosphere and making guests feel very welcomed. If theres ever issues from customers or the teams side their immediately resolved with no further problems. Keep up the great work to all the staff that work there 👍

The chai latte here is amazing! Food is alright, though the place is very busy.

By FAR the best decafe Americano we’ve had in a long time. The coffee is sublime!

Food was great but delivery was TERRIBLE 35min late. It's putting us off reordering again from JustEast which is a shame

Brilliant place to eat amazing staff great manager food is 5 stars

Cold dry pizza and burnt garlic bread I could not eat.

Shop crowded to capacity. Stairs unsuitable for elderly. Got to counter served with a stale iced bun with cream. Had it changed. Your staff were very good working under stressful conditions. Always use Gregg's so can draw a comparison.

After a bit of shopping we were looking for somewhere for lunch and came across Poppy's. Very quaint little tea room set out very nice with 50s music playing in the background with lots of old 50s posters and pictures on the walls. We ordered coffees, my with having black and me a caramel latte which was extremely nice. We both ordered sandwiches,my wife having tuna mayo with red onion and me having a club sandwich of chicken,bacon,lettuce,tomato and mayo. The sandwich was then lightly toasted. They were both very well presented and were very tasty. Would highly recommend this lovely little tea room!!

Great Evening. Great food and great service.

We placed an order from this restaurant and were disappointed to find two strands of hair in our food (efo riro). When we called to complain, the staff member insisted the hair was from the goat meat, explaining that in Africa, hair is burned off the meat, but in the UK, it isn't possible. However, I pointed out that any visible hair could be removed while washing the meat. She responded that since she cooks in bulk, she removes only what she can see but refused to acknowledge that we had found hair in our meal. As if that wasn't bad enough, we later found a stone in the Jollof rice. Just then, our phone rang, the same staff member was calling back. When we informed her about the stone, she immediately argued that there couldn’t be one and insisted we bring the food back. This was unreasonable since we live quite far from the restaurant. We offered to send proof via WhatsApp or email, but she refused, unwilling to accept our complaint. Additionally, when my partner complained that the turkey was dry, a staff member kindly offered to replace it. Instead of supporting the offer, the original staff member questioned why it should be changed just because we said it was dry. Overall, their customer service was terrible, rude, defensive, and completely unwilling to take responsibility for mistakes or accept constructive criticism.

Good products and pleasant service from staff