The Boathouse Charlestown — Restaurant in England

what an experience! booked for my partners birthday lunch and we have arguably had the worst service and food we’ve experienced!

where too start, we arrived 25 minutes early so we can have a drink before hand, got greeted by a semi smiling chap behind the bar who told us to “find any square table” we opted for the comfy chairs 2 metres away from the bar as we had a large golden retriever and didn’t want to disturb anyone else in the main restaurant. A good 15 minutes later he came around to get our drinks order for a further 10 them to be delivered. This was now 12pm other than 2 other tables who arrived after us and got their drinks before us we were finally celebrating.

Moving on a further 35 minutes later and being invisible to all staff we had to order our own food at the bar dispute it being table service and everyone else was getting service. The starter arrived at a speedy rate credit to the chef and FoH team. We were actually surprised by the semi smiling bartender as he came and got more drinks for us only to find out he came back to say they’ve ran out of lemonade but I can have soda however it won’t taste nice for the shandy. Honesty I guess.

Starter was nice but wouldn’t order again, waited a good 35 minutes for our starter to be cleared which we had to let a waitress know of this. 25 minutes later we finally got our mains. I must add tables that were walking in got their mains before us! a simple roast beef which was greeted by the phrase “ROAST” with zero emotion. Which was poorly plated and poorly executed by raw vegetables and unseasoned everything. Followed by mussels and a side of chips. Mussels were still dirty and didn’t taste fresh which shocked me considering you’re right by the sea. No check backs from anyone, wasn't offered pudding menus or anymore drinks, poor!

Had to get up and get the bill with the semi smiley bartender who again didn’t even acknowledge us, ask us about the experience just took the payment didn’t even say bye which we both thought was just rude.

Atmosphere gets two stars for the dogs that we see in there.

ALL FOH and BOH staff need training on food safety and service.

Zero...

Booked to come on Friday night with some friends. Atmosphere inside the restaurant was good (though the music was quite loud so difficult to hear people on the other side of the table) The food we had was really tasty and I love the choice of food you get in the Boathouse. Living locally, it’s always a top choice to go for dinner when in Charlestown.

However, my party and I were quite shocked by the attitude of one of the waitstaff. Throughout the entirety of the night, she appeared grumpy, fed up and completely like she didn’t want to be there. There was no friendly greeting or conversation at our table at any point during the night, just a “yeah?” when she came to take our order. No niceties at all. I understand it’s the height of summer but we were made to feel like such an inconvenience, and when we were paying over £200 for dinner, it’s nice to feel valued. She also missed off one of my friend’s dishes, despite counting the orders when she took our order, so one of our party had to sit and wait (fair play to the kitchen who got the dish out speedier than we were expecting!) and we were understanding, but we didn’t even receive an apology from her for the mistake (another waitress who didn’t take the order was lovely but again, it wasn’t her fault bless her.)

I should also mention that at one point, this staff member was walking down the stairs to the kitchen, loudly swearing. Something along the lines of “I couldn’t F*king believe it” It was certainly loud enough for our entire party to hear and didn’t particularly fit with the atmosphere of the restaurant.

Overall, I love my visits to the Boathouse but I do not feel keen to return with this particular staff member there. It didn’t feel welcoming and we almost dreaded having our order taken! We are normally keen tippers as lots of our party work in hospitality and understand the stresses of the job, but didn’t feel we could tip after this meal - it just wasn’t a pleasant experience. Which is a shame, as without this service I would have said it was...

Both the service and the food were a mixed bag, unfortunately… FOOD: Mostly very nice, but one meal was very poor - a clearly burnt burger and overcooked fries were inedible and left uneaten. We mentioned it to a waitress, who was genuinely apologetic, but by this point we didn’t want to make a fuss or wait for a replacement. However, when it came to paying the bill, we deliberately weren’t asked the standard question “was everything ok with your meals?” and neither were we offered any form of refund, which would’ve been appreciated. We didn’t bother to ask either, we simply won’t go back… SERVICE: We booked a table online, but it wasn’t ready when we arrived (slightly early). No problem, we sat outside and were told we’d be called in when the other diners had left. However, I had to go inside twice to check whether it was ready - the second time, the table had recently been cleared but we hadn’t been called inside to sit down. No big deal. But this did set the tone for generally slow and unattentive service for the rest of the night. The staff were all friendly enough, and we regularly got asked if we wanted extra drinks, but when they were ordered they sometimes took a very long while to arrive (despite the bar not being busy by this point) and there didn’t seem to be any sense of urgency. We genuinely thought they’d forgotten to take our dessert orders (despite two waitresses coming over to ask if we wanted more drinks), and we were almost going to just give up and leave. It’s a shame, because the restaurant itself was nice, as was most...