Green Man Inn — Restaurant in England

Visited on a Saturday night early December. I can honestly say it was one of the worst meals I have ever had in a pub. I ordered a mixed grill. When it came I couldn't believe what was presented to me. The black pudding was totally uncooked. By this I mean it hadn't been anywhere near a grill. That aside, they forgot the steak. When it arrived it was so tough you could sole a shoe with it. The other 3 meals presented were nothing to write.home about either. All this and the service was dreadful too. Take my advice. If you're on the A43 and fancy a bite to eat whichever way you are traveling, stop at either Towcester or Brackley. It's a real shame because I like Chef & Brewer as a rule. If I could give the Green Man no stars, I would. Well it's 8 years since I last visited here and sadly it would appear that not a lot has changed. I can't comment on the food as we didn't stay long enough to order a drink let alone food. I had arranged to meet a couple of friends who drove up from Oxford. I live in Northampton so we decided to meet here. When I went to the bar to get a drink there was no one there apart from a customer waiting. I asked him if he was being seen to but he said he'd been waiting 5 minutes and no one was there. I walked down to try and find someone but there was no one around so I went into the kitchen and found someone. He said that the person on the bar was out the back taking a large order and she wouldn't be long. He wasn't very helpful at all. I went back to the bar and waited with the other customer. Still no one came so I went to my friends and said let's leave, so we did. We went back to Brackley and had a nice lunch there. It wasn't busy it was Tuesday 9th September 2025 at 1 to 1.30pm. Truly appalling way to treat customers. I will never go...

Went for a mystery shopper meal on my other half's behest. We were seated quickly, but the same cannot be said for the rest of the visit. The starter, a baked camembert to share, was a whopping £8.99 and arrived after about 25 minutes. It came with a selection of bread - one of which looked to be straight out of a Warburton's packet and overdone in the toaster. This said, the camembert itself was good quality.

Next the main course, goats cheese and grilled peach salad and the avocado and chorizo burger. This took a further 55 minutes to an hour to arrive - with no apology or acknowledgement, despite having to enquire myself at the bar. The salad was good quality but the burger had clearly cooled somewhere along the way and neither were quite worth the price - both £12.49.

The bill came, again without any acknowledgment that we had spent 2 hours in the restaurant - even though the table adjacent to us received one, for a similar wait time, but with the chef having lost their ticket. This leads me to believe it is the kitchen, as usual, that lets this place down. The Front of house staff are helpful and friendly, but obviously used to the long wait time for food - hence the lack of apology. Working in a similar industry myself, I understand it's really hard to keep up positivity when, behind the scenes, things are failing.

Unfortunately I doubt we will be returning as this was our second attempt here. Our first we left immediately due to a rude barman. I hope they can find some balance here soon - it's a lovely space and such a shame that it's not...

For a Friday night, we expected better service. Two staff in their early 20s and clearly inexperienced. We were not informed of the "soup of the day" or about any 'specials'. Usually, you're told these things as the menus are handed out! What happened to STAFF TRAINING?? Our male waiter looked confident taking our order for starters and mains WITHOUT writing it down. Needless to say, about 10 minutes later he returned having forgotten part of our order. The drinks orders were very slow to arrive so our host brought them to out table on a tray. No salt and pepper on the table :-(. My husband left most of his burger saying it didn't taste right at all, probably to do with the ingredient "dripping gravy". He said, "The chips were nice"! My lamb shank shepherds pie was delicious but the "buttered greens" turned out to be just a small dessert spoon size scattering of cabbage. some peas and carrots would have been a nice addition. Two of the ladies loo cubicles had huge cobwebs dangling from the ceiling and walls and there was loo roll on the floor. The bay window we were sitting in looked like it needed a paint good job. In fact, the restaurant looked a bit tired and lacklustre. There was little atmosphere. The staff lacked motivation. An element of 'pride in their job' wouldn't go amiss. My husband and I were very disappointed. Come on "The Green Man"! You've been much better than this in the past. Make some changes to encourage us to...