The Dudley Arms — Restaurant in South Staffordshire

It's the first time we have had a Sunday roast dinner here and it won't be the last. We went around 6.00pm and there was plenty of room. The staff were exceptionally friendly and let us choose our table. Despite it being quiet the carvery was well stocked but most unusually there were no carrots! So we docked it a star, that will teach you! I should add it back as the beef was the best we have had in a very long time, lean and tender, and not dried out, please note Mr Toby. There was nothing wrong with anything else either, even the broccoli seemed to have more taste than usual, this and a rich gravy, what's not to like? It's not cheap but I still thought it was good value for money. Too full for a dessert, perhaps next time. Nice red wine and Sunbeam ale, plus a relaxed atmosphere made it almost perfect. Two weeks later and we did return, and yes they had carrots! The beef wasn't as tender as last time but I guess you can't have everything. It's now 5 stars as I haven't had a better carvery recently, however I am open to suggestions. I would like to add on a review for the function room which it appears that you can't do separately. The family and I went to an evening wedding party here and I must say how impressed I was with everything. It's has a very well presented upstairs room that holds around 75 people at a guess. I understand that they can arrange for most of the usual things that you may need. The evening hot food buffet comprised of large bread roll with a choice of roast pork or beef, roast potatoes and gravy. Straight forward but very well done as it played to their carvery strengths. Two small bars with a good choice of drinks kept the queues to a reasonable short wait. It also has its own separate car park, access is at the bottom of the main car park which I hadn't noticed before. I suggest it's well worth checking out if you need a function room for...

Booked a table for 7 to celebrate our twin grand daughters 13th birthday. Arrived on time and our table was pointed out to us. We had 2 birthday cakes with candles which we asked if they could be brought out after our meal. We ordered 2 meals and 5 carveries. They said they would let us know when the two meals were almost done so we can go up and get the carveries so we could all eat together. I asked . We asked fir a glass of sweet Rose wine and a glass of dry Rose wine. We were told they had dry Rose but bit sweet so the person who wanted the sweet rise changed their order. The Rose was sweet not dry so we had to swap drinks. We weren't told the other food was almost ready it just appeared so then 5 of is had to go and get our carveries. The carvery food was amazing and the lady serving the meat was friendly and sang happy birthday to the girls. When I got my food there was no cutlery so I had to ask for some . After we had finished it took ages for them to clear our table. We were asked if we wanted dessert and we said no thanks as we've got birthday cakes. We assumed they would bring them out as requested but despite asking a further couple of times for this to be done in the end I went up to the lady serving behind the bar and said we would take the cakes home and light them there. The bill was settled and the lady behind the bar apologised about the cakes not being brought out and knocked some money off the bill. It seemed like there was a function on upstairs and there was not enough staff downstairs to clear up and serve at the bar. Although the food was very good the cake incident spoilt the evening...

Carvery is lovely, as is the surroundings inside and out, however trying to get any service is impossible. Not allowed to go to the bar but left to sit unattended to. If you don't get your drink order and food order in as soon as they seat you then you've no chance of getting anything ordered. Even then trying to get a second drink or the bill proves challenging. I know it's a lot for staff to provide table service due to not being allowed to the bar under current restrictions but then in that case get more staff on? An idea would be to assign one staff member per area of the pub to attend to customers in that seating area.. It's not rocket science.

We are regulars and there has very recently been one occasion where we were seated in a corner next to the carvery ...and after 20 minutes of waiting we got up and walked out and went elsewhere, no one even noticed us leave so felt very undervalued.

I understand that wakes are popular here but even so no additional staff are put on shift so then they're spread even thinner across the customers. It's not just is that feel this way all customers are having conversations between themselves across the tables about this issue. Definitely better "bar management" is needed to iron out these problems otherwise customers will decide more and more to do what we did and vote...