The Boathouse — Restaurant in Shrewsbury

The Boathouse sitting over the River Severn, has so much potential to be the No.1 location to go to in Shrewsbury. Unfortunately there are a number key areas where improvements are definitely required:-

1. The establishment advertise itself has a Grill & Bar pub but unless you are sitting inside on a hot summers day there are no compromises of having the same menu outside?

2. we ordered 2 x Burgers & chips from their outside menu. Food came fairly quickly. We started to eat and had consumed half of my burger to find it was raw inside.

3. I spoke to the waitress who looked overwhelmed and said she would get back has soon has she could. I decided to go the bar to highlight the issue to save having to wait for waitress to come back. At the bar I showed them the burger & they said would cook another.

4. I returned to our table and a manager/owner came across. In anticipation for an apology I was aghast with his response. The uncooked burger which I had just half eaten was referred to in the same conertation has you would cook steak. He told us it was perfectly safe and some customers prefer there burgers raw has how you would eat steak.

5. In all my years of eating burgers have I ever been asked how would I like my burger cooked raw or well done? The implications of eating raw food are self explanatory.

6. The fact the manager was trying to justify why the food looked this way was more condensending than the actual complaint to start with. I was eventually offered a refund on my meal & reluctantly offered to replace. I followed him up to the bar & said I would just have the refund although he said I'm sending a new one out now. By this time my partner had finished eating.

7. The food came back out but this time I had really gone past the enjoyment of the time at the Boathouse. Another member of the management team came out to check all was ok. We thanked her for checking but did advise her we were not happy and if any food poisoning accurred would be taking it further with FSA for Shropshire.

8. Overall lovely location but unfortunately food and customer satisfaction let this restaurant down & looking at other reviewers this echos...

The boathouse is a lovely location for food and drinks. It’s one of my favourite spots in Shrewsbury. Unfortunately I will no longer be able to visit and neither will I be able to recommend the boathouse to anyone else.

This is due to an incident which occurred yesterday (17.06.2023) around 7 pm.

My friends and I were falsely accused of taking intentionally inappropriate pictures of our waitress. There was no evidence for these claims or accusations and even the waitress herself stated that she reviewed all pictures and they were harmless. The pictures were just for our own memories as it was a special occasion.

A table next to ours decided to bring it to the manager’s attention and that was enough for us to be asked to leave. Without any justification any evidence and without any complaint from the waitress we were supposedly inappropriately photographing.

This is ridiculous and after spending £200 or so here it will be the last we spend after this treatment.

Kaitlyn (apologies if misspelled) completely mishandled the situation as I was personally verbally abused by the person on the other table having being called a Neanderthal. Again, all I did was to ask what the issue was and my friend taking the pics showed everyone involved the pictures he had taken which were completely innocent as agreed by the waitress. So for Kaitlyn to decide we had to leave based on no evidence of the sort, and just taking another person’s opinion into consideration is not just.

We are deeply hurt, my friend has 2 children with another on the way and this left him distraught with the situation having questioned him self for no reason. This whole ordeal ruined the rest of our evening and tainted what was a great day.

Terrible ordeal, awful management and...

We have dined here 2-3 times per year when visiting family.

This time however was not a good experience.

I had booked earlier in the week. The booking process was easy over the phone and I was asked how many people, what time, dogs and do we have any dietary needs?

However on arrival it was as if our booking wasn’t on the system. Diners in our seats and only one table out of the two tables booked.

Food ordered and when it came out there was a few issues. One of the chicken pies was Black. I assume to crisp the pastry under the grill but it was inedible. Also at dessert the cheesecake was smaller than what a child’s portion would be and for £8.

Service was particularly poor. I counted at least 6 servers and 5 bar staff. We had to go to the bar to ask them to take our orders at the table. We seemed invisible. Granted if the staff were busy and rushing back and forth to the kitchen but they were all giggling and joking around with each other like they were just here to hang out rather than working and serving. At least look busy even if you’re not.

The bill came and we had been given a discount but no explanation why plus they added a service charge on top even though service was non existent. Shame really as we come here often to meet family.

Perhaps we will dine elsewhere in future.

Has the business changed hands? I think some customer service training, and quality control when food leaves the kitchen is needed before the Christmas bookings come in to avoid disappointment.

We are sad as we love this place. But sadly won’t be returning.

Side note we have always come in the week. This was a Saturday and it was fairly quiet. Lots of empty tables inside and outside and lots and...