Zest — Restaurant in Wigan

An experience from hell and beyond! Had an absolutely terrible experience in this place. Went there with a friend last Wednesday after a very nice night out watching a ballet, and I'm afraid to say the experience here really ruined our entire evening. The food was average (and below) with the onion bhaji the only nice item we tried. The curries were too oily for me and my friend's jalfrazy (which she asked to be medium hot) was so spicy that it brought her to tears.

But worst of all I have to say, was the terribly poor attitude of the manager. Apparently there is an offer of 25% off your bill if you have a loyalty card, and my friend, who had been there on the Monday with her husband, knew about it and had the card. Unfortunately she didn't have it with her. When she told the staff, the manager came round and told her without the card he is not going to give us a discount as advertised (although I was about to sign up that evening as a first time customer). After a little bit of investigation, we found out there is nothing important in the card (no numbers or a barcode that needs to be scanned), all it has is just a name which she was telling him and proving it with ID. The manager still said no in a very reluctant manner (not even bring your card later and we'll refund you), teh excuse being that he had no access to the database of the customers. We gently pointed it out to him that if there are no numbers and no barcode on the card and all he needs is a name, it's rather an unacceptable excuse to refuse to give the discount to the customers. The response to our point was very shocking and in fact disturbing: he started shouting at us very loudly and rudely and then when we refused to make the payment through him as a result of his rudeness, instead of replying to our request of calling another member of staff to settle the bill, he made us sit there for over 15 minutes! Imagine two ladies (my friend is in her mid fifties and I'm almost 30) at 11:30 PM sitting on our own being ignored while we are asking for the bill. And eventually I was asked to go to the bar to pay while this rude manager fellow carried on shouting like a mad man, let alone an apology. Well, I suppose I have made my point now; if you fancy a night of less than average food and terrible hospitality, then this...

If I could give this place zero stars I would. Truly terrible experience with exception of drinks, poppadoms and starters. Ordered mains but didnt taste before the standard 5 min return check by waiter who asked us how our meal was so far. Answered with so far so good, but how very wrong we were. Kids Korma resembled boiled chicken in custard. Girlfriends curry was just lamb in chilli powder and my meal (South Indian chilli chicken) was boiled chicken in tomato puree. On asking to speak to the manager we were greeted by a small arrogant man who said we complained all wrong and not after we'd eaten our meals. Well on informing said manager that our meals, still on the table and untouched bar our first bites were the worst we've eaten and that we were happy to pay for our drinks and starters but not our mains, we were met by a very unprofessional and intimidating attitude towards my girlfriend who had our 5 month old baby in his car seat next too her that was truly disgusting. Funny that his tone changed after I took over the conversation. So given that I told my family to stand up and leave informed by the little man that he no longer wanted our service ever again which I had to laugh at. I will never ever eat here again nor anyone I know. So in conclusion, if you want friendly service, good food and the manager to not talk down to your better half for daring to complain go to Amans or any other place on planet...

Average food for what I consider quite an expensive price. As a family we eat a lot of Indian meals out as we and the kids love curry, and on this occasion they even shared a Korma and rice (which by the way was so sweet it was unbearable). My lamb Karahi didn’t taste great either, and also had far too many big pieces of onion that was taken in my opinion from the outer section of the onion, the grainy green hard part, this made for a curry I had to pick through and couldn’t eat properly. We also got charged quite a lot for the chutney tray and popadoms, which Seems to be customary now in the north west, they used to be free at many places, that was considered a perk and welcomed freebee going out for an Indian meal!??they then had to cheek to try and charge us extra for a refill on the lime pickle when there was barely a tea spoon full in the first pot. Call me harsh, call me fussy, but I feel massively underwhelmed by a lot of places these days and this was no different, zest lacks value for money, good service, and atmosphere, the staff barely...