The Canford — Restaurant in England

The Canford Pub is my local and we’ve always loved to come here for family and friends roast dinners in past 5 years. It used to be favourite place with the best roast. Its really sad but only Until now. We went for Sunday roast with parents and my husband today. Them three had roast chicken and I had classic beef burger. All was bad. What used to be half a chicken is now chicken breast only. Fair enough, with current prices of meat, it’s understandable. But for the price charged? The portion is so small. There is almost no veg (smallest portion of swede and carrot pure and I think it was leek prepared as a cabbage. That’s it.) and we had on each plate 3 tiny quarters of potatoes. The veg is the cheapest on that plate. Why not to give people at least feeling they are getting value for their money? Why not to put on the plate few more potatoes and some carrots or red cabbage. If cauliflower cheese is too expensive. For £20. The Yorkshire pudding was big but over baked. Very hard, dark, crumbly. The best on the roast is gravy. It was very nice and tasty! The burger… another story. £16 and it did not even look appetising. In each mouthful was hard gristle. Cheap, cheap meat. Horrible. The tiniest bit of lettuce, no burger sauce, no tomato. Just slap bit of mayo and ketchup on the top bun, job done. I cannot recommend any of them two. I am really disappointed. What used to be great pub now needs to step up the game. With this approach many of locals will simply go somewhere else. The Canford is still great for its atmosphere in the pub and beautiful garden. But this was last time I went here to eat. Just across the park there is a strong competition. I really don’t understand why would you do this to such a great...

We thought the service could have been better. The menu is on the pricy side which is fine but good quality service needs to be provided, if prices are high. What should happen is: Be shown our table and asked immediately if we would like some water for the table. Then after a couple of minutes asked if we'd like some drinks. What actually happened is: Be shown to our table and nothing. We had to get up after at least 5 minutes of waiting and ask if our drinks order could be taken.

It was a least 15 minutes before our drinks arrived. We still had to ask for water.

Our food arrived at an acceptable time after ordering but it took 15 minutes before our order was taken. When food arrived vegetable sides were luke warm. When ordered coffee these arrived luke warm as well. Menu quality good, food quality okay, service below average. It was a quiet evening but didn't think the young lady serving us was adequately trained in. Possibly not her fault but she was pleasant enough. Unfortunately our experience did not impress and gave us no reason to book again anytime soon.

You did ask...

This was our third year in a row visiting the Canford, which we have always found to be a great restaurant with good quality food.

Sadly this year it seems the quality has deteriorated on several fronts. The menu choices sound inspiring but when served the food is mediocre both in taste and quality. We visited several times and everyone in our group commented that their dishes didn't seem very fresh and lacked taste. On several occasions the lettuce in the salads was limp and brown.

The service has become lacking somewhat, with the staff a bit disorganised meaning guests are having to flag them down multiple times to chase up their meals or other requests (this was our experience and we could see other guests doing the same).

The famed burger shack in the garden wasn't open for the full 2 weeks we visited; given the recent heatwaves it seems a bit bizarre, and meant the (previously excellent) takeaway offers were no longer available.

Hopefully the management see this review and feel inspired to review the situation, as it would be a real shame for this establishment to fall...