The Fox (ExCeL)

I've never been so completely baffled by a place in my entire life. My friend and I went to Fox Excel during Comic Con on a Saturday. We figured we'd make a reservation to make sure we'd have a seat. So we get there and the man doesn't seem to care much about it. He says we can sit wherever. We pick a place. Fair enough. We sit down, we choose our order, it takes a long time to order. We order. Now the first thing I notice is that it's not that busy. Still quite a few empty tables. We came early. Makes sense. Then I notice that there's one person behind the bar, one guy who receives the people but also somehow seems to take the orders, clean the tables, take people to their tables, and take food and drinks to their tables, with one other girl who only seems to wait tables. It kind of seems there's one more guy who came from the kitchen to help deliver the food sometimes, I guess he's a cook? Okay? Now it becomes increasingly busy after a while. I'm thirsty, it's hot. A nice temperature inside, but still, I've been dragging myself through that heat for hours and just wanted a nice cool drink and good food. We wait. People come in after us (some with children). They get served before us? We continue waiting. One hour and twenty minutes pass and we still don't even get a drink. I'm starting to think that I should've hired a child to get served (they seemed to get served faster). I must be delirious at that point. My friend asks the guy. Eventually finds out we haven't even been put in the system. I'm sorry, what? He puts us in the system. It still takes ages to just get the drink part of our order. I didn't know pineapple juice was so hard to come by. Maybe they're squeezing it personally. All the time during that wait I'm wondering whether I should just up and leave. But I'm hungry and thirsty. They're clearly understaffed for this kind of day. To make things worse, the state of the toilets was lacking, no toilet paper, it looked unclean, someone was nice enough to leave their empty drink there, and it didn't seem well maintained. For some reason they were all auto-flushing at a set pace. Guess you gotta go fast before the splash. At this point I'm so confused I can't even fathom what's going on. I didn't know it was so difficult to receive food and drink at a place that serves it. More and more people come. It still takes ages for our full order to arrive. My friend tries to at least get it compensated a little, since we sat here wasting our time. The lady says no, it's Comic Con. Wow, well, if you knew that and I knew that, wouldn't you have more staff to deal with all these people? Sure, this guy keeps saying sorry. I'm sure he's nice, but I literally had to waste several hours of my life trying to be fed, for money. Even the people behind us put in a complaint because their order was messed up and never resolved. Guy goes sorry again, girl goes it's okay. She was obviously not okay. Getting it fixed would probably take longer than she was willing to invest. Honestly, weird place. My friend had to ask them so many times for our order. Maybe that's normal in the UK? Doubt I'll ever want to come back here. I'd be more understanding if they actually cared, but the woman was very blasé about it. Not enough menus to go around (watched them take them from other tables for new people coming in), not enough staff during a busy con and sure, the food and drink is good enough, if you're willing to wait and be forgotten during the process.

Came here after the IFE expo next door. Loads of people having a drink in the afternoon. Decided to have dinner too, the prawn pasta was cooked very well and the prawns were fresh.

I always come to The Fox to watch football and socialise on the weekends, and the atmosphere is always absolutely top-notch. It’s one of my favourite places to relax, enjoy great food, and soak up the lively vibe. A special mention goes to Ben, one of the Bar staffs, who is always such a gentleman — respectful, polite, and genuinely welcoming. His excellent customer service always makes the experience even more enjoyable and memorable. The Fox is definitely the place to be for great food, an amazing atmosphere, and outstanding service. The staff, especially Ben, consistently make customers feel valued and well looked after. Highly recommended!

We had a fabulous team night at The Fox. A super Cocktail Masterclass which was great fun and the cocktails were delicious. The downstairs bar is a perfect venue for a team night. Chloe, Olu and Fenella were fabulous at teaching us how to make a great cocktail and making it a fun event. We then went for dinner upstairs where I had the best pub Christmas dinner. Super tasty. Can highly recommend.