Paul Restaurant, Café and Bakery

I had made a reservation beforehand, and I feel like it would logically make sense for us to be seated in a nicer area of the cafe - especially since we were looking forward to the dine out experience. They placed us in a corner by the garbage and plate-return, and we literally had to request upfront to be seated somewhere nicer. The food took about an hour to arrive, and when it finally came out, it didn't look worth an hour wait at all. Shrivelled up salad with only two small slices of tomato, two shrivelled pieces of bacon, stale baguette - I probably could've gotten a better meal at Denny's breakfast menu.

The food was delicious. We had a Paul Mocha And it was divine. The breakfast for 2 was also very good. All that being said... the service was slow and unattentive. Took 10/11 minutes for my husband to get cream for his coffee. When our meal came out they forget the salad dressing on our salads and did not bring syrup for the waffles(which took another 5ish minutes to get) Again... waffles were delicious but service was so slow. It was surprising since it was not very busy in the cafe.

We were the first guest of the day, however still take more than 30mins for our meal. The meal arrived all cold. During the wait, we saw two groups of guest walked away as no server even greet and seat them given only 3 table are occupied. Very poor service overall.

Dessert was amazing. Rest of meal was OK although I asked for the sauce on the side of my steak and that was ignored, which kind of ruined the steak for me. Staff were lovely, very friendly but the service was quite slow. The room was lovely though, very nicely done and pleasant ambience to enjoy. I would definitely come here for a drink and dessert, (the coffees, hot chocolates and cakes that I saw people buying looked awesome!!!) not sure I would do dinner again, though, but perhaps I just caught a bad night as everything else was lovely.

I've always liked the nice ambiance here, but service is strained. Made a reservation and purchased items from the café case, then when I asked to sit in the back area, which was largely empty, was told it was reserved for their Dine Out menu, which was confusing given the space wasn't being used. Staff seemed overwhelmed and it was difficult to get questions answered or have drinks/food brought to the table. The experience didn't give me a strong reason to return.

Our second attempt to try Paul's Bakery was futile. We stood at the “Please Wait to be Seated” sign and were thoroughly ignored by the 3 servers that walked past us (and saw us) at least 5 times. There were people from “the cafeteria” part of the restaurant making requests of those staff ... yet we were being ignored. We waited for 5-7 minutes, were never acknowledged and left to eat someplace else. Disappointed with both experiences and vow to never give this place another minute of our time.

Try the Dine Out Vancouver dinner menu. Two items on the dine out menu is out (the lobster bisque and steak). The pasta is undercooked... The rest of the food are ok. Service is good. But overall I'm pretty disappointed...

Very disappointing Dine Out experience – poor execution and management This was our first Dine Out experience of the year, and unfortunately it was a major disappointment. I've been to Paul Bakery Café & Restaurant before for lunch a couple of years ago and had a decent impression, but the Dine Out dinner experience was completely different. Menu & availability: We were informed at ordering time (Saturday evening, around 6:30 pm) that the steak main course was already sold out and could only be replaced with chicken. For a Dine Out menu, running out of a key main dish that early is unacceptable and shows poor planning. Food issues: •We ordered three lobster bisques, but what arrived was clearly tomato soup. We patiently tasted it to make sure it wasn't our misunderstanding—there was no lobster flavor at all. Only after asking did we find out the kitchen had run out of lobster bisque and served tomato soup instead, without informing the server or guests. •The French onion soup, listed as a house specialty, was overly salty and came with barely any cheese—no cheese pull at all, which is quite disappointing for such a classic dish. Dessert & service: We ordered four desserts (with one pistachio cake repeated). The two pistachio desserts looked completely different—one appeared to be only mousse with no visible cake. When we raised the concern, the response was defensive rather than apologetic, and we were told it was “the edge of the cake,” which was hard to believe. Eventually, it was replaced with a different dessert, and the original plate was simply taken away. Overall: This felt less like individual mistakes and more like a management and communication problem between the kitchen and front-of-house. If a restaurant feels the pricing isn't worthwhile, it may be better not to participate in Dine Out at all. The event is meant to build reputation, not lose loyal or returning customers. Very disappointing experience overall.

