The Ethorpe — Restaurant in England

We come to the Ethorpe regularly and this review is pretty much purely about the food, one dish in particular. We were a family party of four and our dog, for lunch on Friday. Our meals we ordered were the Garden Plot Medley, Salmon and Cheddar fish cake, Roasted Vegetable Tart and the Vegetable Grill. Everything was good apart from the Garden Plot Medley (see photo) (£13.49). The criticism I have is that whilst the dish is as described, it looks so measly. And this is not the fault of the Ethorpe at all - we realised that we had this same complaint at another Chef and Brewer pub in Hertfordshire. The fact is CAB portion the meals so precisely that anything at all that is extra is chargeable. I asked for extra sourdough shards and was told it would be £1.00 extra, and when we asked for the kitchen to take the medley back to add (anything) to it, it didn’t come back until my family had completely finished their meals. I had the salad from the fish cake my stepdad didn’t want and to be honest, that alone made the medley look more of a meal. ALL IT WOULD TAKE is a portion of mixed salad (which would cost CAB pence) and it would have looked an appetising main meal.

At the Hertfordshire pub AND the Ethorpe, our comments were accepted and agreed with by the staff/management but their hands are literally tied and are not allowed to make any amends without charging extra due to company rules.

It is embarrassing for the staff to be in this position and it just reaches a stalemate. At the Ethorpe the situation was dealt with by Kelly, who was understanding, diplomatic and professional in every way, and if it hadn’t been for the service we’d had from her, my review stars would have been much lower.

Can I urge Chef And Brewer to make their dishes reflective of the price of each meal, bearing in mind that sometimes, the extra effort required would not affect the P&L for the kitchen. Also, a smaller plate would give the illusion of a less measly meal! And lastly to appreciate the efforts and service of the staff who are put in awkward situations and have to deal with the customers’ reactions.

Given the opportunity, I’d give 2 stars for food, 4 stars for the Ethorpe as a whole, but 5 stars to Kelly for her...

I visited the restaurant today 05/12/2023 as it was my 30th birthday and celebrating with my friend her child and my newborn baby was a good idea over some food as we had previously been before and had a pleasant experience.

Today was the most disappointing experience:

We were rushed out the restaurant as we were told there is a table of 7 who are waiting at the bar to be seated.

We were served by a tall male who was serving everyone else but us. When we were attended to we were given 10 seconds to look at the menu and told he needs the table.

I was breastfeeding my newborn baby and the male waitor was v aggressive in his manner raising his voice saying he needs the table.

My friend went to check if there was a table at the bar area we could be seated. There was and we gathered up our belongings and as we were walking there the waiter was shouting at us demanding to pay the bill. We said we will in a second can we just vacate to another area as we have a new born and toddler with us. He said no it needs to be done now and made us look as if we were in the wrong.

We said we will pay the bill when we put our children and belongings down. He began to raise his voice and we were being looked at by others in the hotel.

In the end another member of staff took over and apologised on his behalf for his behaviour and approach towards us.

He was clearly stressed due to the volume of people in the restaurant. However the way we were neglected and spoken to and also shouted at arrogantly. Aswell as chasing us in the hotel was disgusting.

We sat down Yeah, I think and a member of staff gave us a complimentary coffee to apologise.

The man serving us had no manners or customer service. I am saddened by this experience as I have visited the restaurant manure times and will not...

Me and my work colleague stayed here for a business trip. When arrived at the hotel was greeted and booked in. When getting to the room it was freezing cold no heating was on in the room or bathroom. It was requested that the sofa bed was to be made up this wasn’t either, so had to go back to reception to ask for this to be done which was promptly done. Later that evening we were both woken up by a loud vibrating noise sounding like a washing machine on a spin cycle this went on all night! We tried to contact the emergency number that was in the room which did initially ring and went to voicemail after this the phone went straight to voicemail! If there was a proper emergency god knows what would have happened! I did even message the number with no response. When reporting this first thing in the morning we were told that a manager would ring us to discuss what had happened. They did ring and explained that they had left the fire place extractor on all night which it should have been switched off after they closed at 11pm. She then said that the phone being switched off was not acceptable & she would discuss with the manager. No further communication was given to us and no attempt to apologise or...