Oak Fired At The Royal Oak — Restaurant in East Suffolk

I attended bottomless brunch on Saturday, at 1:30pm, I understand it’s 90mins of unlimited food and drinks (from the set menu) perfect! We got settled in, we ordered a round of Prosecco spritz cocktails, and 2 cokes. They came swiftly, alongside our starter courses. There was only 1 other table in the restaurant which consisted of around 8 people. So it wasn’t busy. We were tucking into our starters. The way the man (I assumed it was the owner, darker haired man) spoke to the young waitress in front of us was awful. He openly told her to “go over and stand around and smile and start clearing the plates” so they’d “hurry up and finish”. So I wondered if he was going to do the same to us. Anyways the food came out and was lovely, only down side was one of us didn’t like goats cheese pizza so declined, he then didn’t offer her any more of the pizzas after that that were brought round, so she only enjoyed one slice. The pizzas were cut into 8 pieces but instead of leaving them on the table for us to pick what we want we were given one slice each n the rest was taken away.. before we had finished the last piece of pizza he came over to collect our plates, one of us hadn’t even finished and he was stood next to her waiting for her to finish cutting her pizza and put it in her mouth so he could clear her plate. At this point we were on our 3rd round of Prosecco spritz and we were told we would have to drink up as they had no more wine glasses to make fresh ones in, which I don’t mind drinking out of the same glass but they were all collected at the same time and I don’t think it was noted who’s glass was whos! It was 2:50 and the man came over and cleared the plates as I said, said quite aggressively “what desserts we ordering”. Desserts were ordered, and brought over at 2:55 along with our last drinks. He hovered around us, making me feel very uneasy. It got to just past 3 pm and we were chatting away, and eating our desserts which too were lovely. To then be approached by the man and was told “look it’s past 3pm and we close at 3 technically, and I want to go home so can we hurry it up” My reply was “well we are nearly done” So one of us asked for the bill, whilst we were still eating. They brought it over we paid what we owed. Leaving a tip for the young lady waitressing. As I myself felt very sorry For. I get that it is for 90 minutes but I feel we were very rushed, we didn’t order anything at 3, but he wanted to be out of there dead on 3, so why allow people to book at 1:30?? I won’t be returning unfortunately, which is a real shame as I felt the food was lovely and the service from the waitress was top notch, but this man made the rest of the...

A little slice of Italy in the middle of Suffolk. I was so excited to be able to go out again to eat and this place did not disappoint. All the socially distanced measures are in place to make you feel safe throughout your visit. The fellas that run this place are lovely and more than happy to chat about their pizzas, the inspiration and their love for authentic Neapolitan pizza. Menu was tough call as you do actually want to try it all. Settled on the the special starter of calamari which was followed by hands down one of the best pizza I have ever had. Their No1 'oakies' pizza deserves its No1 title. I took away the last two slices and I'm typing this as I have just scoffed them for lunch and what I really should have done is order another one to take home. Classic Napoli pizza done authentically with the perfect thin and just crispy base and expertly balanced toppings to tomato to cheese ratio. Their dough-balls are things of sweet but savoury wonderment. The panna cotta had its perfect wobble and was significant in size. No teeny tiny puds in this place. I also got to try some of the tiramisu and that did not disappoint, perfectly light, a little bit boozy and quite simply delicious. Lots of other things on the menu other than pizza too. Desperate to go back to try the pasta but doubt I'd be able to resist getting pizza again. I let the waiter choose the wine for me and he made an excellent choice. A...

Used to love coming here pre-covid but when we went yesterday, we left feeling slightly disappointed.

The food wasn’t as good as we remembered but that may be us. The pizza sauce was a little acidic and was quite soggy on the base which was a shame. The pasta was ok but nothing special. The desserts were the main issue. We both ordered a brownie and they were more the texture of a dry cake than the gooey brownie we expected. My partner ate his but I couldn’t personally. I did mention it to the gentleman on front of house but he didn’t seem overly impressed with the criticism and even brought the dessert back out and pulled it apart in front of me to show me he thought my opinion was wrong. I never even asked for money off for it, simply wanted to let them know. My partner did find a hair on his ice cream but he’s not a fussy person so he just dealt with it.

The main let down however was the service. The young waiter was brilliant, especially considering the awful way the owner was treating him in front of customers. If you want to give feedback to your staff you should probably do it out of customer ear shot as it made us quite uncomfortable. We even overheard (what I assume to be) the two owners/managers gossiping about the waiters performance behind the bar (a few feet from our table).

Very unfortunate as we used to love this place but probably won’t be...