Rhydycar Harvester — Restaurant in Wales

My wife went here after a long 5 hour journey with her friend and godson and while they waited to be seated, they were walked past by 3 different waiters who completely ignored them, rather than just say a simple “hi someone will be with you shortly”

When the lady finally arrived to seat them, she just stood there looking at seat and said “oh no sorry we have no room.” Despite there being seats outside and inside, and it not being busy at all. The outside option was never offered to them and they just got stared at.

My wife stood there for a minute before asking if they could sit outside, which the woman was like “yeah, I suppose, but you have to order at the bar.” Fine by my wife, they had a hungry and tired 2 year old they needed to feed.

They went outside and sat themselves down and asked for a high chair which arrived 10 minutes later. I took them 5 minutes to choose what they wanted to eat and when my wife went inside to order at the bar- as she was told- she was waiting there for 15 minutes with waiters and waitresses walking past her smiling as they did whatever it was they were doing (some just standing around in a different spot)

Another small family walked over and someone finally came over (who had very clearly seen her stood there several times as they went by) and served the people who had JUST got to the bar. My wife stood there in utter disbelief at this and when eventually it got to her turn to be served (a further 10 minutes later) the woman huffed when she said they wanted to order food. She took the order and was the most miserable woman to exist. As soon as my wife paid the woman was like “by the way it’s gonna take ages coz everything is”. This should have been told BEFORE my wife ordered because then they would have found elsewhere to go.

When they were up getting the salad bar, there was no salad. No bread rolls, nothing. This was raised to them multiple times, but nothing was done about it. So while waiting for the food (in the ages it took) they had nothing to snack on, nothing to keep the toddler entertained and had to sit hungry for 1hour 40 minutes. Despite walking past the serving wall to get the drinks and seeing that their food was sat there.

When it finally got to them, it got put down in front of them without a word, and the waiter just walked off.

The food was stone cold, but no one came by to check “how’s everything going” so no opportunity to leave any feedback on how disgustingly cold it was.

No one ate the majority of the food, because it was vile, and in the end after more time waiting inside to speak to someone, and a further 2.5hours to travel they left.

My advice to anyone would be to AVOID this place with every ounce in your body. You may turn up thinking it looks lovely but it...

We attended this restaurant to celebrate my father's 70th birthday. There was no celebration. There was no enjoyment at all. This was possibly the worst dining experience my family and I have ever encountered. The issues we had were numerous, I will attempt to summarise them succinctly below:

The outdoor tiles of the restaurant were bumpy and uneven which almost led to a fall. We had to wait 15 minutes to be seated by a staff member, who only seated us after we started making moves to seat ourselves. One staff member actually ignored us after my mother had asked her politely if we could be seated. We were not allowed to sit in the area of the restaurant we desired as a staff member told us it was closed off. We were not given any reason explaining this. The area we desired to sit in was relatively secluded and quiet which would've been ideal for my 6-month old daughter. The staff member who took our order failed to lodge it with the kitchen which resulted in us waiting 30-minutes for food that wasn't even cooking. We only became aware of the situation after enquiring ourselves with another staff member as to why our food was taking so long. As our original order had not been lodged, we were forced to re-order our food with another staff member, without the benefit of having the menu in front of us which was a struggle. The salad bar was largely devoid of food, the salad itself was stale, and the rolls were rock-solid. The soft drinks from the dispenser were diluted to the point where they all tasted like water. The portions of food ordered from the menu were paltry in light of the expensive price we paid for them. The salmon we ordered was so dry it was almost cremated. The manager we politely raised our concerns with was completely disinterested, dismissive, and patronising towards us. We felt brushed off in a very rude way. The manager did not have the decency to even apologise to us for the poor level of service we received and instead sent another member of staff to deal with us (who was very gracious and helpful). The remedy we were initially offered for this regrettable experience was a meagre 25% discount off of the bill which was frankly insulting. The discount was only raised to a more acceptable 50% after we further expressed our deep dissatisfaction with the poor level of service.

It cannot be overstated just how awful the experience we had with this restaurant was. This was a huge blemish on what was meant to be a very special day for my father. It is a massive personal regret and I can say with utter certainty that we will not be visiting this restaurant ever again after this horrific ordeal and we would advise others to...

I have always loved Harvester - mainly because of the salad bar tbh. My husband booked a table for 12:30 on Sunday 26th January 2025 and are order was taken very quickly, however there were no jacket potatoes so I had to chose an alternative for my meal. Thankfully the salad bar was well stocked and fresh (except for the rolls which were dry and hard) and I thoroughly enjoyed everything I stacked my bowl which I slowly ate while I waited ..... and waited ..... waited for the main meal. Meanwhile the guests continued to arrive - including several large parties with young children. Nothing seemed to be coming out of the kitchen and it was obvious there was a problem! By the time our main meals were served - almost 1hour after we had arrived - I was full of salad, but also extremely disappointed with what I was given - I did in fact laugh! The meal was incomplete (no coleslaw) and also badly burnt. The waitress said she would return the meal and returned shortly afterwards to advise me that it would be a while to replace. My husband accepted his meal - which was a mixed grill - which was also overcooked (but he was starving and doesn't like to complain). His medium-rare steak was well done; the chicken leg (not a quarter) was burnt and also over-cooked; the gammon steak and black pudding was like leather and the fried egg had a hard yolk but thankfully the peas, tomato and chips were at least edible. Due to the time factor I asked for my Camembert tart to be packed to takeaway which was arranged and I was served with extra fries and coleslaw. The waitress was extremely apologetic and admitted to difficulties in the kitchen - which obviously wasn't her fault! I also saw several other meals being returned to the kitchen - so this certainly wasn't a one off experience to us! Sadly my husband will never return to a restaurant that he has had a bad experience (which is unfortunate for me as I love the salad bar) so we will not be back, but this was an unfortunate incident and the waitress we...