We started the evening with the haggis and it was delightful. Followed with our main course which was absolutely wonderful. The toffee pudding to finish it off was fantastic not to mention a few great cocktails and great service read more

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Quick service, and the staff were friendly. The food was great and the dessert was delicious.

Our Contiki group dined at Ash for dinner during our visit to Inverness. We were weary, tired and just a tad sick. The soup came out and had a strong celery flavor to it but it was good. One of the girls at my table didn't care for it but it was warm, liquid, and tasty to me. The main was chicken in cream sauce and vegetables. It was yet another chicken dish. We didn't get a choice really so chicken it was. It was ok and at least the chicken wasn't dry. I ate what I could manage. The dessert was chocolate cake but it was a little stale. I only consumed water with my meal because I had just come down with what we referred to was the Contiki cough. The service was fine and they did well for serving a group of 53 at the same time. The dining area was modern and sleek compared the the rest of the hotel and the bar area was really cool. read more

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All style and zero substance for a hefty charge. My wife and I were traveling on holiday and booked two nights at the Royal Highland Hotel. We paid a little extra at booking for a dinner included, and the front desk gave us a voucher for the attached restaurant Ash. It was, in a word, terrible. The service was mediocre. They were trying, but it seemed really disjointed. Rather than one waiter or server, we were visited by just about every member of staff at least once. This made for a lot of repeating and some confusion. Also, there was a real language barrier with most of the staff. The food was a joke. I had the haggis neeps and tatties (beef haggis, mashed turnips and potatoes) and Sausage and Mash main while the wife had Carbonara main and creme brûlée dessert. The Haggis was actually ok (you know for Haggis) but was covered in a strange flavorless cream gravy. The sausage itself was alright, but the potatoes were microwave heated and the gravy was bland, flavorless bisto. The carbonara pasta tasted like it had been microwave reheated and not at all fresh. The "sauce" was cream and a touch of butter and nothing else. And not even a little Parmesan cheese. The creme brûlée custard was ok, but the brûlée was badly torched Beverage Selection was one high point. They had a pretty impressive list of spirits and wines with more than a few cocktails . It's a shame the bartender had no idea how to mix a balanced cocktail. In the end, we both picked at it and considered sending it back for something else, but looking around at our neighbors plates, we determined it would not help. We paid for our drinks, gave over our vouchers and went to the Indian restaurant down the street for a much better meal (I'll review that later) Disappointing, flavorless, not fresh, and WAY overpriced. There are many better options within a minute's walk. read more

Service was fine and food came quick, too quickly actually. Some of our dishes we could tell it was reheated in the microwave, over cooked, tasteless dishes with shop bought sauces and low quality ingredients. Don't get fooled by the lunch deal that they offer, we left very disappointed and couldn't really finish our food which very rarely happens. Never again! read more

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We had a great experience dining at Ash. For the price, you aren't going to do much better within walking distance of River Ness. The waitstaff was attentive, accurate, and appropriately expeditious. The venison was outstanding. Traditional Scottish dishes were well prepared. Ash is underrated--give it a chance. read more

Surprised at the Qype reviews. We saw the '2 courses for £6.95' lunch offer and, not wanting to travel far from the bus station, headed in. The place looked reasonably swanky and we were expecting a nice feed. We weren't the only ones as most of the clientele seemed to be people waiting on buses and trains, with a glass of wine and an iPad. The menu was a wee bit deceptive. Three tiers of main courses, which you can add a starter or desert to. The choice of main determines the overall price (6.95, 8.95 or 10.95). Many of the starters and deserts have additional charges. I started with chicken pate. My previous assumption was that chicken pate is such a great, simple dish that even when it's bad it's good. Not so. It came piped into a tower with a black olive on top and tasted like someone had blended cardboard and water into it. The texture was closer to cake then pate and the two tiny pieces of toasted bread provided were not sufficient. For mains I went with minute steak served with chips, onion rings, salad, grilled mushroom and roast tomatoes. Note the plural tomatoes. The minute steak was decent. I think when you order minute steak you know what you're getting. There was a single tomato on the plate (plural on the menu) and the salad was the same salad I had with my starter. Most ickily, on closer inspection the green peppers in the salad looked like they had been cut at least a day ago (all wrinkly and shriveled) which made me question the dish and I ended up eating only the steak and chips. If I'm in the area again I'd give it a miss. UPDATE: I've edited this review and dropped a star off. Why? Not liking a dish is one thing. Being physically ill for up to a day after eating a very small amount of a dish is another thing entirely. I know it was a cheapish lunch (under a tenner each) but seriously. Not worth it. read more

