Tofu
The Refuge By Volta

The Refuge By Volta

Oxford Road, Manchester I-M60 7HA, United Kingdom

British • European • Vegetarian • Contemporary


"Excellent! We spent around four hours here on a Tuesday afternoon sampling their food, savouring their coffee and scabbing their free wifi! I 'll start with the basics. The Refuge is conveniently located on Oxford Street just a two minute walk from the train station. The casual seating area is huge with plenty of places for different sized groups to sit, there 's even an Apprentice Style boardroom table. The vibe is very relaxed but when I entered I noticed a lot of business people (or people clearly working). The decor is fantastic, as mentioned its a huge open space but the dark wooden finish makes it feel close and comfortable. The lunch menu isn 't huge but they clearly want to keep things simple and do them right. I had the beef burger accompanied by skinny fries and it was delicious. Just the right consistency so you could pick it up without it falling apart. It was generously topped with salad and the 'posh big mac ' sauce finished it off nicely. If you want to eat you 'll have to head through to the dining area as they don 't serve food in the lounge beware this was very busy, even on a Tuesday, so you may need to book in advance. After lunch we headed back to the lounge area and had a coffees while we chatted. The coffee was great, I had a flat white which was just off on the good side of bitter. We also ordered snacks later in the day the Almonds cooked in bacon fat are a must try that might sound gross to some people but just wait until the bacon flavour hits your taste buds! To access the free wifi you 'll need to sign up wth your email address but then it 's all yours. I haven 't even received a spammy email a week later. It 's really hard to fault The Refuge the staff were attentive without being too in your face, which I suppose is important when people are using their premises for business meets! All in all a really great experience and a lovely place to spend the afternoon working."

The Fable

The Fable

52 Holborn Viaduct London, EC1A 2FD, EC1A 2DY, United Kingdom

Beer • Steak • British • European


"A group of ten of us went here last night for our work evening out. First impressions were good the place looked really nice, and it was packed (not so good if you are into any kind of social distancing). However, once we were seated for dinner next to the main bar area, it became apparent from the incredibly loud dance music that this was not going to be an evening of easy conversation. I like to think that a basic requirement of going to dinner is that I can enjoy some conversation but that was far too much to hope for. It was like being in the middle of a nightclub or bar where to have to really shout and strain to hear someone. Things got so bad that the waitress simply could not hear me to take my order. When my colleague 's order came it was completely wrong which was no surprise. We asked for their music to be turned down several times but that was just not possible by the looks of things because of the huge bar area next to us that they cared about more. Overall, the food was good, but the evening was totally ruined by the stupidly loud nightclub music. I do not exaggerate when I say that several of us left with sore throats and lost voices. If the management is reading this then I don 't want a stock robotic reply underneath we are very sorry to hear that....... kind of response because we made it clear that the music was stupidly loud several times. The next time I want to sit and eat in the middle of a nightclub then I 'll just go to Pret for a sandwich and just take it into the middle of the dancefloor of my local. It 'll be a lot cheaper for sure."