The Rising Sun — Restaurant in Dover

We arrived and instantly felt welcome — maybe a bit too welcome. The barmaid was polite, but that’s about where the service ended. We were politely informed that there were no more fish in the sea — both literally and metaphorically. The menu may as well have read: "Lower your standards or leave."

With no table service, we became our own waiters — only to be told to hurry up with our orders, as if time slots were tight for disappointment.

While we waited the next twenty minutes, we sat outside and were treated to story time from the neighbouring table, who appeared to be halfway through a care-home night out and reliving every war memory they'd ever heard secondhand.

Inside wasn’t much better. Someone had evidently tripped while carrying a tin of varnish and generously shellacked the tables. We spent most of our evening unpeeling our playing cards from the surface like we were performing pub surgery.

Then came the food. We had to send back the hockey puck that had been struck and wedged between two slices of bread pretending to be a burger. And the sticky toffee pudding? It was as dry as the inner sole of Aunt Bessie’s night slipper, and probably just as flavoursome — a culinary war crime.

A pint of Coke cost roughly the same as a two-bed semi, and by the third round of Guinness, we were filling out applications for payday loans. To round off the evening, we were nearly mowed down by a convoy of drunk great-grandads behind the wheels of their mobility cars, joyriding home after their victorious...

After good reviews, booked a table for Sunday lunch 3pm after the rush, good call, very busy. Nice pub, great atmosphere, drink in the sunny garden before our table was ready. Oh dear, such a shame My pork and my wife's beef looked too perfectly and thinly sliced to be anything other than catering pack convenience. I don't imagine anything has been carved off a "joint" from the excellent local butcher. Seasonal veges were over cooked, the add on cauliflower at £3.50 was served in a tiny ramiken, even apple sauce was not home made. I sent back a very limp "roast parsnip" just the one piece, asking the server to show the cook. It came back a few minutes later having been resuscitated in the Air Fryer, I kid you not ! The enormous grapefruit sized Yorkshire pudding was like savoury loft insulation and served "cold" House wine at £8.50 lge glass was Supermarket bargain basement quality Gents loos were awful, staff agreed they needed a complete refurbishment. Sorry but this pub needs to up their game, relying too much on the nearby camp sites and becoming lazy...

We stopped by this after having been to 2 other pubs (those two were booked fully), and when we entered here the chef wasn't taking anymore orders because of high volume of food being ordered. While we waited out looking to go somewhere else to eat the chef decided to serve us food and oh boy was it good. The portion of my Sunday lunch was massive and amazing. My husband had the scotch eggs and my two children ate from the kids menu and trust me when I say my kids and husband ate everything. I couldn't eat any dessert because I was stuffed to the brim but everything was soooo good. Would definitely book in advance because it gets fully round mid day. And visit this place when in kent. What a beautiful pub. Staff were so friendly and calm. Thank you for a lovely visit, we thoroughly enjoyed the food...