The Tilbury Hotel — Restaurant in Sydney

We had a friend's birthday dinner here in the restaurant section on Saturday night. They had limited vegan options on their restaurant menu, so our vegan friend ordered food from the bar menu. This man, who may have been some sort of manager, told our friend she couldn’t eat her food in the restaurant, and she had to eat her food OUTSIDE Even though this is all the same venue???? When there was little to no vegan options, he said she should have ordered the risotto without cheese... On arrival, they told me they couldn't split the bill. We then decided to order our own drinks at the bar as it was easier for us to keep track. This same man told us to stop doing this as they did table service and could do split bill. We apologised and explained this is not what we were told. After this, he would not stop staring at us from a distancing with a rude look on his face. Our friend got up to take his sister to a cab and this man started going off at him as he thought he was walking to the bar to get a drink. This man then came over to our table and went off for around 5 minutes, making the biggest scene. He would not look at me when I was talking to him telling him his behaviour was aggressive and he is making a scene in his own restaurant. He was towering over the birthday girl and would not make eye contact with the guys when he was going off. He obviously has a problem with women. The security had to come over which no staff seemed surprised by, so I think this is not the first time this man has done this. He would not apologise and just kept going. It was mortifying and I am still in shock. The rest of the staff were nice and were probably used to his foul behaviour. He definitely needs to be fired, go to anger management and learn to respect women. Wouldn’t be surprised if he was on something as this behaviour was unexplainable. I have never experienced anything like this nor did anyone else from our party. Our friend started filming him which started to shut him up. He bought out a free vegan salad for our friend who had already eaten so it was a waste of food. They then tried to charge us an extra 10% as we have a group booking. This is on top of the $5 per head booking fee. They ended up waving the 10% after...

Tilbury Hotel , Woolloomooloo 3.5 Stars

Nice “trendy” pub situated in the heart of Woolloomooloo.

The indoor dining area was loud, considering only 1 other party of approx 6 on the other side of the room, a dozen folks in the courtyard, plus a few customers drinking at the bar.

Food prices are on the high side, considering you do need to order additional side dishes to accompany the mains.

Serving sizes were adequate.

For Starters: Ocean Trout Crudo (cucumber grapefruit + crème fraiche) - $24. This was superb. (Mind-blowing) Presented beautifully and tasted even better. Highly recommended.

Stracciatella (Dill Cucumber with a vinaigrette)- $18.00 A simple yet fresh basic dish. Pretty hard to stuff this one up. Nice fresh starter.

Zucchini (Goats curd, Zucchini flower + hazelnut / chilli dressing) - $24 This was average and overpriced. Two tiny Zucchini flowers……… Zucchini was overcooked and a bit mushy. Under Average, not recommended Do not waste your time with this.

For Mains: Crab Spaghetti (Corn Butter, chilli and parsley) $38 Not great. I adore crab spaghetti. Eaten this dish out many times. The Tilbury’s version tasted like a dessert. Too sweet. Salt and pepper was added in the attempt to dull the sweetness. It did not work. Not recommended. This dish should have been returned to the kitchen. 1 x Star.

Aylesbury Duck (Chicory + Jus) $42 The duck was overcooked. Mainly white slightly verging on pink. Jus was bland. Unmemorable duck and did not finish

The Kingfish (Capsicum, Tomato, Basil butter) $39 This was nice, with a good balance of flavours. Satisfied.

Side of green beans (Eschalot) - $10 No complaints

Wine: Very limited selection with inflated prices So few middle of the road wines offered.

We chose the: Domaine Ledogar La Compagnon Corbières 2020 @ $75 On the day we consumed, very dense and heavy. Would have been nice if decantated to allow much needed air Not an “easy drinking” wine. After an hour or so it was slowly opening up

Needs a few more years in the cellar.

Considering the prices for food and wine I expect something slightly better (or...

Wow. Rudest manager I have ever come across in 10yrs of working in Potts Point.

I had thought I’d give it a try for once with an after work drink on my way home tonight, but I won’t be making that mistake again!

I merely dared to step foot on the premises and the manager aggressively stopped me in my tracks, repeatedly barking at me “What are you doing here?? I need to know what you’re doing here!” He kept demanding to know what I was doing, as if I had committed a crime by not first asking his permission to enter.

I stood there dumbfounded- It’s a bar right? What do people do in a bar?

I’ve never encountered anything like it. It was shocking and bizarrely hostile.

For a split second I actually questioned myself, if I had set foot on private property or some kind of elite private event space.

Was it suspicious/threatening behaviour for a 48kg woman in her 30s to walk into a pub at 10pm on a Saturday night? Was it my long black hooded fur coat with slides?

Whatever the misguided reason, that strange agro man from the Tilbury does not have a temperament for hospitality.🤣

No wonder the Tilbury is always empty whenever I walk past, with that sort of toxic management.

Since I’m a resident and a business owner in the Potts Point area I’ll make sure all my friends and colleagues don’t risk it either.

They won’t need to anyway, with the plethora of other options:

All the cool young people go to the Old Fitz Hotel, and if you want an upmarket modern pub with water views, the the Woolly Bay Hotel is just around the corner.

The Tilbury has nothing to...