Went as a group of 4. Upon booking the table, we advised the staff that we had a Gourmet card, we were told this was not a problem.
We sat down and ordered some bar drinks. The drinks arrived, one of which was a John Smiths, Possibly the worst pint of Smiths I have ever tasted. The beer tasted flat, unclean and slightly warm. Another drink was a pint of premium lager, this was also poor flat, head died within seconds and smelt like washing up liquid. This is not good when you're charging £3.50 plus for a pint.
We then ordered our meal, 4 starters and 4 mains. The waitress then took away our side plates? (if this was the correct thing to do, i'm a little confused as to what they were for in the first place.) We were then given a basket of bread which we had to butter sitting it on the table. The starters arrived just over half an hour later (this seems a little lengthy for a Thursday night when the most complicated starter was Mussels.) From finishing the starters we waited 15 minutes before our table was cleared and a further 25 minutes for mains. The mains arrived a pasta dish, 2 pizzas (one of which was brought out missing a topping) and a med rare steak. The steak was most certainly medium well but we were in quite a hurry by this point so ate the meals. Another point about the steak it was served ontop of mushrooms in a garlic butter If i order a steak without a sauce, I don't then want it to be drowning in garlic butter!
In total from ordering to clearing mains, we were sat there 2 hours and 15 minutes. I then immediately asked for the bill, which arrived without the Gourmet discount taken off. I raised this issue to the slightly obnoxious, arrogant waiter/barman who responded by saying Well have you got the card on you? Working in the catering/hospitality industry, I would have thought a slightly politer response would have been more on the lines of Oh, I do apologise about that sir, would it be possible to take a few details from your Gourmet card? The bill was then put back down on the table, without an apology, with the discount taken off.
To top it off, an older female member of waiting staff was working wearing a pair of 3/4 length trousers I did think this was slightly unprofessional.
All in all, I say the pizzas and pasta dish were good quality but the steak, drinks, service and attitude of a certain male member of staff spoiled the evening for us. If we hadn't been getting 25% discount with the Gourmet card, I'd have certainly had something to say. We may return for a pizza but would never spend a great deal of money there. read more