Playford Tavern — Restaurant in Adelaide

Average facilities with poor quality and quantity, poor customer service, average prices.

My experience of this venue was 'disappointing'.

After we entered and made our way to the bistro's bar to order food, a male staff member walked by us, and without any eye contact or greeting, stated we needed to walk over to their 'desk' by the other entrance to wait to be seated, whereupon they ponderously made an attempt to explain that we needed to have booked a table, that we could have seen for ourselves that tables with cutlery on them were 'reserved' already, it would be difficult to find us a table - before proceeding to give us a choice of tables with cutlery on some of them... (Interesting note: only two of those 'reserved tables' were occupied when we left...)

After placing our food order, I enquired about ordering drinks and whether i could do that with the one transaction (which wasn't a problem), with the same male staff member then advising me to "take a seat and we'll bring it all out to you". Needless to say, the drinks weren't brought out until after the food was served - possibly 20 minutes later. This was despite the obvious fact that the drinks were sitting on the bar for almost the entire time, with three staff members walking past them a total of eight times, with those staff seemingly not 'busy' with other priorities - one staff member began clearing tables, another seemed to be doing nothing other than just sauntering around, and even the female staff member who poured the drinks was not at all concerned that they hadn't been served or collected and seemed content with lounging in their staff walkway behind the bar between the front bar and the bistro drinking a soft drink they poured themselves.

The food came out fairly quickly, with complimentary warm dinner roles appearing first. Although sufficiently hot, the quality of the main food was very poor. The roast meat was extremely dry despite it being at the beginning of the dinner period and very scant in quantity, the roast potatoes were very good, the vegetables appeared and tasted as if they were simply boiled frozen generic supermarket brand, gravies were tasty-enough yet nothing overly special, chips/fries were slightly above average and cooked decently, schnitzel was tough and significantly smaller than expected for the price, and the pasta was decent in quantity yet very average, at best, in quality.

Drinks were very overpriced and excessively 'watered-down' with soda water.

The facilities appeared, at least superficially, to be clean and reasonably well-maintained.

Sadly, the pathetic customer service and the poor quality and quantity of food and drinks are the main contributors to what could have been a pleasant experience.

Without significant improvements to the customer service and food/drinks, there's no way i can even begin to justify spending the money at this establishment as you can easily obtain far better (both customer service and food) for either cheaper or just barely slightly more expensive at other venues within 10-15 minutes drive in any direction of this place - with that extra travelling time definitely worth it...

Had lunch here today. Thought we would try the me and u tap and pay, planning on ordering a steak and going this way, you get a free garlic bread. So my son wants to try their Kari burger but of course he wants to omit some things and add BBQ sauce, the me&u allows for removals but no adds/substitutes, so he is required to line up to order. The place wasn't busy, the staff were minimal, the wait-not fast moving. I tried ordering mine on the me&u- go through everything to find my card is not able to be processed- my first thought-Stripe- notorious for misidentifying legit cards as frauds. I asked one of the managers if the me&u uses Stripe, she looked vague, said she has no idea, says maybe its poor internet reception etc; I suggested she find out and let people know that they use Stripe as it means they can bypass the time trying to order via me&u and just line up (after foing some internet research of my own, yes, me&u use Stripe). So I had to line up and order, my son's order had been placed already, the staff member seemed confused as to how to add mine but managed to do so; she said she is from the gaming room and just helping out-hint: ensure all staff have a solid knowledge base of all areas of your hotel. I order the 250g graziers rump, rare with reef (prawn and garlic cream) topper. The menu describes it as aged to their specifications by the supplier, ensuring great flavour..... not sure about the aging process after eating it. Verdicts on orders: Burger was meh, chips looked overcooked and were cold. Steak: cooked rare, so that was good, unfortunately black pepper all over it-not sure why, it's aged specifically for great flavour and is supposed to have a reef topper. Reef topper arrived in separate container, understandable if gravy/sauce but this is a topper, thus it should be on top of the steak. Some of the prawns looked too translucent to eat, the chips were too blonde, cold and looked like a no name brand- not steak style/chunky style/French fry style but somewhere in between. While the steak was rare, it somehow managed to be tough in the eating too. Over all, I doubt we will...

Went here with the family for a Bday catch up.

FOOD: Ordered the flathead on the specials board as a last minute decision over the steak. The oil that it was cooked in ruined any flavour that the fish may have had. Others on the table ordered the steak and the burgers which looked to be the the goods. The buffet had a good variety of salad, veg, pasta etc and the quality was better than most places. The food was reasonably priced. We received good service from staff on the floor.

DRINKS: Ordered a lime, soda and vodka for the wife. Took this back as it was lemon, Lime juice, soda and vodka. Staff replaced this with a lemon, soda and vodka as there was there was no fresh lime. The staff charged for both of these drinks at the time of charging the bill and when I suggested that we should only be charged for one of the drinks the answer was that another staff member poured the drinks. Possibly partly the pubs fault and possibly partly mine for only suggesting lime rather than fresh lime. Either way I wasn't happy with the outcome. Ordered beer for myself. No issues.

PROS: Kid friendly bistro - High chairs / Playground Good service from the staff on the floor Decent buffet

CONS: Bar service The deep fried food wasn't up to scratch

VERDICT: If I lived down the road i would pop in every now and then for a beer, a reasonably priced meal and the buffet. If I was driving past and felt like a steak I would give this another go. If I wanted fish I would head home, crack a tinny and cook up a couple of birds eye fish fingers.

FEEDBACK: For the sake of a dollar or two of vodka waive the cost of the first drink. The cost would have been covered considering the price of the drink. You'll likely receive more positive feedback and word of mouth business for taking ownership of these kind of misunderstandings. Ensure meals on the specials board are up the quality of the meals on the menu. Review could have been...