Restaurant L'Ecluse Beziers — Restaurant in Béziers

Booked purely based on Tripadvisor reviews as we drove through France and needed a lunch stop. Friendly welcome from all the staff. Very busy Thursday and booked a table for 13.15pm by phone. Unable to be seated by canal as a private party there so sat inside which was pleasant. We ordered a dish of the day which was brochette of chicken with jacket potato and salad leaves and another main dish of Caesar salad. The brochette was under cooked in 2 of the pieces (pink flesh) and the jacket potato was so dry and shrivelled that it looked more like an old roasted chestnut. My Caesar salad was the worst I have ever had( I love them).. it was basically a pile of chopped iceberg crunchy white lettuce drizzled with clearly, shop bought salad cream dressing.On top , 8 pieces of what can only be described as chicken nuggets, again baked hard and dry. We were hungry and picked out the edible bits of which there were few. My husband had opted for the 2 course menu so obliged to choose a dessert otherwise would have left. He chose with hope that the Cafe gourmand dessert would lift our spirits. Alas, they plummeted further. The coffee was good and the mini crème brûle was acceptable but the 4 or so other mini desserts were bizarre and unappetising as well as unpleasant to eat. Most of which we left and then asked for the bill( which was 50 euros and included just one small glass of rose .). I rarely complain but just needed to provide an honest review to heed...

I was returning back to Spain from a long drive with my extended family and we decided to stop at this restaurant along the way for a nice dinner. While the atmosphere of the restaurant was beautiful (next to the river, nice design), the service and the food weren't that great.

First about the service, the waitress who served us was unpleasant and uninviting. While she spoke English, she didn't answer any question about what type the steak (filet) is, sat impatiently with a sour look watching us struggle to understand the composition of the meals (which is all in French, using culinary jargon), didn't offer an explanation of the specials and in general felt like a total chore to get her to attend us more than the bare minimum of taking the order and bringing it to the table.

About the food, we had the fish and the burrata salad. The fish was very good, but the burrata salad was made with stale and mushy tomatoes so we just picked at it. When I was paying the bill, I mentioned that discretely to the server, hoping that I will maybe get an "oh sorry, let me inform the chef", but instead I got a shrug of the shoulders and a rude "ha, c'est bizarre".

It's unfortunate that such a pretty place has such an...

We were recommended this restaurant by a friend as it was conveniently situated for the airport, we made our reservation online and although we were a little late due to traffic this was not a problem. We were seated outside in the canal-side terrace and were able to watch the boats waiting for the lock. The staff were professional, friendly and welcoming, they patiently explained the menu choices to us in a mix of French and English. We chose Monkfish, Tuna and a Noodle dish, all were well presented and delicious. We particularly liked watching the waitress using the baguette slicer 😀. We look forward to returning on our next...