The Inn at Shipley — Restaurant in England

My disabled wife and I visited The Inn at Shipley for the first time on Thursday 18th January 2024. A telephone call had been made the previous day to book a table . We had planned to have a leisurely late afternoon meal before attending an event in Wolverhampton. The Inn at Shipley is set back from the Bridgnorth to Wolverhampton Road with an large country house converted into a many roomed restaurant/ public house .

On entering The Inn at Shipley a large central bar is straight in front of you with a good variety of real ales on offer including 2 guest dark real ales ( Enville Ginger Gothic and Brightside Brewing Oat Stout) . The lady behind the bar was very knowledgeable about drinks and was happy to offer a taster .

We were then through 2 rooms to a table in the furthest room . Each of these rooms had a warming log fire. Evidently there is a large modern dining room with glazed windows to the left of the bar but the extremely cold weather and large windows meant that it was much colder in there .

In the far room there were 6 tables , all spaciously laid out . It was a fair walk back to the bar but I was able to make the trek back to get a beer sample for my wife to try out . Each of the other rooms were half full but there appeared to be only two staff members working 'front of house' . We sorted the drinks out and managed to order our main course about 15 minutes later . I had an interesting Wild Boar Pie with Mashed Potatoes ( slightly overcooked pastry meant it was a little tougher to cut ) and my wife had a lovely Fillet Steak .

We decided that since we were only 15 minutes from our appointment that we would risk having a sweet course. I really like the smaller puddings which are accompanied by a drink of tea or coffee. So I ordered a Small Creme Brulee with a pot of tea whilst my wife ordered a Dark Chocolate and Cherry trifle . Again the wait was much longer than we would have expected but we were really pleased with quality of the food As we were finishing the original waitress that I had asked came to ask if we wanted to order a sweet course . As the restaurant became busier and we needed to depart I had to go in search of a staff member but could not find one despite 5 minutes of searching . Eventually a waitress brought the meal to a nearby table and so I attracted her attention to ask for the bill. Ten minutes later there was no sign of the bill so again I had to leave the table. I spoke to the at the bar who sent someone across with the bill . Sadly when the bill was shown to us - it was the bill for a different table ! So the other waitress had to 'hike' back for the correct bill and then get the card machine ( We did joke that we could have paid the other bill as it was £25 cheaper than ours ) The original waitress arrived a few minutes later to ask if we were ready to pay the bill - better late than never - despite the fact that we had already paid ! We left a 18:30 and arrived in Wolverhampton 20 minutes late .

We were really impressed by the layout and calmness of The Inn . The place in the late afternoon is relaxing and generally has a high quality of food and good real ales. Sadly , the service was too slow , as I expect it is understaffed. Hopefully we caught The Inn at Shipley on a bad day and are certainly happy to give it...

Firstly, I don't tend to leave reviews; I review only when a place is extremely good or particularly poor! Sadly, this was poor. It was our third visit here over the summer. The first - an evening meal - was fine. The second - a southern fried chicken burger at lunchtime - was poor; the fried chicken was burnt black. My husband pointed it at straight away to the waiter who just said see how I get on with it. It tasted burnt; I should have sent it back but I didn't want to make a fuss. The third meal - steak sandwich at lunchtime (today) - was very poor too! My husband wasn't asked how I liked the steak when he ordered so it came out bleeding on my ciabatta and mooing. Not wanting to make a fuss as usual I took a bite. I couldn't bite it though so it all had to come out my mouth to be cut with a sharp knife but it was horrible so I returned it to the bar and asked for it to be more well done. The exact same plate of food came back without the half of piece of steak I'd needed a knife & fork to complete! So I was short-changed for a start. What was left was four cm-cube morsels of medium 'steak' which tasted like liver. It was yuck. I would have expected a new plate of food without the blood soaked bread! At £15.95 the sandwich I received was terribly over priced. It's also disapointing that no one here has ever aksed how the food is during the meal; perhaps they're scared of the answer? The Woodbridge (Ironbridge) and The Mytton & Mermaid (Shrewsbury) have the same menu but their food quality and service is far far superior! This place should not have the same menu if they cannot match the other establishments food and service! It is an awful shame because I like the building and...

I so wanted to enjoy our visit this afternoon after coming a few years ago and having a lovely experience, but it was beyond disappointing. My husband and I booked for Sunday lunch and arrived hungry and ready to go. We were shown to our table after a 5 minute wait at the door behind others - I think everyone was confused as no one was being seen to, but eventually we were seated in a nice spot by the bar. The lady took our drink orders straight away, perfect. 20 minutes later, we were still waiting for someone to take our food order, even a couple who were seated after us had their order taken which was very frustrating. My husband went up to the bar and eventually the bar man come over and we ordered. The food arrived within 10 minutes, we had two lots of roast chicken. I have to say, the food was so underwhelming, the roast potatoes (which is my favourite part of a roast) were completely inedible. They were rock hard, and when you did eventually hack into them, they were tasteless. The chicken was cooked nice, but the rest was below average and certainly not worth £40 for the two meals. Not one person during our entire visit came over to our table to see if we needed anything else, ask how the food was, if we wanted any more drinks etc, and no one came to take our plates away. We ended up having to go to the bar to pay and get the hell out of there.

We had high hopes for a lovely afternoon, but the complete lack of service and below average food has just cemented the fact that we'll...