London – Westminster (Borough of) – Oxford Street – Hard Rock Cafe (4th Visit – with Robot)

And another visit to this central London hotel, restaurant and bar, with this meal being funded by TheFork.

I tend to notice different music memorabilia every time I visit here, this time the star of the show looked to me like this piano once played on by Freddie Mercury.

It looked quiet from this angle, but they must have had over 100 customers in for lunch. It’s the busiest that I’ve seen it recently for lunch, another sign of the tourists returning to London.

The menu mentioned at the top to ask the server for details of what craft beers they were offering. I asked and she said Heineken, which didn’t entirely surprise and delight me if I’m being honest. I ordered the Brixton Coldharbour Lager instead.

The beer tasted as expected, with the chicken wings being to the usual high Hard Rock cafe style.

This seemed quite exciting, as they were using robots to deliver around half of the meals. Unfortunately, I didn’t get the excitement (I’m easily pleased) on this occasion, so I took a photo of the neighbouring table receiving their child’s meal. Apparently there are two of these robots meandering their way around the restaurant, named Bellabot and Holabot, with customers clearly being impressed by the whole arrangement. Some diners weren’t quite sure whether to take their own food or wait for a staff member, as the policy seemed mixed, but the robot patiently waited before returning back to the kitchen.

I had gone for the chicken fajitas which came with a staff member telling me to be careful of the hot dish, which likely explains the lack of robot interaction.

And there’s the rest of the dish. It’s one of my favourite items on their menu, although the four wraps are never enough for the quantity of food which is provided.

The server returned to tell me that I had under-spent the allowance offered by TheFork and I could have a free dessert, but I had already gone through enough food, so they brought over half a pint of Guinness instead. That seemed a fair compromise, Guinness is like a meal, so that’s all well and good.

This is a well run restaurant and there are plenty of attentive and helpful staff members around, although it’s not the cheapest for those paying for their meal as mine would have cost around £44 before the tip. And if I get chance for another meal here, I will most certainly take it and hopefully next time I’ll get more robot interaction during the service.