The Black Horse Great Missenden — Restaurant in England

We booked a table for 3 for Mother’s day and to say that we were disappointed would be an understatement.

The table we were assigned was squashed into a window recess directly in front of the bar. This meant little privacy and essentially we felt as if we had been left in a corridor. To make matters worse, each time the front door opened, we were greeted by cold air and the fumes from the smokers who congregated outside the front door as this was their chosen space.

I ordered a fish pie and explicitly asked if the pie was made from pastry. I was told it was. The pie arrived with a potato topping so I returned it. I was told that they could not make a pie for me with pastry but I could select something else. I don’t eat any other type of meat so I chose the vegetarian sweet potato burger. It arrived as the rest of my party was finishing lunch. The burger was awful and the so called “vegetable crisps” would have been better described as “soggies”. However, I had now been seated for 90 minutes without anything to eat. My mother ordered the shoulder of lamb shepherd’s pie. She complained that it was bland and asked for mustard to inject some flavour. The rest of my party also complained that the vegetables were both over cooked and over salted. We told the staff of our disappointment. The Black Horse did not charge me for the one meal that I did not eat and said they were sorry. However, they expected full payment for the two other meals and the drinks. I paid the bill but I really wish I had not. I think the least they should have done is to have offered us some free drinks or coffees to show they were sorry for ruining mother’s day.

In fairness to the establishment, the Sunday roasts I saw being served to other tables looked well prepared. Perhaps one should learn not to challenge the chef at this eatery by asking for any food that goes...

Mother's day treat turned into 2 hours of poor food & service. Not recommended at all. Arrived at for 5pm booking, served at 7:30pm. When finally served, the food was below average at best & one of the dishes was inedible as all the vegetables were burnt & an aubergine accompaniment was tasteless watery slush. The Caesar salad main was bland, poorly prepared, had oily fried bread croutons & was a minuscule portion...particularly for c. £17 set menu price. We therefore complained. They blamed the delay on the fact they had one other large booking (about 15 people) plus our 5. But if they had been happy to take the bookings you would expect them to plan for set numbers. They blamed the inedible dish (a roast) on the fact that they had a "new chef today who was not used to the ovens". So aside from having their new chef's first day on one of the busiest days of the year, they wern't that familiar with the ovens. Advice alert to management....phone the parties in advance to explain this to allow an informed decision as to whether they wanted to continue with their bookings. I note others have had spookily similar experiences recently. Aside from the food I'd characterise this place as a tatty drinkers pub. So if that's what you want, then fine, but for food the...

Booked for Sunday Lunch despite only one other table of guests we were kept waiting for at least 40 mins, we were told they were only serving roast dinners and yet they could only give three of us a Yorkshire pudding because they had run out. The three guests received theirs which were burnt black whilst the other guest didn't have one but we were offered extra potatoes to compensate. The potatoes were obviously frozen bland ready made, a teaspoon of stuffing on the side , and a few peas and carrots completed the serving . No apple sauce or crackling with the pork, all in all in all very poor quality of food, extremely disappointing. Would have explained our disappointment but no member of staff returned to our table during service to ask if we were happy with our meals sadly we left - we will not be returning . Poor food ,Poor service , very disappointing for what appeared to be a pretty local pub in a lovely setting which could have been and should...