The Hanging Gate — Restaurant in England

Review

Came here as a table of 9, after having good reviews from a family member. Turned up, the place is stunning, very well decorated and welcoming. Unfortunately, it went downhill from there.

We had to wait for our drinks order to be taken. We then had to ask for this to arrive .. and then we had to ask again for our food orders to be taken, having waited another 20 minutes. When the drinks arrived, the Zinfandel didn’t taste right. When we asked if we could change it, we were told we couldn’t.

Starters - arrived, all lovely. Pate was lovely, but not enough bread so had to ask for more, which we were given.. after a wait.

Mains - a bit of a wait for mains. Which was disappointing, especially as most of them arrived cold. The stroganoff was tasteless. The burgers arrived with toppings we had ordered without. The mixed grill was just underwhelming. We asked for sauce for this, as the chips were very overdone/greasy .. we never got the sauce. The pesto pasta came with more veg than pasta.

We asked to see the manager, who did come to our table and apologised and said she would speak to the bar and kitchen staff.

The Zinfandel rose was taken off the menu and a ‘50% discount’ was applied ... little did we know that this is actually capped at £50. There was 9 of us so unfortunately this wasn’t good enough.

It’s a lovely place, but for the amount of staff on, the service was slow and lacking. Wouldn’t visit there again for food, taking everything into account. Very unenjoyable experience for a birthday meal with family.

Won’t visit again and definitely would...

The venue is fine, clean and well appointed, suitable for children in the outdoor area playground and dogs seem welcome outdoors. Staff were polite and friendly and not to be faulted. Understandably tabs cannot be opened for outdoor dining and that definitely and easily highlighted an anomaly... being one of the two things that ensures we would be reluctant to give our custom again. Initially, when collecting menus, we bought two drinks which had to be paid for immediately. The amount was £5.50. The exact same two drinks just 30 minutes later was £6.20. It would have been queried had we realised immediately and not from the two separate receipts afterwards. ( One of these drinks was only tap water with splash of lime). My husbands meal was acceptable, but for the awfully cooked veg, though it did have a heavy reliance on the potatoes in the potato, cheese and onion pie. Both meals must have made a large-ish profit (£26+the meals alone) but the second issue was the cost of a medium sized bowl of Caesar salad - £11 for lettuce leaves , a few very thin slivers of cheese a few croutons and a drizzle of dressing. £2 more was charged for making this chicken Caesar salad. The portion of chicken for extra cost was fine, but it was incredibly dry. A whole bag of lettuce down the road is £1.50, the proportion of other ingredients from bags or bottle was miniscule and no energy was required to cook it....sadly a disappointing £37+ experience/ treat we are...

I decided to wait before writing this review as yesterday I was upset at the situation at The Hanging Gate. The service was below standard. The food virtually inedible and the drinks 'watered/iced' down. It all started with a soft drink with half the glass being ice, when I spoke to the manager about it, who was on the bar, he told me that he just puts a scoop of ice in the glass. I know that the hospitality is having a hard time but to try and make money by using ice to reduce the amount of a soft drink is much. We ordered grilled fish in butter and checked if the chips could be swapped for seasonal vegetables. Well, what we got was not grilled and any butter was definitely awol. The seasonal vegetables was green beans which were hardly properly defrosted and peas likewise. The manager's excuse was he gets his seasonal vegetables on a Sunday and this was Friday and that's all he had. Now in my view either he has a problem or the chain of pubs management has a problem, either way, I will not be coming back here, even though I believe in supporting local pubs. Nor will I be going to any J W Lees establishments. I am attaching photos of my ordeal Ps. The toilet door was also broken to the point that it could just be pushed open. Also note mushy peas and...