We must have had 5 different waiters and waitresses tend to us throughout the meal, each one unaware of what was discussed with the previous waiter or waitress. They stood together in a cluster by the bar staring at the patrons, but never really approaching any of the tables. I had to signal when I needed something because they were talking amongst themselves. With every request for more water, a new glass was brought out and the old one left on the table. At the end of the meal we had a collection of glasses. One of the servers actually said audibly to the bartender, "one water please!"...Why not just bring a pitcher of water by the table and refill? The food wasn't terrible, it was satisfying. But the service was. In fact, bizarre. One of the strangest experiences I've ever had at a restaurant. read more

My family and I had an awful experience here. We were looking for something near the train station that would have both vegan and nonvegan options and happened upon this place. When seated they took about 10 minutes to take our drink order which we weren't complaining too much about but they got my fathers dry martini completely wrong, not dry at all. After that we waited nearly an hour for our food to come... Just 2 sandwiches and a pasta. When the food finally came it was messed up! The vegan order had cheese on it and the sandwiches were switched. what was supposed to be in the panini was in the normal sandwich and vice versa. After the meal we waited 40 minutes for the check to come while all the staff were standing around doing nothing. Worst experience ever. read more

Worst service I've ever had!!! We arrived an hour too early to check into our hotel and since this place is situated in the lobby, we decided to kill time by having lunch there. There was no one there to greet us so we sat at the vacant table near the reception desk. We looked through the menu, which each table already has, and decided on a couple of small plates. After waiting for about 10 minutes (still no greeting or acknowledgement) a server quickly walks by, smiles but doesn't stop. After another 10 minutes, another server speeds by but also doesn't stop. At this point I have already decided to wait until after we check in, and just head to another place for lunch. After another 10-15 minutes, the woman who seemed to be a manager came within feet of our table (to clear the adjacent table) and although I was no longer in the mood to eat there, I asked her if orders are normally placed at the bar on the other side of the restaurant. She then informed me that she would be back in a couple of minutes to take our order. She came back after 5 minutes so I ordered a soup to hold me over until lunch. My husband ordered a cheese plate and 2 waters (which only arrived at the end of our meal after we asked a second time). He was also going to order a sandwich but was unable to do so because the woman who took our order was already turned and speeding away from our table within seconds! Our food finally arrived, which was just okay -- nothing special. After about 10 minutes, another server stopped by to ask if everything was okay (without stopping to listed to our full response) and that was the last time anyone from the staff stopped to check on us. We quickly asked for the check as one of the servers sped by, again and I decided to just get up and pay at the counter instead of waiting another 45 minutes to be acknowledged. This is our first trip to Scotland and prior to this, we spent 3 amazing days in Amsterdam where service everywhere was absolutely amazing! I was so disappointed with my experience at Ash that I actually thought this was the kind of service generally expected in Scotland. I was very relieved to read on yelp (and google) that this was not the case. It seems that many other guests had similar, if not worse, experiences here and that the poor service here does NOT represent the service provided in other establishments. Let's start fresh, Inverness. I can't wait to try the many other and much better options you have to offer. read more

We went here for a New Year's Day lunch. I'll start with the downside. Food took a while and the risotto wasn't great. But the kids meals were very generous and my daughter loved the pasta sauce. The coffee was pretty good and the deserts were brilliant. And the best thing was the service. We had the manager serve us and he was friendly and fun. Great value and had a wonderful time. Many thanks. read more

I am typing this in a bar (Number 27) not far from here as we left this place almost completely dissatisfied. We were recommended to another place but they couldn't seat us for a half an hour and being that we are traveling and making limited use of our data, we didn't use Yelp to find an alternate place to eat and we paid for that mistake. It started out okay, but when we placed our drink order, I asked for a pint of the IPA (that's the standard way we ask for an India pale ale in the states, and given that they only offered one on the menu, I thought that would suffice). The waitress didn't know what I meant, but the way she handled it was completely off putting...she acted as though I were a complete idiot rather than being respectful and asking for clarification on what I was after. That started things on a downward slide... The food (aside from the basic mixed greens salad) was less than stellar. The seafood risotto was not thoroughly mixed such that the seasoning added to the base risotto was not uniform, and there was no squid to be found anywhere in the dish. The special leek and potato soup was dull in flavor, and was really funny for a potato soup, though I would be willing to concede that the very thin consistency could be a regional preparation and not a fault with the dish, but again when it came to flavor, the soup fell flat. Also, the roll that was served with the soup should have been called a brick. It was so hard (not your typical hard crusted roll) that it had to be sawed with a knife to cut it. Not good. The service consisted of them dropping off the food and I think we had four different waiters that were involved in serving us, so we had to keep clarifying what our waiter should have known - simple things like explaining who ordered what. That type of bush league behavior I expect at a dump of a diner, not someplace that serves £15+ entrees. The final straw on this place that dropped it to the bottom of the rating scale was at the end of the meal, we were simply asked "You finished?". Not anything like asking us if we wanted dessert (we were thinking of doing that), but we were at least going to get a drink. After asking if we could see a dessert menu, the third or fourth waiter that had been involved in serving us, handed the menu to my girlfriend over her shoulder rather than coming to the table side as I guess those extra 4 steps were too much effort to put in. A few things to note, they were not busy and there was a lot of standing around by the staff as noted by another reviewer. Also, there was one redeeming thing about the place, the mixed greens salad was very fresh and refreshing. So if you are looking for terrible service and a good mixed green salad, then this is the place for you. If not, go somewhere else as every other place we have been on this short trip to Scotland has been outstanding! read more

