The Dovecote Eatery — Restaurant in Fareham

As promised, Ive changed my rating. I had the full English this time. No complaints whatsoever. The coffee was really nice as well even though it was an americano. The rest of my team (and my dog) had a great time as well. He particularly loved his "doggy sausage". So here it is. 5 stars. I'll leave my previous review in for reference.....

"Hmmm...I'm going with 3 stars. This was difficult. I would say that everything not mentioned below was a fat 5 stars. Everything else...1 star.

First annoyance...we phoned up to reserve a table. The guy said to just come down as there were plenty of tables. Wouldn't let us reserve a table. We got there and it was really busy. Only one table was available which we were lucky to get as people were arriving behind us.

Second annoyance...the table I had was wonky and I don't mean it was wobbling. The table itself was made out of odd shaped wood which meant my dinner was always slowly sliding off the table.

Last of all, the food was perfect with the exception of my baguette. My baguette was quit the opposite. It was hard to the extent that it hurt my mouth.

Huff

Its a shame because everything else was great. My party had a great time as well.

Will I go again?.....yes. absolutely. I feel like my experience was a one off so I want to give it another go because everything else was superb. And if I have a great time and...

Not a great experience at all, due to the following:

None of waiters cleared (previous customers plates) from our table the entire time we were there. You cannot make adjustments to any of the meals. I asked to switch bacon out of a salad for halloumi but because the meals are pre-made this wasn't possible. Also, another customer who was sat next to us received their food before they'd even returned from ordering inside, which questions how fresh the food actually is. The chicken caesar salad was missing ingredients, which I was not informed about until I questioned it and then I was told "it must be out of stock" with no apology or replacement offered. The chicken in the salad was dry and had very little sauce. The portion of chips were half cold and half hot and a lot of them were the crispy bits from the bottom of the basket that lack any potato. And the final, most frustrating point was that I was refused cash as a payment method. This is a legal tender and I cannot understand how a company can refuse or would want to refuse a legal form of money. They said something about company policy which is irrelevant as common law trumps this, so they should not be refusing my offer to pay for the food. For this reason and this reason alone, I will not...

I wouldn’t usually leave a review on Google AND TripAdvisor, but this place is something else. Been in for the last two Monday afternoons for a coffee. No oat milk both times.

I asked the girl serving what the issue was and was met with a rude, disinterested response with ‘waiting for a delivery’. The list of ‘out of stock items’ was 4/5 items that are pretty basic for a cafe.

If you’ve got stock issues every single Monday, change your order, change your supplier or pop to the supermarket that’s 3 minutes away?

Her lack of any interest in listening to a customer means that I certainly won’t be back as there’s so many other options locally now.

The manager replied on TripAdvisor with such nonsense and absolute lies, alleging my behaviour was the problem. If you can’t manage to work out how much stock you’ll need each week or can’t order an extra bottle of milk, you shouldn’t be in business.

Their Facebook reviews from the past year or so say it all! There’s plenty of other places to spend your money that offer much better service, food, drink...