Toby Carvery Caversham Bridge — Restaurant in Reading

We arrived a few minutes early (table was booked for 17:00). There was only one young man clearing tables and no other staff in sight. I walked around the whole of the Toby and saw nobody. We waited for almost ten minutes, then I asked the young man if he was the only man working. He said that it was just him and his boss. The young man was clearing tables and serving drinks and eventually showed us to our table. The place was almost empty of customers. We ordered two apple and raspberry J20s. The young man went off and came back and said that he was sorry but they didn't have any. He then reeled off a list of what they did have and apple and raspberry was on that list so we got what we asked for in the beginning! We then went up to get our meal. The gammon was turning brown and looked like it had been sitting there for ages. The pork was the same. My husband is a great meat eater and chose pork and beef but he couldn't even eat the pork as it was so dry. I had the vegetarian option. Usually I just fill my plate with macaroni cheese as the Toby does the best macaroni cheese I've ever had. Today it didn't look the same as normal. It looked as if it had been tipped out of a tin and placed under the heat. When I got back to the table and tasted it, it was stone cold. I asked a waitress who had just arrived if they had changed it and she said that she would find out for me. After we'd been there about ten minutes we decided that we couldn't eat any more (I ate none of the macaroni cheese after the first mouthful) so we went to pay. I explained the problem with the meal to the boss (it says Alex on the receipt he gave us) and he said 'I don't know. I've only been here an hour and I've been doing 'their' job since I got here. I'm guessing by 'their' he meant the waiters. He made us pay for both the meals and wasn't remotely interested in the fact that I hadn't eaten mine. We have only lived in Reading for a year and the Toby is the place where we always eat out. It's always been our favourite. This man has let you down badly and we won't be eating there again. I imagine that mine won't be the only complaint tonight. The young lady who said that she would find out about the macaroni cheese has served us many times there before and has always been nothing but helpful and friendly. She was very busy herself but still took the time to go and ask...

Very disappointed with the Toby Carvery. When we arrived we noticed that the temperature in the restaurant was quite cool. The reason that I consider this to be relevant is because once the meal had been plated, it immediately began to cool down. The choices on offer at the servery were very good and only one item was not available to have. I was the last person in my party to be served, and when I went to the condiment area, there were no sauces in two of the bowls. I went to the servery area to ask for the condiments to be refilled. The person who was behind the servery told me to ask one of the waitresses to help! I was annoyed that I had to do the chasing. However, I reluctantly did find a waitress who did immediately help me. After the time waiting around my meal was getting cold. I then sat with the rest of my party who by now were already half way through their meals. Even so they all stated that their meals were only luke warm, and that the hottest thing on the plate was the gravy! We had already decided that we would have desserts, (two waffles and one crumble). At the same time we ordered a cup of tea. After waiting about 20 minutes the desserts and tea had still not arrived. Then one of the waffles was served up. We assumed that the remaining items were following on immediately afterwards. How wrong we were! We were initially told that they "were trying to find another waffle". Shortly after we complained to the waitress that we were still waiting. She then replied that she "had already told us that they had no more waffles" This was a blatant lie as there were 5 people on the table when she initially said that they were trying "to find another waffle". (This did not explain why the crumble and tea never materialised). This was the final straw and we instructed the waitress to cancel all of the remaining items. The manager was alerted to the situation and duly arrived at our table and apologised for the poor service that we had received and did not charge for the one waffle that we did receive. Toby need to urgently address the problems that we encountered. I am sad to say that this was, by far, one of the worse dining experiences that I have ever...

The food is nice, however the service specially from the manager wasn’t too good. At dinner time, the queque for the Roast was very long, at least 7 people waiting. Only one person serving the meat. The server had to go to the kitchen to grab more meat, and left the area unattended for about 3-5 minutes. The manager was called and she said they went to get more meat, we said that as a manager she should be ensuring there si people always serving and to perhaps call another staff member for support. The manager left and didn’t even bother to send someone else to support the poor lady serving the road and cutting the meats. She appeared overwhelmed and stress with the long queque, more people arrived we were up to 10 waiting. There was three waitress standing waiting and laughing. On my way to the loo and I spoke with a very polite guy, with moustache. He apologised and went to the kitchen to find out where the other staff was. When I return to the toilet, the woman was back with more meat. The manager was not seen after 15 minutes and the rest of the waitress waiting around seeing how many customers were waiting for food, and not supporting the lady at the roast station. I felt very dissatisfaction about the managers response. She didn’t take any action and didn’t bother to ensure that all the queque was waiting for a little as possible. Or to even ask how the lady was feeling. If I was the manager, I would have of step in and help OR send another staff member to help and reduce the queque.

The manager in the shift was called Lizz.

All the people quequing were dissatisfied as well about the service as we were all...