We were treated horribly at this restaurant. We booked the Royal Highland Hotel through Superbreak (a nice company to deal with) and we upgraded our booking with breakfast and dinner vouchers (we paid extra for the vouchers). The vouchers were delivered as expected but Ash did NOT accept them. We discovered this AFTER the meal was over. The waiter who handled payment was VERY rude to us and we were treated like second class people by the entire staff. It ended up costing us £50 more than we expected and we are still holding the useless vouchers. All of the waiters just hovered around the bar with the restaurant manager and were obviously talking about us and giving dirty looks. The manager never came over and addressed the situation, I told the waiter that we will never return and his exact answer was "The restaurant will move on without you". Please don't patronize this restaurant; there are plenty of other options where you will be treated with respect. Just exit the hotel and walk a few steps to the right; there is a very nice pub next door and we had great food and service...I wish I could remember the name of this place. read more

Ash gets five stars from me. It is just the sort of place to go if you are celebrating or fancy a great meal although as already mentioned the food is a bit on the pricey side but it is linked to a hotel so that could be expected. The best thing about Ash is there cocktails which are also a bit on the pricey side but definitely worth it. I was recently in there and got a pitcher of a cocktail for £9.95 which was very nice and did several drinks for myself and my friend however don't expect a pitcher like you would get in Wetherspoons but more of a small jug. The atmosphere is great and the staff are really friendly. read more

Horrible service. I didn't even get to taste the food. When I walked in the host/manager asked me what I wanted. To dine please. I respond. I was shown to a table. After 5 minutes the server still hadn't acknowledged Mt presence and the manager came back to ask if I was ready to order. I told I would like a water and when you come back I'll order a beer. He dropped my water and left. After I watched the manager and the server smooz other guests o just got up and left. I felt like they looked at me as if I were out of my element and I could afford to eat there. read more

My order for one of their signature cocktails came out as a simple pour of gin--a £8 pour of gin. I was able to get it straightened out at the bar (since I was unable to flag down any of the servers), and the bartender was so nice, that i couldn't really be mad, however he did tell me that he hadn't seen the rest of the ingredients listed, and thought that it was simply rhubarb gin i wanted. Shouldn't the bartender be familiar with their own drinks list? Maybe he wasn't the usual bartender? At any rate, he came over after the meal to ask how the drink was, because he didn't think that those ingredients sounded good together. I assured him it was fine, and then he left a comment card for us to fill out. Except i think he expected us to say something nice on it, god bless him. Sort of like when a particularly challenged five-year-old shows you a drawing they did, and you have to pretend like you can tell what it is. I ended up leaving it blank. Other than that, the food is decent and presented attractively. The staff are friendly, but rather disorganized for the type of restaurant they're trying to be, at least for the prices that they're charging. read more

Used to call in ash every now and again and has always been better for a relaxed drink than food. Lunch today (22 may 2009) was simply shocking. Clearly heated up mass catering rubbish that even lacked finesse in putting it on the plate. Shame as has never been like this before. I hope it's a one off but I won't be back to eat. read more

