Sweet Chestnut — Restaurant in Dunfermline

⭐ 1/5 – The Sweet Chestnut? More like The Bitter Acorn!

If you’re looking for a night of disappointment, confusion, and a trip to McDonald’s afterward, The Sweet Chestnut is the place for you!

We booked a table for 8, which was very kindly accepted. However, upon arrival, it became clear that basic counting wasn’t their strong suit. They had prepared a table for 6, and their genius solution was to awkwardly wedge in two extra chairs, turning our meal into an elaborate game of elbow jousting. Sitting down felt like a game of Tetris.

Things only got worse from there. The drinks order was a complete lottery, and we definitely didn’t win. A simple request for fresh orange and lemonade with no ice somehow transformed into flat lemonades with a hint of orange cordial (at least, we think it was orange—science may need to confirm). Blackcurrant & water came out as blackcurrant & flat lemonade, a small blackcurrant drink came pint sized, and the lemonade was as lifeless as my enthusiasm for the meal.

Then came the highlight of the evening: the mysterious disappearing food act. The waiter confidently told the carvery folks to go up because the rest of the meals were “on their way.” Well, I guess their definition of “on the way” is somewhere between “stuck in traffic” and “lost at sea,” because 15 minutes later, the non-carvery meals were still missing in action. I half expected David Attenborough to pop out and narrate the great migration of our missing plates.

When the food finally arrived, it was clear that someone in the kitchen was playing their own version of “How wrong can we make this?” The kids’ meals were missing chicken strips—ordered five, got three (maybe they were on a diet?). The under-5 meal was meant to come with small kids’ corn, but instead, we were gifted two full-sized corn on the cobs, possibly as a test of our toddler’s jaw strength.

And then came the burger… I’m fairly certain it was forged in the same factory as medieval battering rams. I could have taken it home and used it as a home security device. Yes we all like our food cooked however I would also like the toddler of the group to leave with his pearly whites in tact with no requirement for a dental appointment for dessert.

My gammon steak came with a side of onion rings… Well, at least that’s what they called them. In reality, I received three of the smallest onion rings I have ever seen. The chips were equally scarce—about eight in total, which is less of a portion and more of a suggestion. And my 8oz steak? I was lucky if 1oz was edible. The rest was either pure fat or so undercooked I thought it might still be planning its escape.

By the end of the meal, we were left with only two options: leave a bad review or make a quick trip to McDonald’s, where at least the food doesn’t come with a built-in scavenger hunt.

Needless to say, we won’t be back. However, if you’re into food-based guessing games, enjoy playing sardines at your table, or fancy leaving a restaurant hungrier than when you arrived, then by all means—book yourself a table for...

What can I say, not sure what my husband paid for Christmas dinner the other week, maybe £60ish per head!?! From entering it was very busy which you would expect. Got seated at a table which seating was so uncomfortable on the bench seating, sit back and you’re too far away from table sit forward and you get achy back. Firstly we waited 20-30 minutes to have a drink order taken waited a further 15minutes or so to receive drinks. Starters arrived, soup was fine apparently, I had pate and it was the worst flavourless pate I have ever had, the equally bad part was the bread it was served with, looked like brown or the bread but was oven cooked/toasted within an inch of its life and was extremely hard at really not nice. Main course when we went up was fine though cleanliness for me surfing the lids on things were awful, meat was pretty good, veg was ok, the main thing was the small plates where everything was piled, plates snn hi oils be bigger so everything is not slopped on top of everything. Desert Carmel tart was not the nicest a the desert choice was poor so it was the best option but not nice. Throughout all we had to wait to re order drinks and call over a few times to find out where drinks were. Staff were slow and hovering at times . I understand it was busy. Also last thing, Dogs… I’m a dog owner but. Don’t want to have to see dogs in a “restaurant” of sorts, especially when the get off lead and running up and down the place and listening to them barking, and I love dogs but not in a place of eating and them not been controlled it’s unhygienic and the place was filthy enough without adding in another factor. Would not go back if I was paid and we paid too much for the Christmas Day dinner and was not...

Waited a long time to be seated (3 persons) even though there appeared to be lots of tables available. Order was placed on line using the QR code on the table, server came to the table to apologise that there were no spinach tarts available from the vegetarian section, my wife then chose the cauliflower tart as an alternative, this is now 3 time in a row my wife has tried to order the spinach tart but it has never been available!

The server then approached the table again a few minutes later to say one of the drinks that had been ordered wasnt available either, once again my wife had to order an alternative. Drinks were then served and we were told they would let us know when the cauliflower tart was ready and we could all go up to the carvery. After about 40 minutes had gone and no sign of the cauliflower tart I managed to catch the attention of one of the servers who then checked and it then appeared that it had been forgotten about so we then had a further wait while this was then started from fresh.

Once the cauliflower tart was ready the server said we had only ordered 1 carvery meal & 1 vegetarian cauliflower tart carvery meal on the order and even when I showed her the email order confirmation with 2 carvery meals & 1 veg carvery meal it still felt like we were getting called liars.

All in all it was almost an hour before we had our food having watched tables who were seated after us being served their food. The food was okay but was probably soured by the feeling of being called liars or unable to order properly. After this experience it will be a long time for the memory of this visit to fade before we would...