The White Lion — Restaurant in Bristol

Myself and my 2 sisters visited the white lion in westbury on trym on Wednesday 18th December 2024. . We all work for the NHS and this was a rare get together as our shifts often clash , so this was a special time for us. We’d book in advance and arrived in time . It was very welcoming and busy as it’s the time of year for Christmas party’s. We ordered our food and asked to use our blue light cards, because of the bad WiFi signal none of us could access the QR code , even though we had proof on our phones of the card, we were told they needed it for Tax purposes. Our food came and from the get go it didn’t look appetising. My sister had lasagna which was swimming in juice , and looked like it had already been served and taken back , the garlic bread was as hard as a house brick . My other sister and myself had scampi , which was overcooked and hard , the peas were hard and cold and the garlic mushrooms we had for starter were swimming in fat . The young lady came and asked if the food was ok . We said no, and repeated what I had described above and we were told “it always looks like that “ we were very hungry and ate it anyway , we didn’t want to spoil our day by getting into a confrontation. We’ve eaten here before and it was ok but decided to give them the benefit of the doubt , and it was dreadful . All I can think is that those coming in just for food and not a Christmas party had to take a back seat . I never write reviews but feel we should bring this to your attention so you could possibly work on these points and improve. Unfortunately we won’t be...

As a regular customer (3 to 4 nights a week, and also "early doors") I was very disappointed to this evening to to be told the pub would be closing at 10pm. This pub seems to be getting worse in the way it is being managed (the assistant manager is very good as are all the staff, cannot be faulted). The trouble seems to be with the company, or senior management! When you have, what was a very busy pub for food, that cannot seem to organise cover for the kitchen when the kitchen manager is off, and you do not open your kitchen for Sunday lunch/evening, monday or Tuesday or whenever, yet you still send out offers for dining at this venue tells me something is very wrong! When you have chefs at head office that will only work during the week (as I was told) and will not help a failing pub, which is what I now believe this pub to be, I think they have their priorities all wrong. You expect your managers and assistant managers to work all the hours, without support, and when they eventually "burn out" and say no more, they have no support, they decide not to work over 60 hours /week for minimum wage, quite frankly I don't blame them, but it is to the detriment of the pub and its regular customers. I think M&B (Ember Inns) really needs to take a look at themselves and the way they treat their staff, and the way this pub is (has been for the past 5 or 6...

Booked day in advance. Got there 1.15 booking ordered around 1.25 helpful with allergy but were told they were out of Turkey for Sunday dinner which we didn't mind just asked for extra meat (we all had duo roasts). 30ish mijs later 3/4 prawn starters came out as mine was separate due to allergy and not wanting the rose Marie sauce. Mine came out about 10 minutes after and were dripping in water so they got taken off my tab. Put me off eating tbh but then we waited another around 40ish minutes for our mains which came out with turkey even tho they said they had none. We also had no stuffing on the roast and the roasters were full on burnt same as most of the meal. It was like the scrap the barrel left over of roast especially the meat. I at this point it was like atleast 3.30 so we had been here for over 2 hours without even being told there was a wait when we ordered (have a 2 year old who was due dinner). Overall I was so upset I didnt eat my start and most of us just picked at our dinner and didn't even want the dessert so we left it.The reason I gave 3 stars was the manager was really helpful and didn't not charge us for this meal. She did seem really understaffed and I felt terrible but It was just a terrible meal for my nan who I don't see much. On a non weekday this pub is completely lovely so no judgment there just some feedback from this one...