Food was great overall for the very reasonably priced Dine Out Vancouver dinner. Service was spotty - had a reservation but after checking in arriving 15 mins early, stood around waiting for over 5 minutes to get seated. Dessert took over 15 minutes to arrive after finishing the entrees. Had to ask a server for an update. Don't recommend Paul if you have timed plans as service was slow.

We attended Dine Out Vancouver (2026) and after reading the 'not so great' reviews - thought to give it a try anyway. We're big fans of French cuisine and not all the reviews were bad. Lobster Bisque was first up - and was more like tomato soup. We ordered 'steak frites' and were told they had run out of steak and were subbing with chicken. Our reservation was for 5:45pm - which felt early to run out of steak. We both chose different deserts and one of them looked like left over Christmas cake. Overall, disappointed as the ambiance and service were both quite nice. We will not be back as there are so many great places in Vancouver!

Worse Dineout Vancouver experience EVER. Who runs out of the food choices at 530PM during a dineout event. We had noodles inside our soup and was simply told yeah thats cause we use the soup as sauce for the pasta dish. Honestly made it feel like leftovers even. Gross. Pasta was bland .. ZERO flavor and we only chose that because they somehow ran out of steak frites as an option at 530PM. Dessert somehow came out while we were eatting the pasta and just plopped down on the table with no new cutlery. All in all .. just the most disappointing night.

Did Dine Out before our VSO concert. My partner had a salad which he said was good. My lobster bisque was cold. They warmed it up (hopefully they did not microwave it). As I ate the soup I ended up chewing pieces of lobster shell. We had the steak-frites as a main dish. The steak tiny, thin, and cold. Again they reheated the meat which made it chewy. The fries were wedges — too think and a bit soggy on the oil. It is not what you'd get in Belgium nor France, crispy on the outside and light/fluffy inside. The dessert, their “winter passion tree” had no distinct flavour - could not identify what it was supposed to be. My partner ordered a tea; server never asked if he wanted more hot water. Very disappointed with the meal. As we left, we looked at the food offered in the display cases and we both said we would have preferred to order from the cafe menu. They should focus on the cafe offerings and forget the casual fine dining menu. A recommendation about customer service: in a public service job all staff, while serving in public, should speak English. If they are in their break room, by all means, speak whichever language is comfortable to you, but in public it should be English.

First fine dining experience at Paul's ended up a 60 min+ wait for food. The server brought us a cold dish of food after we asked for the bill. Never again. The first and the last.

Terrible. While reservations were available, when we got there they said their kitchen already closed off for the day at 5pm. Why accept dinner reservations then if your kitchen closes so early?!? There is no warning or notice on their website... but most importantly don't make reservations past 5pm available on OpenTable!!! What's the point?!? My friend and I were excited to try the food but this experience taught us Paul's is a terrible mismanaged restaurant/cafe. Doubt we will come back.

Disappointed, we go there very often for just sweets and coffee since they were open. For dine in, this is second time Dine in restaurant, first time wasn't great... this time they changed new menus even worse, poor choices, Paul special burgers was very dry.. no salad comes with other than fried or at least we can have a choice of salad or fries but no one ask... my chicken Cesar salad also dried not enough dressing but yet salty, over price. Very noisy. Staffs are not friendly from front counter to dine in. No eyes contact to see we need anything, even though fewer of them walking back and forth cleaning. Won't come back there for dine in but might still just drop by for sweet until there are new dessert place open. In my opinion when it just opens we're very fancy and nice now the restaurant is not improving for better but slightly going down interms of decor, service, not new foods choices, especially tastes... French can't make burgers.