Toulouse Restaurant — Restaurant in England

Where do I begin? DO NOT GO HERE!!

The manager is a vile human being and after reading other reviews I’m baffled as to how he is still running this business.

Myself and 9 other family members visited for a Sunday lunch. I am a vegetarian and ordered the vegan nut roast which once arrived was full of rice which was disgusting and the whole meal was bone dry. This was also served with tomato pasta sauce on the side which seemed like a very odd thing to serve a roast dinner. I asked for some gravy with no meat in, and this is where the problems began. He raised his voice at me, telling me all gravy has beef stock in (incorrect). He then put the menu in my face and raised his voice telling me it says it comes with the tomato sauce and that I shouldn’t have ordered it…. Ignoring the fact it was disgusting and dry. I asked for my food to be taken away as I couldn’t eat the dry meal as it was not edible. Another family member had the same meal and issue but after the managers outburst, did not feel comfortable expressing so had 3 bites and left the rest.

When the bill came, he charged us for my meal regardless of the above and refused to take it off. I have never experience anything like this in a restaurant and I’m embarrassed for the business owner, if it is not himself. We told him because of the above, we would not be paying for my meal and it should have been deducted from the bill. His violent and disgusting manor then presented itself even more, he shouted at every member of my family and got into my uncles face after he told him to stop speak to me in such an aggressive way. Not that it should make a difference on how you speak to customers or people in general but I am pregnant and this experience left me extremely distressed and I don’t know how this man sleeps at night. We eventually paid for what we had, a total bill cost of almost £300, minus my meal and got up to leave.

Once he realised, he begun to say ‘ this is a small price to never have to see your faces in here again ‘ and the abuse continued for several minutes as we was leaving. He also refused to tell us his name because it was irrelevant…just like his existence in my opinion. I wish I had recorded the whole thing to be able to show just how hideous this man was to me and my family, instead I write this review to warn others about visiting this restaurants.

After reading some other recent reviews, Apparently violence and abuse comes free with every meal ordered! How is this ok…?

This small man is a bully, potentially suffering from little man syndrome and I’m still in shock by our experience a week later. The other staff members were lovely, polite but also look completley terrified of...

Well, I tried to go here for my birthday a year or so ago, as I live local to it and thought that I would support a new 'French' restaurant.

There were only the two of us and the restaurant was TOTALLY empty and there was about 15 minutes left before the (official) lunch time closing time, which in all the other restaurants I've been to in the world has always meant last ORDERING time (but even then they've always been good to any customers turning up late) with the restaurant closing about an hour later.

We were told that chef liked to finish on time so no food could be ordered = so why not put up the times the staff would like to ACTUALLY serve food at?!?!?

Okay then, could we have a quick bistro meal and a cup of coffee then?

Er, no.... again the rest of the staff liked to go to lunch at exactly the time on the door.

So, where's the customer service here then?

Oh, and the young lady wasn't particularly welcoming either, for like I said a totally empty restaurant you'd think that they'd almost drag customers off of the street!

It is now close to my birthday again and I am in two minds having read the other reviews whether to chance it again or go to one of many other excellent restaurants near by?

I'm thinking of going for the early bird menu so that I don't spend too much at a restaurant that treated me the way they did previously... Should I or shouldn't I... I really don't know?

Driving past it on a regular basis, it is never really that busy and maybe the early bird menu is to try and get some customers actually through the doors?

Not surprisingly, the local Rossi's ice cream company tea shop which also over looks the sea view and is just along the road, is always overfilled with customers even in the middle of winter on a cold wet day! Maybe this restaurant needs to treat themselves there to see what they themselves are doing wrong... It could be the service (hint, hint) or the food (small portions and tasteless seem to pop up on the other reviews.)

I really wanted this to be one of my favourite restaurants when it first opened as a lover of French restaurant and Bistro but I still haven't been back since my first non-starter. IF I do manage to go there, I will write another review, good or bad... but in the mean time, I think they need to maybe up their publicity somewhat to win...

I want to like it.

It has so much potential.

But a good bistro, it isn't.

It's... Standard pub food (or... Dare I say a posh Harvester?) with a lot pre cooked in the fridge or freezer and ready to reheat.

I know staffing issues in hospitality are hard at the moment, but the food is really middle of the road, and the place has so much potential to serve delicious, quality meals.

My advice is to stay away from the common classics - the scampi and chips, fish and chips, burger, steak and chips... None of those were memorable or better than as I say, Harvester. The chips especially left an oily taste in your mouth.

Go with the dishes you'd not usually find in a pub or Harvester.

The confit duck was good, fell off the bone as you'd expect, but you could tell it'd been zapped as the piping hot steam coming out when it was cut into is a tell tale sign of "just heated up". The accompanying cherry jus was tasteless of cherries which was a shame, it was just a thin gravy with no real cherry taste. Duck loves a good fruity sauce!

The sea bass was by far the best dish, with saffron potatoes.

The staff were absolutely lovely and very friendly with faultless service. A real benefit to the restaurant.

But it could just be so much more.

Places with small menus and a great venue could be creating wonderful locally sourced meals or simple French inspired fare but it just felt like everything came from the freezer (the chilli prawn starter... The prawns were small ones you'd use in a curry or stir fry, not big meaty things as an example), all style and no substance (every dish was well presented).

I hope when there's a recovery in staffing issues in hospitality the menu can be revisited to make it more fresh and bistro like. I feel like they're just plodding along waiting for that to happen.

It could...