Three disabled women walk into a tea room. This isn't the beginning of a joke though, this actually…read morehappened. One with a stick, one hobbling, one limping and all neurodivergent. We wait to be seated, its small, cramped and noisy but had good reviews, so we thought we'd give it the benefit of the doubt. Our first choice of food is not available, so two of us choose the fruit scone with Bon Maman jam and strawberries, I go for cheese scone and apple chutney. Two coffees arrive, fine, but the coke (because they ran out of San Pellegrino) is room temperature, on a very hot day, not even chilled.
We wait for a good 15 minutes for food while, what later transpires to be the owner, fawns over a table (he's been doing this since we arrived) having Afternoon tea and prosecco, completely ignoring the rest of the tea room, leaving a young girl to manage on her own. The owner is wearing shorts, a button down shirt, converse and a pink bow tie. Make of that what you will.
The two fruit scones arrive, small hexagonal, dry, clearly shop bought, no Bon Maman jam, just cheap stuff from Brakes and two strawberries. Ok, so two is technically plural but for £5.75 without a drink, we expected something more than what we got. The cheese scone however was another story. It may have been homemade, but the waitress had "warmed" it in a microwave, rendering it soft, bouncy, claggy and basically inedible. I tried because I was hungry but after two bites, I already had indigestion, I can feel it sitting in my oesophagus, not going down. We tell the waitress that microwaving doesn't work for bread based products as it makes them go soggy and soft. She looks terrified.
Bow tie comes over and we quickly realise why she looked terrified. He offers a cold replacement scone, but I politely say, "I can't eat anymore, I have indigestion from attempting to eat the soggy microwaved scone". He flies into a rage, like a switch has been flipped, swearing, practically throwing the food across the restaurant, saying he's been baking scones for 5 years and there's nothing wrong with them. I reply, "I've been baking them for 40 years and they shouldn't bounce". I point out the fruit scones were clearly not home made. He admits they are shop bought, demands to know where it says his food is homemade, "well all over your Facebook page" (although he's now changed that). He tells us to "f**k off" no payment required. Despite this entire interaction lasting no more than a minute and almost all him swearing at us, on the way out, one of us is fat shamed told "you don't look like you are short of a meal anyway" and I am called a "thick lesbian". Now, If he'd fat shamed me, at least it would have been factual, but I'm far from thick with an IQ of 154 and am definitely not a lesbian, though many have tried over the years! I just have short pink hair.
Stating home made should not be necessary. When you are charging those prices home made is assumed and should you be told by a customer that preparation has rendered the food unpleasant, you should politely accept this, apologise and make the situation right somehow. What we experienced was nothing short of Ramsey's Kitchen Nightmare levels of denial that the food was substandard and overpriced for what it was and all done in front of other customers.
None of us venture out that often as generally the outside world is inaccessible at best and socially overwhelming at worst. This experience has reminded us why we choose to stay home most of the time and henceforth we shall be installing moats and filling them with alligators.
My advice is that Margaret's Tea Room, has a) no Margaret and b) is run by a very rude man who relies on cheap insults if you dare question his mass produced, masquerading as middle class, food. At least we got away without paying for such horrendous food and service.