Despite many negative Trip Advisor reviews, we went to Ash in Inverness. I'll be the first to admit that we should have taken previous reviews into more consideration as the majority were a good indication of the service we received or lack there of. Well we got in and after waiting five minutes the six of us were seated on two tables squished together in the bar rather than all of the seats and tables already set in the usual dining area. We were given menus and before two of us even opened the menu were asked for our starter order, despite telling the waiter we were not ready to order yet we said well we need to do starters first and we buckled into ordering starters and drinks. Well five of us were asked if we wanted drinks the waiter ignored the last member of our six person table and brought tap water for her. Half of these came with napkins coasters while the other half did not. Nearly all of us had potato wedges with a garlic dip, side salad and I believe a salsa if memory serves correct. As we got our starters on the table the waiter must have noticed the slight lack of cutlery and brought some over having to lean over us while our starters went cold. The cutlery provided was unpolished and water-stained. How were they? Well the dip was delicious and the wedges were flavoured nicely but really I wouldn't say anything worth the price. After our starters, well I say after three of us were still eating when they took away the plates and asked for mains orders. The penne carbonara sauce was bland and watery, the meat wasn't very well spread though the dish and the garlic bread on the side was very hard and had no taste to it at all. Other members of our group were unimpressed with the beef steak pie and commented on the thinness of the gravy. Also ordered was the ribeye steak rare which came as ordered and nobody had any issues with it but again were not raving about it either. The last of our party ordered fish goujons which were neglected from the original order. As we received our mains he had every other main placed in front of him and every time had to hand it to the person who had ordered it before being left with nothing in front of him and being asked what he ordered while the waiter wrote down and then added this onto the order via the computer based interface. After what was a short wait the goujons did arrive and we did all comment on the speed of service. Again half of us were still eating and the plates began to be collected without a word said by our waiter. After the last plate was taken we asked for refills on drinks and the desert menu. And then the wait started as a couple more tables came in and had their orders taken and served. Still no desert menu. After waiting a full hour without any further service, being ignored by the water who had to directly pass our table to serve anyone else in the restaurant, we gave up on desserts, frustrating half of the group who had skipped starters to take advantage of the '2 courses' lunchtime deals. Because we'd been trying to use their '2 courses for £x' deal, the bill they then provided us was horribly off, charging single courses at full price. We refused to pay full price given the ridiculous standard of service, and were harassed and followed out onto the high street until we return and paid the bill. Thinking this was a particularly bad experience we were on the other side of the road when a member of staff stopped one of our party demanding he return and pay the full price threatening him and causing a scene. Some of the party just left happy we had paid what was deserved but the threats caused panic in my companion and he returned paying the full price for the meal. For our troubles, we were given a £3 discount off of an overcharged, £65 meal (that should have cost less than £50). Unimpressive, boring food, offensively bad service, and aggressive staff... would never go again. read more

This is my first ever online restaurant review. But I felt obligated to note that, having eaten at restaurants at all price levels across Europe and the U.S., my experience at Ash was among the worst of my life. The servers and (as best I could tell) kitchen staff, were lazy, rude, and incompetent. I visited the restaurant with my wife and two kids. My daughter wanted penne, which they had on the menu, but she wanted it without the sauce. When we asked the waitress, she looked moderately horrified, but she promised to "ask" the kitchen. She returned shortly thereafter to state that the kitchen had "declined" our request--something that I don't believe has ever happened to me before. Now, I would of course understand this unwillingness to compromise in a top-flight restaurant. But this is a decidedly below-average (more on this in a moment) hotel restaurant. The staff's absolute lack of interest in being of service was apparent again later, when my son accidentally spilled a glass of water. Neither our waitress nor anyone else made any move to be helpful, even after I'd gone to the bar to get more napkins. Given the extraordinarily poor service, it seems almost beside the point to note that the food was lousy. My venison was shockingly overcooked. My wife's fish and chips were the worst we had during a week-plus full of fish and chips across the UK. As for my son, he ordered the "ribeye steak," which was more expensive than the "minute steak" on the menu. What he was served, however, far more closely resembled the latter: a ridiculously thin cut (maybe 1/8 inch) of the kind one might get for breakfast with eggs in a cheap diner. His onion rings, moreover, were inedible: all breading and over-fried to a leathery toughness. We are not difficult patrons. We did not even complain at the time. But Ash is one of the few restaurants in which I have ever eaten that I would rate as genuinely terrible across the board. read more

Terrible experience: I was hurry for the train in one hour and was told that there was no fast food here, and unbelievably, was urged to the other restaurant nearby! I'll remember Ash forever read more

Food was o.k. don't be afraid to go to the bar to pay. Used coupon from the attached hotel.

A bar/restaurant which links up to the hotel. The food is good but can be quite pricey. The bar has a lot of comnfy seats and they do a really good cocktail, normally quite expensive elsewhere but very reasonable. There is a good atmosphere within the bar. It is quite a modern bar as well and can be busy if there is an event on in the hotel. read more

good food and relaxing place

good to go have cake and cuppa