Miller & Carter Milton Keynes — Restaurant in Milton Keynes

Went to here last night for my girlfriends birthday. Sadly I think they was abit overwhelmed. I'll explain below

We booked a table for 7pm managed to get seated and ordered pretty fast. We ordered 2 starters and 2 of the 10oz (chefs recommended) steaks.

Starters arrived very fast. My gf had the prawn and crab cocktail. This looked very nice and she really enjoyed it. I had the garlic prawns and sadly they did not have any garlic at all as might as well have been boiled prawns they was so bland.

Anyway moving on from starters we then got excited waiting in the steak(we had not eaten all day in high hopes of a good steak.

Anyhow after probably 40min of waiting it turned up. Again luckily the girlfriends was fine and she enjoyed her meal. As for mine well we both ordered medium rare. Well mine was so rare you could have put legs on it and it would have ran away. Not even edible which really left me dissapointed.

I gave 2 stars only thanks to the manager and waitress. I showed the waitress who could see the issue so straight away apologized and asked if would like another. Unfortunately we had already lost confidence due to poor food and long wait for the main so I did not want another and instead was not prepared to pay for the meal. Manager came over very apologetic and again had seen the food and without hesitation refunded the meal and a starter. (This was good as we had not complained about the starter but did think it was bland so happy to be refunded that too)

We did notice that we was not the only table to have complaints as heard at least 2 other tables within the time we was there also have manager at tables apologizing for things.

Bill should have been £93 however we paid £53 which in our opinion was an expensive steak and starter for 1 person.

It's a shame as it could have easy have been a different review if food had just been done right. I understand they had a busy night and chef had a nightmare but that is not an excuse to produce poor food at premium prices.

We won't be going back as sadly it was so bad we have lost confidence now and won't risk spending our own money on something that could be dissapointing. It's not exactly cheap place.

Happy to change my review if the restaurant wants to invite us back for a free better experience that we could then...

Absolutely brilliant staff and great food.

I had been here once before and it was nice, tonight was round 2 and it was a absolutely brilliant experience.

I booked a table online and left notes to say that my wife is autistic and struggles in busy places. After a bad experience the week before at a different restaurant, I decided to drop in and speak to the staff the day before our booking to pick the best table for someone who is extremely sensitive to noise and busy environments.

Straight away the manager who's name I think was Chris (sorry if I have got that wrong) and one of the hostesses who's name I now can't remember (a tall blonde lady) were extremely helpful. They picked out the best spot for us to sit and even arranged for us to use a fire exit door near our table incase my wife felt like she couldn't walk through the busy reception and restaurant.

Tonight we arrived and my wife wasn't feeling to bad so we used the front door. Straight away the manager recognised us and took us straight to the pre-arranged table. Our hostess for the evening, Sarah, introduced herself and took our drinks order. The manager had obviously briefed his staff about our needs as they were attentive from the moment we walked in. The evening went brilliantly, they even kept the table next to us empty to keep the area as quiet as possible for us.

I cannot thank you all enough for the help you gave to someone who can really struggle in places like this. You made it a very enjoyable evening for her.

To Miller and Carter head office: If you read this and think why did they sacrafice four covers to meet the needs of one guest, please do not bother to respond. If you read this and see how far your staff went to make our evening enjoyable then please give it a thumbs up, then contact your Milton Keynes, Shenley restaurant and ask your manager how he handled the situation that I presented him and give his advice and experience to every other manager within your organisation. Tonight you guys made someone's night because you cared and understood a neuro-developmental disability, a disability which can be misunderstood and mishandled.

Again thanks to all the staff who worked so hard tonight to make our evening. We will be back again soon.

With thanks,...

First the positives. The manager was extremely good at dealing with the numerous issues that we encountered. He went above and beyond. The issues were: Drinks order taken. There was a delay in the waitress coming back to take our food order. A good 15 minutes passed before I ask another waiter if we could order our food and that we were still waiting for our drinks and he said he would get our waitress. She came over and said the drinks were on their way and took our food order. We continued to wait for our drinks when the starter for my son arrived. My husband went to the bar to ask about the drinks and it appeared our order had been lost. They sorted this out. We were then waiting for our mains. By this point, we had been in the restaurant just over an hour. Three other tables who had arrived after us were all having their meals already. I then went to speak to the manager who was aware of the missing drinks problem and he assured me the mains would not be long. When they arrived, two of the steaks were perfect. My ribeye, which I had asked for medium rare, was overcooked and dry. My husband went to speak to the manager who came over to apologise and agreed that the steak was indeed overcooked and offered to replace it. It came just as my son and husband had finished their meals. The steak was OK but had quie a bit of sinew running through the middle so I left about a third of it. We asked for the bill. The manager came over with it and apologised again and had given us a generous reduction as he had also noticed that I had left quite a bit of the second steak (this impressed me as he had obviously asked to be notified or kept an eye on it himself as I had not made any mention of it when my plate was cleared). We said we appreciated the gesture as our complaints were not made to try and get money off, but to highlight the issues. My husband had told him we were there to celebrate my birthday, and it hadn't gone well. Upon leaving, the manager presented me with a bottle of wine and said he hoped it would in some small way compensate and that I could enjoy it to finish off my birthday. This was very much...