I don't often get to use the word "bamboozled" but that is exactly how I feel when reading these sterling reviews of Orchardleigh! The best I could muster would be a "Meh, it's okaaaaaaaaay." Because of the occasion we still managed to have a good time but ever the objective observer, I couldn't help but make mental notes during our stay with a plan to put them to paper, albeit digital paper, eventually. I'll start with the aesthetics, follow with the food and finish with service.
My partner and I attended a wedding over the weekend. Firstly, the pictures on the website paint a much more appealing picture than it looks in person. The grounds are indeed expansive and I'll concede that in January they are not at their peak of loveliness, but even our taxi driver said what a shame it is that they don't keep up the grounds properly and just leave dead trees and piles of broken branches lying there. I can see how the back gardens could be very nice in the right weather. The outside of the house is very "Downton Abbyish" but the interior mostly disappoints. The billiard room was impressive (I assume because it was dimly lit) and the wood fires put of a pleasant scent but our bedroom (The "Ily room") was not the 4-poster oasis we were hoping for. The furniture was a mix of some traditional pieces (often dirty - see the mini chaise) with some kind of trashy-wannabe-cream-leather-IKEA sofas. The room was freezing, the radiator leaked, the shower didn't really work. The room did have some strong points, being a comfy bed, a nice bathtub and how spacious it was.
On to my favourite thing to review...the FOOD. The evening began with a variety of canapés and bubbly. These were all edible but unimpressive. There wasn't any temperature variation so things that probably should have been a bit warm, weren't. The dinner was downright disappointing. We began with what I can only describe as the worst parsnip soup I've ever had. I'm pretty convinced they just pureed parsnips with water. It was awful. I seriously don't know in what universe that would have passed for a decent soup? The main was a classic roast beef with roast potatoes, Yorkshire puddings and veg. Our roast beef was so overdone, I had to get extra water just to make sure I could swallow it. Potatoes and veg are pretty hard to mess up and the gravy made the meal tolerable but this was a pretty poor showing. To be fair, there were other roast beefs floating around that were not cooked beyond recognition, we just weren't lucky enough to snag one of those. The chocolate cake dessert was my favourite. Unfortunately, Orchardleigh can't get anything more than credit for presentation, as this was the wedding cake that I *believe* was outside catered. Finally, at 10:00 there was an additional round of hog roast sandwiches and a cheese plate. The pork was decent but not anything more than roast meat. I enjoyed the cheese that was on the plate. Kind of hard to mess up cheese... We didn't make breakfast the next day because we couldn't be bothered to get up for what would, based on our earlier food experiences at Orchardleigh, be a disappointment.
From an individual perspective, all of the staff at Orchardleigh were very friendly and helpful. On the whole though, there was some lack of organisation. 120 of us were all crammed like cattle into a hallway for canapés and were then crammed into the same hallway while they cleared the dining space to make room for dancing - this seemed to take hours! Another point of contention for us was that at 9:00am, the cleaning person burst into our room (we may or may not have been butt-naked) without even knocking. My boyfriend managed an "OYE!" before any irreparable damage was done but seriously?? We also had to be out of the house by 11:00am. This resulted in us having to totally change our plans and end up at the airport about 5 hours before our departure because, well, we had nothing else to do.
We would have loved to provided the venue with this feedback, as they provide you a lovely form to do so, however they don't leave you a pen. I tried to communicate it telepathically but just to be sure, I put it on Yelp too. read more