Dean's York Garden Centre — Restaurant in England

Just want start this review by saying the garden centre and staff are lovely but the cafe experience was awful.

At the front of the cafe is a sign saying to take a table, then check the menus get your table number and go up and order. Simple and logical. We couldn’t find a small table so settled for a bigger one hoping to move when another became free.

The older gentleman working came over after about 5 minutes and asked us who had seated us, we explained we followed the instructions and he got very irate and said there was another sign saying wait to be served (which in fairness there was but we hadn’t seen this as it was near the tills and we had left someone else to go order whilst we grabbed a table, we saw it as we left though) we quickly apologised but he refused to accept our apology, loudly and very aggressively saying we had pushed in, stolen a table and there were lots of people waiting ahead of us.

To be clear people were queuing to pay for food but no one was waiting to be seated as we just walked in and sat down, as did another party of 3 who sat down without anyone seating them (if someone had been I would obviously have realised the protocol at that point and asked for a table too)

Again we apologised for not seeing the different instructions and said we’d happily move or go back and he demanded to know if we were going to order, we said someone else was queuing and he was even more irate about this demanding to know their position in the queue which we obviously didn’t know, to try and defuse the situation we made to get up and go join them in the queue and he waved his hand at us dismissively and said ‘no, you might as well stay now you’ve just taken the table’.

Honestly it was really upsetting and embarrassing, I have PTSD and having an older man leaning over our table aggressively telling us off over and over left me close to tears, it may seem like a little thing to someone people but for me it was very triggering.

The other person in our party had already ordered by this point or we would have left, he then came over and told us the man came over to him and asked if he was with the two ladies and he said yes and the man said he should join us as we’d just helped ourselves to a table. It just seems completely unnecessary to be so aggressive over a garden centre cafe seat, especially as it was a simple mistake we were more than happy to rectify.

Then the food arrived and the omelette was so overcooked it looked like a pie and the chips were burnt and oily. The staff were lovely aside from this man but did seem quite flat and the atmosphere just felt absolutely dead. Not wanting another scene we quickly ate what we could and left.

We would definitely visit the garden centre again but not the cafe. We didn’t let this incident ruin our visit and went and got some amazing flowers and plants for our garden, the staff were great and helped us organise a delivery. Such a shame this one person lets down the overall garden centre experience!

We complained and did ask for a refund after and the older gentleman denied this whole experience happened (inferring we were lying) and said the chips weren't burnt but were darker due to the type of potatoes which is bizarre and clearly not true as they were clearly just….burnt.

(Pictures of the sign we saw at the entrance, the omelette and the chips...

I love to go to deans every week particularly for a cherry scone and a coffee before browsing the garden centre. Unfortunately of late I have to mention the cherry scones have almost become 'a scone,'. Lately there have been less and less cherries in them but todays really was the worst ever. If I added the chopped slithers together there might have been in total 'half a cherry'. Not good Deans at all. It’ll try another but if it’s the same it’ll be going back with words.

It’s taken me all week to get around to this but again it has to be said… I really do love Deans garden centre, it’s a really nice place to visit for all out bird foods a plants throughout the season but most of all I make a special journey of 30 miles round trip to simply enjoy a cherry scone with a coffee in a nice relaxing cafe.

I was informed the kitchen would hear about the serious lack of cherries in their cherry scones of late but sadly last Sunday… nothing had improved at all. When I cut into my latest purchase, the cherry scone I expect to discover at least one cherry but, it just doesn’t happen these days. On opening the sliced scone it is simply 'BLANK', not even a hint of a cherry.

So on making an effort myself I feel so let down and all pleasure is gone.

It may seem trivial to most but for me it is so disappointing not to get what was expected after I made an effort to go there.

UPDATE 05 May 2024

After all of the above, I have since and only recently complained again about their RUBBISH cherry scones to the floor manager and some staff, all agreed they are not worthy of their name. They are so bad I would be surprised if there was even ONE cherry cut into about six even smaller pieces in the whole scone. I have pictures of this taken on the last two visits. They have become worse rather than better. I’ve a good mind to report them to Trade Descriptions. Today I crumbled the scone and left it to be collected, maybe they might wonder what it was too… ABSOLUTEY...

While visiting Vertigrow which is an amazing place we decided to call into Deans garden centre. What a mistake that was!! After travelling for two hours we decided to eat having felt light headed so picked Deans to eat at instead of waiting to go back to Vertigrow and pick up or plant order. Now, I fully understand that cooking and serving meals has an end time at Deans garden centre which, we didn’t realise, with all honesty we didn’t notice it stated it but that’s not the issue. What is, is the RUDE behaviour and attitude by Lisa a member of Deans garden centre staff serving on the food counter telling me as much. Deans garden centre is NOT Karen’s bar restaurant where you expect to be actually abused where as at Deans garden centre you do not. I as polite friendly customer made sure I state my table first so Lisa didn’t even need to ask me for it like the customer before me. I said hi asked if she was good but the response I got for simply asking for food was not needed at all and what’s more being looked down at by other members of staff because I dare asked for food over the lotted time wasn’t needed either. I’m just disappointed by the first time visit and what’s more my order was near £35 if I’d had been able to make it that is.

Will not...