Mackerel Sky Seafood Bar — Restaurant in Great Britain

Now that's how you cook scallops! Don't be put off by the oddly uncustomer focused answerphone message, the strength is in their food. Loose a star for slightly unfriendly customer service. As I couldn't make an appointment after 4pm on a very wet day when they had no customers anyway, and at the time, Covid restrictions prevented me from sitting in their little restaurant, and the rain prevented me from sitting outside their restaurant, so asked for something from the more expensive main menu to takeaway, to which the waitress said I couldn't, and could only order from the takeaway menu. I had to ask her to double check, since they had no customers, which she did, thankfully. Honestly, common sense doesn't seem to be all that common. Gratefully got what I wanted and it was delicious! Response to their response: Interesting to note the tone of their response. I try to be completely honest in my reviews and say it as it happens from the customer perspective, as it should be more helpful for everyone; it doesn't surprise me that your response matches my comments about your answerphone message and service on the day. And while I'm here, can you tell me and your client base why your chefs in your empty restaurant at 6pm on a Bank Holiday Monday (due to bad weather), managed to "bend over backwards" to use fresh ingredients (scallops) that would have otherwise gone off? I'm sure you had a few takeaways to deal with, but nothing compared with what you were hoping for... Gladly, your chef clearly knows what they're doing, but if your customer service skills improved, I don't know, maybe you would have 60,000 customers each year... I'm sure you would have been much busier that Monday evening had your customer service been better on your answerphone and at the door. My compliments...

Please read all and don't skip to the end. We've waited a long time to get to this famous "seafood bar" and we obviously had high expectations. The place looks very nice, it seemed clean and staff were extremely helpful and communicative. We were sat immediately at a table of our choice and because we knew exactly what we wanted it took us one minute to order. Food was served extremely fast, I would say about 5-6 minutes and was well presented. We felt that our expectations (based on reviews) were met so far and we decided to dig in. But then we both stopped and looked at eachother with the same disappointment in our eyes. I will not say what we had because we want to give them another chance these days and don't wish to be recognised by staff (our order was pretty specific). To sum up, we don't really care about presentation etc, food can come from a street van or a fancy restaurant. But we strongly feel that food should be the one earning the 5 star reviews and not the rest. Location, staff etc, come second third and so on.

Dear Mackerel Sky, please for the love of God, just choose your dishes wisely and cook them well because you're not the cheapest and if so far you've made a name for yourselves it doesn't make sense to disappoint people. Don't take your good name for granted, earn it daily with every single dish.

The 3 stars we gave them would sum up as follows: Location 5 stars, staff 5 stars, serving speed 5 stars (but this might have beed their mistake, maybe rushing to serve?), prices 4 stars, BUT food's taste only 2 stars. I want to believe that our experience was a mishap. Normally we would avoid the place after this but based on their amazing reviews we'll give them...

2 part review 1st from 2021 second is the new .

Very lovely food ,tasty and fresh !We ordered a few from the menu ,consistent portions, well presented, interesting and creative! Try to get there 2 hours earlier, especially now, to manage to get a table they are very busy. Also they close ar 9 pm.Service was fast and well organised.

2 part 2023

We have visited again after 2 years, same time around ,this time we have noticed some changes ,plates rapidé tasting starter plates are different also the difference in portions size when different tables having same ones . Taste is a bit different aswell but this is not unusual. Starters were actually good ,we really liked them ,when ordered the special lobster and crayfish we noticed our one was missing few ingredients as compared to other tables which ordered 10-15 min after us so save to assume that or they forgot or didn't have it on stock at that point, but still was no communication with front of house staff to let us know if we would like something else instead. Main was a bit pricey but was lobster and crayfish so hence the price ,dish was uneventful sos was a lot ,plate could have been a bit more appealing as we felt it was just added there instead of build up. I would definitely not order the lobster again . Timing is fast and so seating compared to last time more organised, hot drinks and cold drinks are decently priced ,service is a bit laggy as no one did checkback, also when leaving nobody said anything . We felt a bit disappointed.

P.s. When we arrived we were greeted nicely and politely which we...