The Wicked Lady — Restaurant in St Albans

So went for Sunday Dinner on the 28/05. From start to finish this was a very poor experience and that is being kind. Stood waiting for our table for 10 mins where various members of staff walked past with no eye contact or can I help you. Eventually approached the bar to get seated. Once seated it then took a further 10/15 mins to get our drinks order taken and this again came from us stopping a member of staff for service. Order was taken and drinks came in 5 mins. Starters then came 5/10 mins later. We had 2 portions of Mushrooms and Scallops and this part of the meal was the only highlight of the meal and was actually very nice and hot. Main course came within minutes of our starter plates being cleared where we had 2 Trio of Meats and 1 Sirloin of beef. All 3 plates were warm however the food all round was a complete let down. The pork on both plates was just basically a lump of fat. The crackling although small was actually very tasty. The chicken leg and thigh was luke warm and clearly been ready for a long time as was a little rubbery and luke warm. The beef although warm on all 3 plates was warm but quite tasty. The vegetables, Roast potatoes, Yorkshires and Gravy were all warm and very limp with no crunch on raosties and tough skin. The Yorkshires were just chewy. For pudding we went for a trio of cheesecakes, pavlova and a panacotta. These were all a big let down as cheescakes were tasteless, panacotta was overset and the pavlova basically was sharp with too many berries. For drinks we had 4 bottle of Coke and 1 bottle of Ginger beer.

Service overall was abig let down and very uncoordinated with no direction for any staff although they were polite when serving.

The bill was just short of £120 for 3 people having a Sunday pub dinner for me would of been acceptable if the food reflected that, however even half of that bill would of been over payment for this quality of food.

Did we complain on the day, no we didnt as there was no attention to us during our meal and to be honest based on that it would fall on deaf ears.

If you are going to charge £40 a head for a 3 course roast dinner then everything needs to be freshly cooked, hot and full of flavour and texture.

Very let down by the whole...

Staff very friendly, but need to pay attention to things like light fittings that are not angled correctly, along with lightbulbs that have blown. We were sat at a table that had very little natural light, so had to use our phones torchlights to read menus. When staff noticed they turned lights on, but due to previously mentioned issues it didn't resolve the lighting situation. We eventually suggested we move to another table with adequate lighting. Our starters arrived promptly, however the whipped brie was disgusting and as it tasted more like ripe stilton, I believe it was off. The creamy mushrooms were clearly made with tin mushrooms. When alerted to the brie tasting awful staff offered a replacement and deducted cost from bill. Mains was not much better. Two of us had the pork belly with scallops. The potato Dauphinioises were dry and oddly sweet, one belly pork was mostly fat and not rendered down enough, the two scallops with each meal were not cooked properly and didn't even look cooked. We suspect they were cooked from frozen as they were so lacking in taste and texture, if this is not the case, then the chef needs retraining.... The gravy was quite frankly an unexpected extra and was at odds with pineapple and pepper .... But the ladies toilets were the lowlight of our evening.... As you make your way up the grubby corridor, you emerge into a filthy stairwell... The paint work I suspect has never seen a cleaning cloth.... At the top of the filthy stairs you are greeted with a door that is so ingrained with dirt that you don't actually want to touch it... Once we opened the door it was difficult to comprehend what you saw... The door opening out onto the roof is the best bit. The second cubicle has had the toilet removed, but don't worry it's on the roof, propping the door open, the third cubicle has a toilet but the wall at the back is missing and the cistern and hole in the wall is piled high with odd bits of wood... The whole toilet experience was made much better by the many flies buzzing about. If we had used the toilets before we had eaten, we'd have left without eating. So no we...

Staff were welcoming at the bar and at the station where the booking was “checked-in”

We were seated at a table that was perfectly adequately sized for my wife, I and three children.

Service was a little rushed - it felt like the waitress was trying to turn over the table - but all in all it was fine

The food was the reason for the weak overall score. Unfortunately, the prices you are charging is absolutely and utterly the wrong price point for the quality of the food.

My wife had a chicken burger - from memory it was around £18 - really poor quality food, poorly executed and I’m sorry to say, £5-7 too expensive for what it was

I had the steak pie from the main menu - again, recognising you need to maintain 65% margin on food is fine .. but I’d assume the margin on that product was significantly higher .. at £19 approx, you have to deliver a half decent product but the quality of the product was really poor .. the accompanying mash and gravy were equally poor - I assumed the mash was made from packet ingredients

The kids meal was adequate .. kids sausage and mash - one sausage - doesn’t provide good value for money. The kids burger was probably the best of the 5 meals we ordered. The final kids meal we ordered was the grilled chicken strips - adequate and as expected - but the side salad was totally bizarre - it was also 1/4 raw, white onion ! For a kids side salad? Just a weird thing to served

Desserts x2 - Brownie / ice cream - all good - as described. Service was rushed

From memory the pint of Neck Oil I ordered was again more expensive than the quality of environment warranted (by...