Racehorse Hotel — Restaurant in Ipswich City

We have visited this hotel many many times and had the very best of service, and food. It has been our go-to for great pub nosh and we tell everyone about it. This review though I hope is informative for the kitchen staff. We visited the venue a few weeks ago to see some new items on the menu. A Burrata entree and a Tuna steak main. I'm an adventurous foodie, so I decided to try both. The Buratta turned up, nicely sized, drizzled in olive oil and served with lightly grilled tomatoes. A lovely looking dish but that was all we were given. No bread, no crackers, ummmmmmm no way to eat it. Im not sure what they were thinking, or if they did not know that the centre of a Buratta is a creamy liquid, but as my husband is a chronic anti-complainer; we ate it with spoons. Then arrived the Tuna steak served with nicoise and a 68 degree egg. Sounds delicious and should have been. the Tuna was almost cold, it had been sous vide, so was very soft and not at all like the seared steak described on the menu. The centre of it was cold. I moved quickly on to the 68 degree egg, which turned out to be fridge cold. Hmmmmm!!! Trying to find a repreive on the plate, I ventured to the salad. Nicoise is normally a salad served warm, but nevertheless, it is a salad so it should not have been searingly hot. I burned my tongue on the potatoes and then gave up. The wait staff at the hotel, true to my original statement of how attentive they are noticed my distress and asked how the meal was. They were shocked as to what I had received and changed my meal out very quickly and gave us a complimentary drink. My hope is they mention to the kitchen staff that while offering something adventurous on the menu is a great idea. Can we please inform all staff members as to how to serve said items. It hasnt turned us off this venue as being from a hospitality background, I can understand how this may have happened, and!!!! the staff were amazing once they knew what had happened. I would hate to see this kitchen lose their great reputation over trying to be "fancy" without the understanding of how to prepare and serve the dishes. Usually 8/10. On...

I went to their Christmas buffet….. I flew up from Melbourne to see my family and they had booked a table for lunch the 1:30 seating, we were all excited as I haven’t seen them in a while and we were looking forward to Christmas lunch together. When we arrived we had to wait out the front in the heat for over 30 mins, we then got into the venue and the host asked our names and there were only 4 of us but she said we had booked for 5.?.?. We got taken to our seat got some drinks and sat down ready to eat, we then had a team member come over and let us know they had sat us at the wrong table and moved us to another one (fine everyone makes mistakes) the table they sat us at was in the walkway of the line for the buffet and my mother kept getting knocked into all day by other guests. To say the least I wasn’t impressed at all!! The food was lovely so the chefs did their job very well and they kept it conking never getting low or running out, I work in the hospitality industry as a trainer and I was shocked that we didn’t even get any compensation for the terrible seating and the table move. The reviews of this venue are good but at this time I think it was the worst Christmas experience dining I have ever had, I don’t ever write review as I know it can tarnish the score but in the case I felt I needed too. If the manager or at least someone came over to recover the service I would have been great full but nothing happened, the staff looked extremely stressed and all over the place. I feel that a drinks comp would have been sufficient to make our day better but nothing was offered at all! I will not be going their again and will not be recommending the venue to...

We've been going here for many years, birthday celebrations, impromptu dinners and lunches and the food has always been pretty good, along with the customer service.

However, tonight, the vibes, the food and the customer service was just phenomenal and we had a wonderful time. From the perfectly cooked meals, cooked and served with passion and care (shoutout to tonight's chef, forever will be kicking myself for not asking her name, we saw you working hard and ensuring that the food went out in a timely manner, despite having a handful of tables to cook for).

To the wonderful lady, Amber that served us at the counter and took our order, polite, gorgeous smile and just such a lovely lady, great vibes, good chats, just a funny lady and incredible customer service, also going above and beyond to ensure we had a wonderful time - thank you. 🩷🩷

To our wonderful waiter, Saur (gosh, I hope I've spelt this right, if hate to ask a 5th time for his name, I apologise) for also going above and beyond this evening and who equally was just impeccable with his customer service, big smile, so polite, ensuring that our meals were great, good banter (which was highly appreciated and welcomed by our crazy family), and just an overall, a wonderful man! 🩵

Honestly, cannot possibly commend these guys enough for their impeccable customer service, polite, respectful, patient, kind and just happy people who are passionate about what they do, it's such a rarity these days, and again, thank you, thank, you, thank you! For making this evening so much...