The Sun Inn — Restaurant in Basingstoke and Deane

Was 5 star, but not anymore.... My girlfriend and I decided on a quick lunch on Saturday so thought we'd go to one of our favourite's, The Sun Inn. We never booked, just turned up at 12 noon and were told by a very friendly and polite young lady that she could just about fit us in, even though there was only one table with people sitting down at. I think they were very short of staff and even turned other people away who wanted to eat. We had the breads to share whilst waiting for our mains, and was nice with the flavoured butters. Our mains came pretty quickly, my girlfriend had the Fish & Chips and I had the Ribeye Steak. My steak was nice but the chips were totally different to their old triple cooked chips, which would always get a 10 out of 10, but these were more like 3 out of 10. Some partially uncooked, hard in the centres and looked burnt. The rest of my meal was ok. My girlfriends Fish & Chips were very poor. Same chips, fish not cooked enough. The batter was still soggy on the inside which was very poor and surely the chef knows how to cook a bit of battered fish!! Her side salad was nothing like she's had with that dish in the past and no salad dressing on it, which made it very bland. She basically left half her meal.

The Sun was in my top two places to eat around Basingstoke but the change that has come from Gordon cooking elsewhere has made a big difference and seems to have gone down hill. Even the napkins have changed from being ironed to not being ironed, just folded. One other annoying thing is not having salt & pepper on the tables anymore. When your food comes you then have to ask for it, then have to wait a couple of mins for them to bring it to you. I would of given the Sun Inn 2 star's, but gave them an extra star for the very nice service we were given from the young waitress. We will try again but won't be in such a rush...

I am fully aware this review sounds like it's a typical exaggerated bad take, but it is a genuine account of my experience.

Booked dinner for 7pm on Saturday, turned up on time with only 1 other couple in the entire restaurant, who also turned up at the same time as us, my partner and I ordered our meals first, around 7:15, as we both had looked at the menu before hand and knew what we wanted, we done this because we had both planned to have a quick meal, go back and have a few bottles of wine whilst playing card games together after a lovely sunny day.

The other couple managed to not only get their food first, but also finish, eat desert and pay their bill before we received our food, we waited for 50 minutes after ordering until we received our food. In a restaurant that had 4 people in total dinning. It was very awkward, we discussed just leaving as we wanted to get away but decided to stay. We shouldn't of.

Onto the food, my partner and I both ordered rare steaks, no starters & a glass of wine. Both of the steaks were over done. They were both cooked to medium - well done. This was very unfortunate because the rest of the food on the plate was actually quite pleasant, but the fact we had to wait for the better part of an hour to receive steaks that were very overcooked, we ate most of the steak as the time was now around 10 past 8 and we didn't want to wait another hour before getting it replaced.

When asked how our meal was after finishing, I told the waiter this, explaining that although the food was okay, our steaks were not cooked properly. I didn't expect a free meal, but seeing as neither of us finished due to a poor steak, I did expect some of the price tag of 26 odd quid each to be discounted. It was not.

Unfortunately it was not a well spent 2 hours & 60 something quid.

Other people may find a different experience, but...

Some improvement required, still worth a try.

I wrote a review about The Sun a couple years ago when they just changed hands urging people to try as we had an excellent evening, which just lacked people.

It is still worth a visit but unfortunately, this time it was not as good. We were place outside the dining area on our own and although book we were, sent to an empty table with no cutlery, which again lacked atmosphere. The food is quality and you can taste that but I would say the cooking isn't quite what is was the first time. There was a mistake in the starter order and dealt with immediately but I felt it meant 2 of us eating first followed by the next 2 eating as didn't want their food getting cold. Because of this I think the starters were rushed and 2 of the 4 cloves of garlic in the cheese was uncooked.

The mains again lovely quality meats and veg, the roast potatoes were hard in the middle and the sprout on the harder side, this could be personnel preference.

Desert and coffees were lovely the temperature on the bread and butter could have been warmer.

Over all, the service was good and despite the hiccups in ordering, it was dealt with promptly and apologies given. We...