Bistrot Pierre - Torquay — Restaurant in England

Far too many new/young unprofessional staff not knowing what they're doing. Service was a complete mess, didn't get any food until almost 1 and a half hours after we got there. Obviously some staff trying their best which I appreciate but our meal was still a complete trainwreck so sorry if any of the good staff are reading this.

Booked a table for 8pm, when we arrived we were told to wait in the bar area downstairs as our table in the restaurant upstairs wasn't ready yet (no problem - we thought). After half an hour of waiting we had to go upstairs ourselves only to find out that the person we spoke to when we arrived hadn't told anyone upstairs. We ended up having to sit downstairs which was a bit annoying but we were okay with it - this only happened at around 8:40pm, 40 minutes after the time we booked for. They took our food/drinks orders 10 minutes later and then after ANOTHER 15 minutes of waiting for our drinks, we noticed the bar staff just standing around chatting so my parter went up to the bar to ask for our drinks (it was 2 glasses of the same wine - all they had to do was pour it surely?). The starters arrived shortly after that but my partner had just ordered a starter to come with my main course as she wasn't planning in eating much, this was explained but had obviously just got lost in the order. We explained this to the waitress (who couldn't get her head around what we wanted - I thought it was a relatively simple request when we ordered). The waitress then walked off without actually giving me my starter! I was literally sat there thinking I was about to get food but no I gotta wait a bit longer 😢 They came back a few minutes later and gave me my starter which was nice to be fair. No one had been very apologetic about any of the mistakes thus far which was also a bit off-putting. When our mains arrived, they were lukewarm/cold. Pretty obvious they had just been sat on the side waiting for ages, my partners starter was completely cold. I'm guessing hers was the same one that was first brought down with my starter and it seemed that no attempt had been made to reheat it let alone make another to be ready at roughly the same time as my main.

We spoke to 4 other tables around us that were also having issues with their meals. One couple having the 6 course 'Soirée Gastronomique' had been there since 7:15pm and by 9:30pm were only on their 3rd course!

We ended up sending our cold food back and leaving. Never had service as bad as that in my life so had to leave a review...

I'm still laughing now!!!!! We booked a table as a treat. However, our experience was far from a treat. We ordered the Fromage Frites.....Houmous, Olives & Pate. Out of these, the only one that looked appetising was the pate.... Fromage Frites lacked fromage as they had been in the deep fat fryer too long and all that was left was the shell.... houmous was a smear on the plate with oil and nuts and as for the Olives, you can't go wrong with a bowl of olives can you! Nobody came to table check and nobody was around to mention our disappointment. We even had to catch the staffs eye to ask for another drink. The first floor part of the restaurant had a few people in ( approximately 60 covers including outside at the time) Then the mains came out..... I couldn't catch my breath. Two steaks , glazed pork & the Poulet Roti. The two steaks came out and looked very lonely on the plate with a small amount of salad leaves on the side and a little bucket of frites.... the poulet roti just arrived with no side salad and a bucket of frites... very beige. It was so dry!!! The only dish was the pork, it did look very yummy, and was told by my friend that it was. We had to ask for cutlery and napkins. Yet again, nobody did a table check so we could express our feelings. No drink checks, and boy , certainly needed something to wash the extremely dry "poulet" down. We had empty glasses sat on our table which surely would have been a huge hint that we may require them replenished. Staff were walking past dirty tables, empty handed, not even attempting to clear them as they were going past anyway!!!! The dinner plates were taken away whilst I visited the toilet so I didn't get an opportunity to say anything to the staff about the food quality. The dessert menu was left at the table, but after waiting 25 minutes we decided we had waited long enough and thought we should leave. When I went to pay the bill, I was asked how everything was, and I tried to tell the lady that it wasn't a pleasant experience, and where it could have been improved. She wasn't excepting my constructive criticism, just came back very defensive , trying to tell me that it was a busy night. It was a Tuesday evening!!! I'm so glad we didn't book on a weekend!!!! She said that it's not normally like this and they only had 4 staff on, with a bit more organisation, they would have cope admirably. I'm sorry, but it wasn't the enjoyable evening we were hoping for. French cuisine it certainly is not!!!...

We never got to eat... but no option to leave zero star for food and zero for service!

We arrived about 10 min early for our booking at 6. 45pm on a Monday.

Really hungry and looking forward to eating here. A lady greeted us on the lower floor and informed us we would be eating upstairs. We got to the top of the stairs and waited by the till.. A few tables in but not that busy innso much as the tables in already had food on them.

A lady came over and said we will just need to wipe table and then you can sit down. We were then taken to a nice window table. We looked at the menus and were pleased with the choices... Although not a large menu with 10 mains and a couple of specials nearly all of them appealed to us.

We waited for someone to come over.... And waited... And waited... And waited....

There were 3 female servers floating around..all oblivious to us.. We weren't in the corner tucked away we were in the middle of the window seats...

One decided to move glasses around in the bar and then a chit chat with someone from the kitchen...

Another chat to customer a couple of times ascshecwent into kitchen.. And the other just fiddling around with a table layup...

So we sat there thinking surely in a minute someone will come over... But no..

Gave it another few mins... (now almost 25 min! ) and I said to my partner "this is going to be a first..

I think I'm going to get up and leave...." (i did consider asking for the bill as a joke... But didn't 😂)

Even when we got up and went put on our coats on nobody came over...

Astonished we slowly walked towards the stairs and down to leave... Even down stairs the lady there said nothing..

So i walked over and told her we were leaving because since we came in 25 min ago no one had been bothered to come and take an order?

I also told her that i wouldn't be surprised at the place getting bad reviews with such poor service and to be honest no apparent manager...

I also said to this lady that we have a restaurant and staff had put some money tonus to pay for a nice evening out... We were very disappointed...

I hope a manager responds to this and perhaps makes an effort.

We left and went to Ephesus where we were greeted with smiles taken to a table presented with menus and after quick decisions (because we were now really hungry) we had drinks within couple of minutes.. And lovely food followed...