Redwood Farm - Farmhouse Inns — Restaurant in Almondsbury

UPDATE – Follow-up from Management

Following my initial complaint, I was contacted by the Deputy Manager of The Redwood Farm, who listened to my concerns with professionalism and courtesy. They acknowledged the issues raised, offered a sincere apology, and provided a full refund in the form of a voucher, which I appreciate.

While this gesture does not erase the poor experience we had on our visit, it does show a willingness to take accountability and improve. I will be returning in the near future to assess whether changes have been made. At that point, I will post a final, updated review based on that experience.

Dear Management,

I am writing to express my deep dissatisfaction following our visit to The Redwood Farm, Cribbs Causeway, Bristol, on Bank Holiday Monday, 26th May, for which we had a table booked for 17:30.

My wife, two children, my mother, father, and I were visiting family and decided to make this rare family get-together special by dining out at your establishment. We booked early that morning and were looking forward to the experience.

Upon arrival, we were told to seat ourselves and found a table that accommodated our group. We attempted to place the following order for Table 27:

1x Standard Carvery

1x Kids' Mac & Cheese with corn on the cob and garlic bread

3x Diet Cokes

1x J20 Orange & Passionfruit

1x Junior Carvery

1x Apple & Raspberry J20

1x Chicken Tikka Masala

1x Hunter’s Chicken

We were then informed that there were no chips, no garlic bread, no cheese, and no mashed potatoes available. This lack of basic menu items was extremely disappointing and forced us to rethink our entire order, ultimately settling on:

4x Standard Carvery

1x Junior Carvery

1x Kids’ Mac & Cheese with fries

When we went to collect our meals, my family returned first, clearly disheartened. The vegetables were either dried out or missing entirely, and the Yorkshire puddings—despite just coming from the kitchen—were rock hard. While the meat was somewhat acceptable depending on the choice, the overall quality was extremely poor and not at all what one would expect from a carvery.

When it was my turn, I asked the carvery server if they were okay, as they looked visibly stressed. They apologised for the situation and confirmed they were both understaffed and overworked. It was evident throughout the entire restaurant—staff looked exhausted, demoralised, and in some cases, openly frustrated at having to inform customers repeatedly that items were unavailable. This is completely unacceptable, particularly on a busy Bank Holiday when a higher footfall should have been expected and adequately planned for.

It is clear your management was warned by staff about the likely demand but chose not to act. That lack of foresight not only failed your employees but directly impacted the customer experience in a very negative way.

Our bill came to £87.00, and for that amount, we expected a quality meal and a pleasant family experience. Instead, we left disappointed and let down.

As a result, we will not be returning. I will also be sharing our experience in a public review to ensure others are aware.

Your staff deserve better support, and your customers certainly expect better service...

UPDATE: Never received a refund for the deserts. Even after speaking to them 3 times on 3 different days.

Visited on Mother’s Day. We had booked a table in advance and arrived a little early. Thankfully, the staff were accommodating and managed to seat us quickly. We ordered our starters, mains, drinks, and desserts via the mobile phone app as the queues were very long. Up to this point, everything was going smoothly, and we were having a lovely time. The food was excellent and the atmosphere was great.

However, things took a disappointing turn when we waited over 45 minutes for our desserts. I eventually approached a member of staff to ask about them. Instead of checking on the order, the first thing he said was, "We need your table, can you finish up and go!" I replied that we would leave once we had finished our food, especially as the delay wasn’t our fault. He insisted again that we needed to vacate the table, to which I repeated that we’d be happy to do so once the desserts arrived.

His tone and attitude were unnecessarily rude and dismissive, which really soured what had otherwise been an enjoyable visit. He walked off grumpily, said he’d look into it, but never came back. We waited another 10 minutes and still received no update, so we decided to leave.

On the way out, I requested a refund for the hot drink and two of the desserts, which, as of writing this, I am still waiting to receive.

Despite this, I won’t completely knock the restaurant as it was a very busy day and the food was genuinely lovely. But I would advise caution if visiting during peak times, and I sincerely hope that particular staff member is spoken to, as his attitude was totally unacceptable and not reflective of the rest of the team.

Still giving 3 stars – purely because the food and most of the experience were great up until that unfortunate...

I am sad to have to give such a low rating as, on first appearance, this place looked great. I was very impressed that they had an adult only dining section, finding a child free atmosphere in many restaurants these days is rare to come by. Unfortunately, things went down hill rapidly. A sign just inside the door asked you to wait to be seated, after several minutes of waiting I decided to go to the bar to ask if we had to wait and was told to sit anywhere we liked. Next, when I enquired if the meal I wanted to order was dairy free (due to an allergy) the server at the bar told me that he had to give me a book to check myself and that he wasn't allowed to do it - fair enough, as I understand they don't want to cause any issues by a mis-understanding, however, the size of the white binder folder that he gave me was huge, at least 4 inches thick. I asked where about I should be looking as there we no tabs to separate each part of the menu other than food/drinks. He literally flicked through the whole of the food section and said "somewhere in this bit", he made no attempt to help me find the right section. The folder was also quite dirty and covered in sticky marks, I would be been embarrassed to hand that to a customer if I worked there. I ended up not ordering anything as I didn't want to trawl through the massive folder. We decided to just finish our drinks and go else where to eat. I used the loo before I left, as you can see from the picture, both of the soap suspenders had been removed and rather than providing pump action bottles as a temporary measure they literally and a plastic bowl of soap that everyone had to dip their hands in... now I have OCD so I found this alarming but even my husband found...