Steam Turbine — Restaurant in Rugby

I visited this Hungry Horse pub last Tuesday with a friend for lunch for the first time. Unfortunately, I was not impressed. I booked a table online just in case. When arrived it was pretty empty, the weather was nice so we asked to sit outside instead of the allocated, reserved table inside, which first seems to be a problem but then not anymore. When I looked at the website beforehand I was actually not sure if it had an outside sitting area, since there were no official pictures of it. Later found some in the reviews. This feature was actually quite important to me. However, I was not impressed with the outside area. The benches were not very comfortable and the metal fence surrounding it looked like from a building side and gave it an improvised feel. Ordered lunch at the bar, first macaroni cheese and onion rings for my friend then hunters’ chicken for myself, mentioning I would like the barbeque sauce on the side. I also ordered alcohol free beer and asked if I could have it as a shandy. Server said, not possible since it comes in a bottle, but could sell me a lemonade separate to mix it myself. It seems to be possible in other pubs I visited, but fair enough. Not a problem. Food arrived reasonably quick. First mine then with a slight delay my friends. The hunter’s chicken had barbeque sauce all over it and instead my friend’s onion rings had barbeque sauce in a dish on the side, which was not ordered. So there seemed to have been a mix up or communication issue between order taker and kitchen staff. I pointed this out the young, male server, which neither apologized for the mistake nor offered to make it right. He said it always comes with sauce on top. I had ordered this dish many times in other Hungry horse pups and always got the sauce on the side. Then he said he could not take the dish back to the kitchen, because they could not sell it again. Well, yes, that’s why pubs try to get the customer’s order right. I did not want to argue further in front of my friend, so just accepted the dish. As expected, I did not like the sauce much. To sweet and smoky for my taste, which spoiled the experience. I tried to scrape some sauce off but there was not much point to it. Otherwise, the chicken filet was very juicy and tender and would have been great. The fries were good but just lukewarm. My friend’s macaroni cheese was good but the portion a little small. We then decided to have coffee and cake elsewhere. Not sure if we will...

Been a long term regular customer. Me and my partner Sarah did really enjoy our regular visits on Fridays and Saturdays. In past year we visit rugby’s hungry horse more then 30 times on regular basis. We did felt always welcome and we feel like we finally find our place to eat. I would say best burgers in Rugby. Unfortunately after todays incidents with new stuff members we will not be back anymore. First of all our desserts has not arrived I do want highlight the fact we did order our desserts with mains all same time. After main course we was waiting for desserts they did not arrived we did ask member of stuff and wait another 20-30 minutes then we ask again and we did ask for them to takeaway as we had enough gent said he will ask in kitchen he came back asking do we want ice cream as they may melt in box so we said that no thank you for ice cream etc and we did wait another 15 minutes when we ask again about desserts gent went to the bar asking colleague for advise and then person who was behind the bar came to my partner asking for order etc I asked is there any problem and from there it escalate quickly. Body language, attitude toward customers and lying straight in face of customer is not what I do expect from customer service experience. I did ask to speak with manager it has been ignored. Table 34 between 20:06 (order placed) and 21:20 / 30 ish. Worth of mention is as well fact of stuff loudly discussing at work about “getting laid” etc not best customer service experience. Will not go back...

A classic pub grub experience!

We arrived and parked in the car park provided. It had a gate but we couldn't see clearly what time it closed. We were going to the cinema afterwards, so in the end we drove round to the cinema car park after the meal to avoid getting trapped.

They quickly took us to our seats. It was warm and clean and Christmassy! We chose our food and went up to order (no table service). I flipping love lasagne, but they were our of lasagne, so in the end I had their sizzler.

The food came without cutlery. We were told we had to get our own. I got knives and forks but couldn't find the spoons. I asked, and they said there weren't spoons. Mains don't come with cutlery, but pudding comes with spoons. Right. Sure.

Overall the food was great. Good chips, good chicken, good sauce. My wife loved her curry. No naan bread, but I suppose it is only a pub! My corn-on-the-cob was dreadful - It was soggy like it had been boiled - but everything else was lovely! Pudding was nice too, as were the drinks! We spent around £45 for 2 of us, but used Tesco Clubcard vouchers to cover £35 of it, so overall it was a cheap but good experience!

I'd definitely recommend coming here. It's not Michelin star or anything, but it's nice! Friendly staff, nice decor, family environment, good menu choice, a classic British cheap...