Old Station Restaurant — Restaurant in Scotland

I have waited a few days to post this to try & give fair & balanced review . This should have been a 5 star review, given the quality of the main course and desserts. Unfortunately, the following 2 customer service 'learning points' in my opinion stopped such a review. First point. Several weeks earlier when I checked their website and clicked on the link for table reservation it led to a screen saying to telephone the restaurant to make a booking. So I did, it was midweek at 7.30pm at night. Once the phone was answered the female voice asked me to call back another day as they were in the middle of a busy service. After a brief exchange ( I'd never had such a comment - its usually 'could you hold' or 'whats your number and I'll call you back, I was totally miffed when I put the phone down). I should have gone elsewhere as such a reply to booking a table deserves. If your only method of booking is on the telephone. MY OPINION LEARNING POINT - Take the booking on the first call or you WILL loose potential customers.

However, I took her advice and called the following afternoon. In fairness, I was able to book a table. So fair enough.

Monday evening, (30.6.25), my wife and I went to the restaurant. It was a busy,chaotic atmosphere, and we were shown to our table. A few minutes later we had our soft drinks & waited for our main course. We waited, we waited & waited more, whilst watching what I can only describe as a restaurant with too many tables (large and small groups for a disporportionate small number of covering staff (we counted only 2 taking food orders and 3 delivering the meals...including the manager who was sucked into this task & failed to see what had unfolded. After 50 minutes, we asked the member of staff, (who I would say was at least the manager .... and had shown us to our table), where our meal was. She initially apologised (but on hearing the waiting time also told me we should not have waited so long to say to her ! ). (I think she regretted saying that last comment). On having checked the status of our meals, her attitude was from that point onwards totally apologetic. Human error caused the delay. The food arrived, (which I say was generous in portion size and delicious, especially the Orkney fudge cheesecake), and there was no further dilemma. IN MY OPINION LEARNING POINT 2 . I appreciate restaurants may struggle to recruit staff, &/or want all the maximum number of tables full at peak times but Managers need to step back at times and check on ALL tables to ensure meals are progressing. This didn't happen on this occasion.

The restaurant manager wanted to waive our bill, which was very generous given the current climate restaurant businesses ate experiencing, however we declined, with the manager accepting our offer of only deducting one main course from our bill total.

Whilst it's unlikely we will return to the restaurant, I hope whoever owns the business considers the 2 points...

After looking at the reviews, we were so looking forward to this, but we had such a poor experience. Our whole evening was a catalogue of mistakes and delays. Our orders were taken quickly, staff seemed really efficient and friendly. Our drinks were brought to the table. We'd ordered 2 ginger beers and lime. They'd only put lime in one glass, but it was quickly rectified with apologies. The food arrived fairly quickly. I'd ordered mushroom risotto and my husband had ordered the venison burger. He'd been given a vegan burger instead. When he told the waitress, again they apologised and took the plate away. I started into my risotto, really hungry after a day's walking, but was very disappointed. It was so oily. You could see little pools of oil at the edges of the dish. I soaked some of the oil up with the bread roll on the plate, and to be fair, I ate about two thirds of it because I was hungry, but I couldn't eat any more because it just wasn't nice. I'd finished eating, and one staff member came over to take my plate away, asking if everything had been ok. I explained that it hadn't, and that it was really oily, which I couldn't understand as risotto shouldn't even be made with oil. She apologised again and said she'd take the meal off the bill. I was prepared to pay for it, because I'd eaten most of it, but she insisted. I also said that my husbands meal still hadn't arrived by this time - which was around half an hour after our meals first arrived. She said she'd go and hurry it along. We waited for another while before it finally arrived. We were getting to the stage where we just wanted to leave. We then had to ask for the bill 3 times, again waiting far too long for this. We were really disappointed with the quality of the food. It's not the most expensive restaurant, but it should be above the standard of pub grub. However, the chips and the bread rolls were cheap and tasteless. We also heard another customer saying that her chips were not freshly cooked, and she was given her meal free too.

I totally understand that maybe we just went on an "off night", because most other reviews are excellent, but I can't get my head round the way the risotto was cooked. There shouldn't be any oil swimming around it.

On the plus side, the staff were all very friendly and they took my meal off the bill without any quibble. Hopefully they don't have too many...

Let me stress by saying this remote location was only visited on a Saturday due to all other restaurants and cafes nearby being closed. It was not our first choice for a stop. We were visiting tourists traveling through the highlands, and we needed hot drinks for the road. As we had no other options, we stopped by this charming restaurant to ask for some coffee. When we saw their coffee was ridiculously overpriced, machine prepared coffee (not an espresso machine, but one of those automatic coffee makers), we decided to forego the coffee and just get some hot water to go. In any other country, tourists would be treated with a modicum of respect and decency. That was not the case here, which is surprising, given that one of the largest industries generating revenue for Scotland is hospitality and tourism. The blonde waitress who was working in the restaurant looked at us as if we were insane when we asked for just two cups of hot water, to go. We expressed that we would pay for them, obviously, but it seemed that she was intentionally looking to humiliate us by boldly declaring that it was one of the most bizarre requests she'd ever received. We calmly said to her how this is a common request in our country, especially for travellers and toursists in remote parts, but she still complained LOUDLY about our request for hot water to her colleagues in the kitchens. Out of sheer pettiness, she filled two cups only half way with lukewarm water. She then went on to complain about how she has to charge us because their paper cups were expensive, to which we again replied, money is not the issue. If we never return to Scotland again, it is purely due to interactions like this. Another visiting family in the restaurant were a family of 4 Americans, and we saw the way this same woman treated them while taking their orders. If you're not trained to respect people, tourists especially, who are visiting your country, maybe don't work in customer service. Their restaurant was empty when we visited, except for two tables in such a massive place, and I do not think this was a coincidence. Uncivilized staff and overpriced menu. Eat at home or find some other place for drinks rather than...