5th March 2025.
I'll keep it concise.
Old woman working the bar alone.
Ordered cauliflower and chickpea curry with rice. £13.50.
Had to pay upfront. Sat down at my table. Number 17.
After some time, the woman came to my table and told me the kitchen said they have run out of that.
I'll pause here to say, this is one of the reasons you shouldn't get customers to pay upfront + your staff need to communicate better. Bar staff need to be informed of such things.
She said instead there's a veggie chilli con carne if I'd like that instead.
I asked her what's in it.
I'll pause to say... She's quirky. Seems on edge or something. Getting straight answers from her was hard. Friendly woman though.
She didn't know what's in it. Just that there's veggies in it.
I gave it some thought and accepted the given alternative meal.
Food came in a decent amount of time.
However this was an insanely low calorie meal and the portion was tiny. Bearing in mind I had paid £13.50.
Food was nice and hot. However. The 'veggie chilli con carne' tasted like just tomato's, salt, pepper and maybe some herbs. And I'm telling you. That's all it was.
The entire thing including the rice tasted like a relatively cheap microwave meal from a supermarket. It was terrible.
For £2 more, where I live, I can get a handmade authentic, delicious veggie pizza from my local family run Italian. It's called Castellum pizzeria.
And it's far far more calories and volume of food than this terrible offering.
I was starving.
While I was eating the woman came to ask how it was. I told her it exactly how it was. She just apologised. Didn't offer me anything. No refund offer, alternative meal. Nothing.
I finished it all. Remember. I was starving.
Went to use the toilet, as I was entering, she exclaimed 'excuse me would you like a different meal?'.
I replied 'I've already finished it'.
She replied 'oh, I'm so sorry'.
She's a nice woman. However she seems to be poorly trained. She needs to be trained what to do in such situations.
Just offering an apology and leaving the customer with what is quite frankly a terrible terrible dish, at that price is heinous. No fault of her own I assume.
I used toilet, sat back at my table.
Still very hungry.
Went back to bar, ordered a panini. £8.50.
I also told her that the alternative meal I was offered had only veggies in it, and that the meat version which was on the menu was priced at £11.95. Vegetables are cheaper than meat. So my meal shouldn't cost the £13.50 I was charged.
She said she'll have to speak to the manager. Turned out he was sitting right next to me. I was standing at the bar.
He apologised and said there was confusion about my order.
There wasn't. I was told what I wanted was out of stock.
Anyhow, I didn't dispute what he said. I was tired, hungry, and not feeling like dealing with any kind of confrontation.
He was friendly.
He said there would be no charge for the panini.
Thanked him, sat back down.
Panini came out nice and hot. Opened it up to release heat.
Dismayed to see there were basically no veggies in it.
It was Pesto, cheddar and veggie panini. Comes with a salad with salad cream of some sort, and salted crisps.
Taste wise it was just OK. Not great, not terrible.
I wouldn't recommend this place based on my experience sadly. Friendly staff though.
Manager needs to teach pub floor staff how to deal with issues with food etc.
Also, he had told me he just arrived and just found out about the problem with my meal.
Even more reason to properly train staff. They shouldn't have to rely on the manager being physically present to deal with issues.
Interior is OK. Warm. Walking past the bar area is a tight squeeze + the kitchen door and bar staff exit are opposite each other where there's very little space for customer to walk by. It's essentially a crossroad. And there was a man sitting with 2 dogs on leashes right next to this crossroad. His dogs were sitting in the crossroad zone. I barely had room to maneuver.
Food needs major...
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