The Maxwells — Restaurant in Charnwood

I live very close to Maxwells, so often visit, always for food aswell as drinks. I booked for a table of 8 of us. We arrived, being a Wednesday evening it didn't look very busy. There were several tables you could see were eating or waiting for food. I placed our order with the young gentleman behind the bar, who I knew was relatively new as on our previous visit it was his second day, and he handled our 'fussy' orders well. I ordered with the same young gentleman on this visit too, we had children with us, who tend to want 'completely plain' beef burgers, although this is not an option on the menu. We had to order a plain old faithful and an old faithful with just cheese for the fussy kids. At the till, this was fine. We sat and waited for our meals, which took a good 50 minutes. I expected a wait being a table of 8, but not quite that long when it wasn't very busy, although I had noticed there were very few staff. I believe there was the new young barman, the what I believe could have been Manager behind the bar, one new waitress who wasn't old enough to work the bar and one chef (there could have been more, but I saw one, looking quite unhappy so I assume he was on his own). When food finally came, orders were wrong. We did tell them that the burgers were incorrect, as the 'plain' and 'just cheese' burger came with cheese and bacon on, but it got brushed off, so I told the kids to just get on with it, take the bacon out and scrape the cheese off. The children's beef burger came without cheese, and with chips instead of garlic bread. We told the waitress about the garlic bread who took the plate back in the kitchen, brought it back out, still with the chips on, and said garlic bread would be 2 minutes. We all ate our meals, which unfortunately, for the prices, were very small portions, even the mega plate tikka masala! Much smaller than I'd had before, same with the old faithful burgers. By the end of our main meals, my daughter's garlic bread still hadn't come out, we tried to get her to just forget it, but as she stated, it was what she ordered so she wanted it. We told the waitress again who then went to the kitchen and returned with some a few minutes later. I already had 2 children's build your own sundaes on order, and ordered 4 adult desserts, as quite frankly, the main meal didn't fill a hole! Again, we waited a good amount of time, around 35-40 minutes. My partner had asked during this time how long they would be. The kids were getting restless as it was getting late. The young waitress offered another table 2 build your own sundaes, and they told her they hadn't ordered them. She took them back to the kitchen and never returned with them. I eventually went to the bar and asked for the desserts to be cancelled, the Manager agreed that if they weren't yet ready, he would cancel them for me. They weren't ready, so they were taken off of my tab. At this point, 2 desserts came through the kitchen door. The Manager offered to sort our desserts himself, and offered us to take them in takeaway boxes so that we could get home. Nice gesture of apology, as he didn't re-add them to my tab. Luckily I had a 25% off voucher, as I wouldn't have been happy to pay in full for the food and service that we received. The Manager did state that he had 2 new starters on shift, I told him that it was obvious, being an experienced previous barmaid and waitress at another public house. We were sorely disappointed on this visit, and aren't in a hurry to return, which is a shame being that it is so convenient for us. I certainly believe, that new starters should be 'shadowing' somebody more experienced on shift. A shift compromising of just new starters will not work, likely cause delays and will end...

Been here many times over the years for lunch, so would definitely recommend, bit I have never been in the evenings. The food is sometimes 5, other times 4, I think it may come down to what staff is on. Positives: Very relaxed surroundings, generally good service, good portion sizes, great value for money, but food quality can vary a little, see below. Negatives: Have sometimes ran out of some menu items on our visits. They used to do Cod as fish option, they now only do Haddock and the quality of the fish has gone right down, see below. We had turned up once, thinking we would try a late breakfast option, but found they had not opened at time stated, after about 10 minutes waiting, we went elsewhere. General comments: I think there is some inconsistency with the food quality, probably depending on what staff they have on, it is generally 4* or 5, but the fish I would now give a 1 or 2*, so we are going to avoid this in the future. Another inconsistency is with the service from the waiting staff, some will be bring the food then appear a few moments later and ask if everything is okay and if there is anything else they can do for you, others may ask after we have eaten, but some do not ask at all, again it seems down to the staff that is on. Most visits the sizzling onions have been well fried, however the last couple of visits they have been a little on the raw side. The hot drinks machine broke down during today's visit, they need a backup plan, they have the filter coffee machine used during breakfast, maybe they could have got this up and running quickly and offered it as an option. I will try and update my review, whenever we visit again, which we will and say how we feel things have changed and change my star rating if I feel it...

No understanding of hospitality or customer service. They do not care. Pressured 2 of our party to order food before the other 3 had arrived as said they needed the table back. This was an elderly couple who had not eaten there before, so believed they needed to order. After we arrived only minutes late we were told their food would come separately as it was already cooking. As they knew the booking was for 5 people I cannot understand why the Maxwells made them give their 2 food orders first. Chris at the bar could only say its company policy that the table was needed back by 3pm, which we were happy to do and it was not even 2pm yet. Decided to give this place another try to see their recent refurb but found the service is no better than before. I appreciate it was busy for Mothers Day and there is a policy to give up the table but we weren't even close to overstaying, but were made to feel very unwelcome. Plenty of empty tables the whole time we were there. Food was nice and reasonably priced but small portions. So disapointing. We won't be back, we'll go somewhere that appreciates customers who are spending their hard earned money. If nothing else I hope they learn from this how to treat...