Joseph's Restaurant — Restaurant in Melbourne

My wife and I stayed at the hotel overnight on the 15th August. We stayed here almost 12 years ago and returned because previously our experience was wonderful.

When we arrived your concierge at 3pm was absolutely wonderful. Our room didn't meet our expectations so he went out of his way to find another room for me to celebrate my 67th birthday weekend. Never have we experienced such professional excellent service and this young man is to be commended. The remainder of our time continued to be great and the great hotel service never faltered.

However, our experience in the restaurant was extremely poor. I have no issue with the staff and restaurant manager but following our complaint re the food the outcome was we will do better next time and I will give feedback to the kitchen.

We have two adult children that are in hospitality and one of them is a highly regarded chef in Melbourne,so we did check with her that we weren't just setting too high expectations. The snapper that was served to my wife was dry and overcooked and in fact she left most of the fish as it was inedible . We paid for sides of carrot and potatoes. The carrots for $18 were far too ridiculously priced for the amount and quality. The potatoes were actually hard but we were hungry so we carved our way through them. Why they were served hard is a mystery to me . I had the eye fillet with Jus which portion wise was small but cut in a way it dried out under heat lamps (possibly) before it got to the table. The entrees were also of absolutely dubious character and again not worth mentioning. The desert is fantastic so win there but for what is described as an upmarket restaurant nothing to gloat about. . Just to tap off the farce that is described as a quality restaurant q meal I ordered a latte. I previously owned a coffee business and my first sip just about took off my lips as it was so hot that the milk was burnt. It tasted like it came from an automatic coffee machine but i twas dangerously hot. Last time we spent over $300 dollars in a restaurant we raved to the world about it . Not this time! Okay I have vented now and will return one day to the hotel but will not eat there or recommend it to others. I have not posted a review yet as I would like to get a response prior to publicly denouncing ...

Stayed at the Werribee Mansion late last year for a nice getaway, opted to have dinner at Joseph’s as it was onsite and seemed nice.

We opted to have the tasting menu which we thought was going to be nice due to most tasting menu’s being the best of what the chef can compile, it was actually subpar. The food looked nice but in reality it really lacked flavour or any wow factor at all, the seasoning was barely there, most the plates were small and left us hungry to the point where we got room service right after our dinner. The quality of the produce is great though and the food was cooked well but they just didn’t seem to gel as a whole, the lamb was good but still lacked flavour, the dessert was probably the best part out of the whole meal.

The service was really average, we had 3 different waiters/ waitresses, 2 weren’t very good but 1 was really good. From the get go our first plate came out and my partner finished first and her plate was taken away, I finished my plate a few minutes after her and my plate was still on the table when they bought out our next plate which came under 5 minutes after I finished, i timed next 2 plates that came out as I thought that was really quick, one came out 3 minutes after we had finished and the next came out 10 minutes and it progressively got better, so within the first half an hour we had already finished over half of our plates which made it feel awfully...

I had left a positive review 3 years ago and it's disappointing to remove the review to leave this one. We regularly stay at Lancemore Werribee for special occasions and enjoy eating at Joseph's. Unfortunately this time, the service was really lacking. On the weekend, it's a minimum 2 course menu so when we ordered mains we asked if we needed to order dessert at the same time, they said no they'd return. After we finished mains, they cleared plates but never returned with menus. We eventually found someone to call over, they brought the menu but never returned to take the order, so much later we found someone to flag down.

When we finished eating, there was no one on the floor to speak to, the only person near the door was in deep conversation with another customer, chatting about personal things. Our group of 4 stood their awkwardly until I saw a waiter in the distance, only when I left to try and speak to them did the man at the door turn to speak to the remainder of my group. This was the first time we brought our friends here, to celebrate my 40th and felt embarrassed by the service. Although the food was great, we are more likely to eat somewhere else like Shadowfax for dinner if we come back to the hotel.

My review from 3 years ago was positive, but also mentioned how long staff kept us waiting so it's not a once-off. Additional training and expectation setting is clearly needed as that...