Queen's Head — Restaurant in New Forest

Was looking forward to a really good roast dinner at The Queen's Head. We ordered the short rib of beef and the turkey roast dinners.

As the menu stated: "All of our Sunday meat roasts are served with garlic & rosemary goose fat roast potatoes, maple-roast carrot and parsnip, Yorkshire pudding, sausage meat stuffing, Tenderstem® broccoli, peas and lashings of rich gravy"

When they came out... The roasted parsnips hadn't been peeled and were rock hard. I couldn't get my knife through them. The most that had happened was they had been par-boiled. The carrots were merely boiled batons and definitely not maple roasted! The broccoli was not tenderstem and merely small florets.

I brought this to the attention of the staff who told me they were from a new supplier and assured me that the parsnips were roasted. I assured them they had not been roasted or had probably seen an oven. Explanation remained that they were from a new supplier and had personally been seen to have been cooked. The potatoes were dry and had no roasting crunch or crisp to them. Certainly not what a good roast potato looks like. In my opinion they'd been reheated in a microwave. I did feel a little insulted about what a roast parsnip should be and the parsnips presented to me were. The explanation certainly did not make any sense. But there was no rudeness and the staff apologised and were happy to remedy the situation. (hence two stars instead of one) To be fair they brought me out a new batch of potatoes which varied from dry to some that were roasted to a certain extent, but the bowl was super hot and obviously been reheated in a microwave.

I did not want any roast parsnips based on what I had. Sadly the Yorkshire pudding was tough and took some severe cutting to get through. The roast turkey was clearly not from a roasted bird but a smoked turkey roll that is usually sliced at the deli counter.

Personally I would not recommend the roast dinner. The table next to us were having a pie and a burger and they seemed happy with their food. Therefore I can't comment on the rest of the menu.

No issues with the service or staff. Food didn't meet the standard expected, which is unfortunate.

I leave this review to highlight the issues we had. Having now seen some similar issues from others who have had meals at the queen's head, I hope that the team can remedy this moving forward. There was a good atmosphere, nice decor, but the one thing we wanted to be good and were looking forward to didn't meet the expectations. Hence two stars...

This used to be our go to stop for food and drinks when in Burley. We made an impromptu stop this time, as just wanted some quick snacks and drinks for the kids. The staff acted as if we were bothering them, which appears to be a trend having read other recent reviews. However, I do sympathise when they seem to have a manager shouting and hollering at them from behind the bar. It must make the day quite stressful. When the attitude was questioned we had an apology with an excuse that it was busy, and they didnt have enough staff. There were about a dozen other patrons in the place and I saw 3 more staff behind the bar. I'm guessing there was also a chef, plus the manager, so not sure how this constitutes busy. It was lunch time, and hardly any options on the menu were available, so this obviously isn't being managed well either. We ordered food and drinks. The food came out and was eaten before we even had sight of a single drink. The food was alright, although some things stated on the menu were swapped out without even mentioning it, so guessing they were suffering with stock issues even on what they could serve. The kids were complaining about the drinks. 3 requests for the drinks and a trip to the bar to find them and still no sight, and just the same excuse of how busy they were. Again, 3 bar staff to do drinks and seemingly nobody at the bar ordering anything else... So not sure why the delay. Eventually when we gave up and felt we wouldn't be getting drinks I went to the bar to pay and as if by magic the drinks were all just being poured. Bear in mind we had already ordered food, received food and eaten food. So this must have been 30+ minutes after ordering the drinks. The staff looked shocked when I said I don't want them and would only settle the food bill and leave. Not sure what's going on under this new ownership / management, but it's not working. In contrast we tried another restaurant / bar close by this weekend and it was a lovely experience. Polite staff. Drinks out before food. Nothing could have been a problem for them. Will be frequenting other places in this area in future until the Queen's Head can somehow return to its former glory and service levels. But it has a...

A royal disaster from start to finish sadly.

4 adults and a 2 year old.

I went to the bar, waited for 10 minutes. In those 10 minutes the manageress looked at me multiple times but carried on drinking and talking to her staff behind the bar. I went to a different area of the bar, spoke to a very young lady and was told I'd only be served at a different location at the bar... no signs to state this and no one told me this even though they could see me waiting!

I asked for a tray to carry all 5 drinks and glasses and didn't get one. When I asked for oneI was asked why I needed it...

We all ordered a trio roast apart from the 2 year old who we ordered a turkey roast for.

A very young lady firstly came with 2 turkey adult roasts - we said that wasn't for us and she said 'yeah it is' - errr no it is not.

She came back with an adult trio roast and the kods roast which were cold and the plates boiling hot. At this point the child is very hungry and we had to ask for a different plate to transfer her food due it being very hot. Again we were asked 'why' by the very young adult...

Everyone agreed the meat was nice but everything else was terrible and cold.

We were asked by a very young man how I food was and I said 'would you like an honest answer?' To which he replied 'no not really' and walked off.

I would NOT RECOMMEND this place to anyone.

UPDATE DUE TO THE RESPONSE LEFT

I was stood at the bar and she looked at me multiple times. When I smiled she moved away from me and then carried on her conversation. There is no way anyone in your small bar area could miss that I was stood there! I addressed this with the bar staff at the time and no one would comment. So when you say you have 'verified' my response as though it is not valid - I find this response as good as the service provided on the day - shocking!

I would also like to add that there was all of the food that we ordered available as we got it eventually - so the issues were that you got our orders wrong and when you got them right the food was cold and below average. Honestly it was terrible and as I pointed out when we did highlight this at the time,...