The Carriage House — Restaurant in England

Well where do I begin on this.....the start seems appropriate. We booked for a 90th birthday Sunday lunch well in advance for my mum's birthday - a table of 10 plus our grandaughter who required a highchair. We got menus out to guests early so we could do a prebooked order to assist the kitchen. 2 of the guests are lactose intolerant one being our 14mth grandaughter the other an elderly woman. My husband and I took the preorders up well over a week before the booked lunch and sat down with Josh the Manager to discuss the dietrary requirements and he wrote everything down infront of us. Thanked us for being organised etc. We also chose here because there is a lift - as alot of the guests were elderly and the restaurant is up 2 flights of stairs - all good!!!! So the birthday is all set. Arrrggghhhhhh We arrived on said day 19th November - we booked for 12noon. No lift available!!!!! Apparently there was a big party upstairs the night before and kids were running amuck with lift - ahhhh what were the staff/parents doing about this. We were not contacted about this big problem - so it was left to us to help get some of the women upstairs (no assistance or apology offered) On going upstairs not only was no highchair set up there was one placing missing - so we sorted that. I guess alarm bells should have gone off when we were presented with the menus!!!! Remember we had PREORDERED over a week ago with the Manager. I explained this and yes sorry - we then asked if we could possibly get our grandaughters meal first as she was getting a bit grumpy...it arrived 20mins later with a YORKSHIRE Pudding on her plate...REMEMBER LACTOSE INTOLERANCE!!! We talked this out a week or so earlier. OK - so 50mins after arriving and having to ask way too many times where the starters were - they arrived for those who had PREORDERED - and low and behold the soup was given to the 2nd LACTOSE INTOLERANT woman with bread and cheese floating on the top!!!!!!!! OK breathe I am thinking!! rectifyed - so let's remember 12noon booking - major stuff ups thus far! Our son, wife and grandaughter had to leave by this stage as wee one was over tired. At 1.30pm mains nowhere in sight....PREORDERED OVER A WEEK AGO! But other tables that came in way after us were eating theirs!!! We all decided enough was enough and walked. Chef shouted at us as we were leaving "I guess you are taking that free bottle of wine with you" arrrrggghhh you bet - we didn't pay for any drinks, stuffed up starters either....then when I said about the lack of lift or being contacted about the lack of he said "can you hurry up getting down the stairs, I have others wanting to come up" - I then said well if the lift was working?? He came back....ready for this people.........saying "the lift is working".....swear to god I could have gone for him. In summary we had a miserable time - mum's 90th birthday was a complete disaster!!! We will also be contacting Council regarding your total lack of regard to dietary...

Having visited this establishment for the first time in 20 + years. I was impressed with the recent refurbishment. I was allowed to have a look around and take some pictures. Which have been posted on to this site. My wife was also impressed, so as my birthday and my father in laws are close together we decided to visit and try the restaurant. We booked a table and looked forward to the upcoming meal. I can honestly say that none of us were disappointed with what we were served up with. I had seen a friend in the bar who recommended the Scotch egg for starters and it was delicious My son who can be a little finicky decided to have the Thai buttersquash and coconut soup(to my surprise) Which he also described as delicious. My wife and inlaws shared a baked camenbert, which also met no complaints, a great start to the evening. Orders were placed for steak,slow cooked belly pork,fish n chips and a vegetarian meal Arancini. All of these were thoroughly enjoyable except for my sons slow cooked belly pork. As I said earlier he can be a little finicky and although he tried pretty much all of it it wasn't to his liking. I on the other hand,had exactly the same meal and loved it. After a break, a dessert menu was offered and well! It was a birthday celebration after all. Sticky toffee pudding was ordered and devoured, it was delicious So, if your thinking of trying somewhere new or like me you haven't frequented this establishment for sometime give them a try, I'm sure you will be pleasantly surprised. All of the above was served by polite and curtious staff who were only too happy to answer any questions we had. One thing you may wish to know is the restaurant is situated on the top floor, a lift is provided to help those who struggle with stairs. The last thing to add is that being a real ale drinker the only beer available was Timothy Taylor. Absolutely nothing wrong with it but more choice would of been nice Thanks again for a great night and...

This is my second review for the Carriage House and what a difference a few weeks makes. we recommended this place for my Father-in-Laws 70th birthday after having such a wonderful meal and service here before. Today was the complete opposite the food was alright however my mum had ordered the fish of the day which came with chirizo and she doesn't eat meat which wasn't explained clearly on the pre order. After taking her food away waiters came up 3 times to explain they would recook and serve with potatoes. This did not happen. The dessert was a selection of ice cream which may be silly of us but we had as assumed we would get to make the selection instead the ice cream was served to us without any choice and also it was half melted when served to us and then they didn't have any spoons they had to go downstairs to get the spoons and when they came back up they were just being short so again my mum had to wait longer to be able to eat her food than anyone else. With 3 staff covering less than 25 covers I expected the service to be faultless and it was...