Newland Steakhouse — Restaurant in England

Not usually one to write a review as I take a bad experience with a pinch of salt and know not to return, however my experience here was something else. We pre-booked a table of 20 for bottomless brunch for my hen do a month in advance and paid the deposit to secure our table, when my mum rang up a couple of days before to confirm we were still coming, they had no booking in the system and denied any knowledge of mum ever putting down a deposit, after some time on the phone they all of a sudden ‘found a booking for 20 people under the incorrect name’. This was fine because at least we could still go, however we were not filled with confidence. My mum also questioned their gluten free menu for one of the party to which they confirmed they could cater for with no issues. When we arrived, there were no bottomless brunch menus on the table, the manager eventually brought our menus that he had just printed around 20 minutes after the last guests arrived, and left again to give us time to choose what we wanted. The menu we were handed stated ‘House Spirit and Mixer’ was included within the botttomless brunch, on the table already was a normal drinks menu which listed all house spirits the bar offered, so when we came to order drinks we were confused when the manager refused to serve any spirit other than vodka as this was not stated on the menu.

As the drinks were being served, the staff were unable to confidently confirm which drinks were full fat coke and which were diet, this meant that the party member with diabetes did not drink anything other than the first glass of diet coke, which she ordered before anyone turned up and watched being poured. The lack of confidence of knowing what drinks they were serving was again not great and led to a poor experience.

One of the party required a gluten-free option, however they did not have a specific menu for this allergen, they were told to just pick anything from the normal menu and they can just ‘make it gluten free’. This did not fill us with confidence and so she ordered the Eggs Benedict as it looked like the easiest option on the menu to ‘make gluten free’. When the food arrived it was just a couple slices of bacon with a poached egg and sauce. There was no gluten free bread substitute or anything extra to make up for the missing ingredients. Later in the evening she started to experience a lot of discomfort and it turned out she was having a celiac flare up and had to go home early, she has since been very ill. I had to write this review as I do not want other people with allergies to have the same experience, it seems as though they do not know how to stop cross contamination between allergens and it could be much worse for somebody else.

This was very unfortunate as the food for the rest of the party was amazing, however I don’t think anyone will be returning as the attitude and customer service from the manager himself was appalling. If you can’t cater for a large group, or allergies, then this should have been stated from the off and we could have booked to go...

Quite disappointed with the visit here on a Saturday afternoon, which is a shame as a few months ago it was absolutely amazing.

We got sat in the back room, which was lovely except for the very loud club-like music that was totally out of place for a restaurant. We asked for it to be turned down slightly and they did, so we were thankful as we could now actually hear each other across the table.

Ordered wine, which was nice, and although the glasses were seemingly clean you could see the wipe marks from the towels used to dry them. Asked about any specials, the wait-staff looked at me blankly and then said they didn't have any and proceeded to go through the menu I had just read.

We shared a starter - olives and feta - which was absolutely delicious - the salad dressing was amazing (basically a star goes to that starter)... but then the mains came.

Our steaks came on wooden boards... instantly unimpressed at seeing this and that the wait-staff almost spilled steak juice on to me when they put it in front of me as it was spilling off the flat wooden board. The boards had loads of scratch marks from previous diners and I wondered how exactly do they steralise these wooden boards? Can it even be done? I asked if I could have mine put on to an actual ceramic plate, hoping that they would give me a heated plate so that my steak would stay warm as I ate it, but was instantly told that they didn't have any actual plates!

"No plates?" Was my reply, in a state of disbelief.

My steak was already cool/cold when it arrived, turned out to be more medium than medium-rare and quite bland, the potatoes were pretty much just boiled new potatoes seemingly tossed once in a low heated frying pan to get the look of pan-fried, and the salad had no dressing so that was also bland. I asked for mayo, he asked for English mustard, mine came in a bowl (you could tell it was quickly squeezed out of a bottle), his came in sachets, which added litter to our table.

Different wait staff collected our boards once we ate what we could, didn't even ask how it was, didn't ask if we wanted to see the dessert menu or wanted any additional drinks and nobody really noticed us leaving after we paid.

Very unimpressed and disappointed.

You're supposed to be a Steakhouse, not a hipster hangout - get ACTUAL plates that can be put under heat lamps in the kitchen so food doesn't go cold for the customer, don't towel-dry your wine glasses, get rid of mustard sachets and serve it in pots/bowls, train your wait-staff to a higher quality, get some specials and don't play...

The food was clearly of good quality, but for a steak house I was very disappointed that they didn't know how to cook a steak medium rare - I ordered the fillet steak, which turned out to be 3 bits of steak rather than 1. The person I was with ordered a Ribeye, which was so flat it looks like a frying steak. His was over done, but he doesn't like to kick up a fuss so he ate it, mine was over done so I asked for it to be done again, the 2nd time they presented it, it was closer to blue. At this point I didn't want to send it back again so I ate it. Despite the mess around it was still a juicy and flavourful steak. Our server was apathetic, monotone and just didn't seem to care about anything. She didn't write down our order to begin with, so when the our food first came out we had the wrong sides/adjustments on our plates. No apologises or explanations, just kind of expected us to deal with it. The onion rings seemed like the cheap ones you get at a supermarket to oven cook at home, they also came out after my 2nd steak had been brought to the table, nearly 15 minutes after the first steak hit the table. Clearly forgot about the side order when preparing the main. For the price point I'd have expected a decent server, who atleast showed emotion, and the steak to be cooked how requested. Aside from this, the food itself was as expected - chips/roasted baby potato sides were lovely. I know that Newland Steak house has the capacity to be really nice, but definitely reluctant...