Old Barn Farm, Three Legged Crossback to pub details please note - reviews on this site are purely the opinion of site visitors, so don't take them too seriously.
Now re-named as "The Three Legged Cross" with the three legs of the Isle of Man symbol on its sign. Still a Mitchells & Butlers chain pub, with nothing to distinguish it: everything is mass-produced (even such things as the "wild boar and chorizo burger"). Only visit if you like that sort of thing: it's about as individual as an M&S sandwich.
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We visited for lunch on 22nd Feb. The beer (Ringwood Ale) was wonderful. However, we were not so enamoured of the food. My husband had the Hunter Chicken with BBQ sauce. The chicken was OK, but had no flavour apart from adding BBQ sauce, but the chips were pale and undercooked. I had the Seafood Pie. This had a portion of white fish, some tiny dices of what could have been tuna (tough) and four prawns (which were good). There was no seasoning in the dish and the cheese topping was negligible. This was served with runner beans and carrots. The runner beans were not cooked for long enough. Did not care for the earthenware pot in which this dish was served, as it looked as if it had many servings of baked on food round the edges. Nothing wrong with the ingredients - but please - do serve chips well cooked, coloured and crispy and perhaps your fish pies would benefit from the inclusion of say smoked haddock.
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Went in the other day, the Ringwood was amazing, apparantly they are cask marque approved.
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My partner and I visited this pub for a lunchtime meal and decided to go for the specials deal which priced the starters and dessets at �2 each.
We chose the smoked mackerel fillet and the breaded mushrooms, shepherds pie and profiteroles and chocolate brownie.
The starters were OK, nothing special and easy to prepare with a microwave! but nevertheless acceptable.
The shepherds pies were truly awful, mine was mostly potato. When I complained the waitress offered to get me another but I declined her offer but she did bring a small dish with further filling in it. The amount of actual lamb mince present in the filling was an eye opener.
They would have been able to produce 24 'pies' with a 1lb of mince by my reckoning. The filling was mostly a gloopy gravy with pieces of carrot, tomato and onion.
The desserts were OK, again nothing special.
I cannot recommend this pub for it's food, one meal there was quite enough for me.
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A frequent user of this pub over the years, I despaired on Friday night when finally they lost my custom. A very varied menu, so lets try sole, "off" monkfish "off" mixed grill? "off" we finally settled for steak and a veggie dish for my wife. In fairness, my wife's meal was fine, but mine was appalling, poor service too.
Onto the drink, well we ordered a bottle of Chilean vin de pays, not cheap at �13.00 a bottle and not good value either, neither was the pint of bitter which I struggled to drink as like the wine it was warm and insipid.
At least the staff were friendly and kept on trying to get us to enter the quiz, which when we finally persuaded them that we really didn't want to play, they piped through to us via the loudspeaker system. Fell sad moaning about this pub, but it has slowly gone down the pan and its only hope is that it will pick up in the summer when the grockles come in, otherwise another Dorset pub is likely to close.
Avoid unless you have to go in.
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My name is skyler i am the daughter of Kerry Tarrant my grandpa.Tony Tarrant was the origanl owner of the old barn farm inn.He bulid it into a pub back in 1986 it was bought out by bass brewery .My mom says the house is haunted my mom grew up in the house since she was seven years old with her brother Dean Tarrant and her sister Dawn Tarrant has anybody else had any experiencses with any kind of hautings.There used to be a man named Patrick Duffy when my grandpa bought the house back in 1976 before it was turned into the old barn farm inn.Does anybody else have any history with this house they would share with us if so email at [email protected].
Thanks,
Skyler
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Together with my Wife, eldest son and his partner we visited this public house yesterday, arriving at approximately 9pm. To be honest, we had tried to get a table at Druscillas but that was fully booked up. In hindsight, they did us a favour.
Without fail, each of us enjoyed a superb meal that was both well presented and prepared. My sons' partner is a vegetarian and it was pleasant to see the wide range of meal options that were open to her, much greater than on offer at the other public houses we have attended.
To be presented with a meal and then have to worry that one of your party is losing out on the experience does not make for a convivial or harmonious evening however much that person may protest to the contrary.
The meals we had were, Open Chicken Pie - Son and myself, Goats Cheese and Nut Wellington and Chicken Forestier followed by Eves Pudding, Profiteroles and Apple and Honey Crumble.
I am ashamed to say that neither my Wife nor I could finish our meals however much we wished to but, true to form, our hollowed legged son rose to the task.
Despite previous comments by others, we found the staff courteous, efficient and, above all, discrete. None of the 'in your face' attitude that seems to characterise some restaurants and bars.
Had we arrived earlier, we would have availed ourselves of an outside table but, as it was, dusk had truly fallen by the time we finished our meals and were on our way home.
Personally, and I think I can say for may family, I would recommend this public house and restaurant and we shall certainly pay another visit before too long.
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Surly staff, though the barman was good. For what is supposed to be a family pub they had a distinct lack of high-chairs (only 2 in the entire place!). Cutlery was dirty and while waiting to pay for my (mediocre) meal the manager walked into me, even though I was holding a baby in my arms, without a word of apology. Needless to say I will never return there.
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The food is from a Brake Bros Catalog.
Therefore the menu range is too big.
Mitchell & Butlers have no money as 5 years ago they mortgaged 1/2 their estate.
All Mitchell & Butler pubs with beer gardens suffer staffing problems on sunny days in summer as the company will not allow them to use agency staff.
A �6.00 per hour agency worker would only cost the business �8.97 (based on an agency margin of �1.50). This in summer would yield higher revenue and lower employment percentage against sales. Put that in your 'Boston Matrix'.
True the staff are very good here apart from 'the jailer' - big guy behind the bar with a complex.
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As a member of staff at the Old Barn Farm I thought I would try and put across a different point of view. Many years ago the OBF was busy every night, weekends you couldn't move in the place. However, a number of serious errors of judgement on the part of the area manager led to two extremely poor managers in succession being placed in the pub. This put the pub in its downward spiral from which it has seriously struggle to recover despite now having had a number of good manager. The current staff do care big time and do their utmost to keep the customer happy, however you cannot please all of the people all of the time. The main problem comes from way above the manager. The pub is seriously in need of a refurb but they won't give it to us because we are not profitable enough (viscous circle). The manager is given a wages budget and gets in trouble for exceeding this. Therefore there can sometimes not be enough staff on the cope with an unexpected number of people, especially in the summer. As a member of staff I must tell all customers past or present who have a bad experience, please do not write us off. We all try our hardest when we are working and I get extremly frustrated when due to sheer numbers of customers and not enough staff that I cannot serve any quicker and people get upset. To those people who were unfortunate to come in during our 'dodgy manager' period perhaps you could come back and give us another try. M&B has spent �2m on a new menu and it is now really good - even I eat here so it can't be that bad. During the bad manager period even I stopped coming as a customer but now we come all the time.
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We used to eat regularly here and the food had always been ok and at times good so we decided to bring a couple of friends to lunch. The staff in charge were useless and rude, the food took ages to arrive and had been cooked to within an inch of its edibility. When we complained to the helpful waitress she told us to complain which we did and were virtually shrugged off. I wrote saying how disappointed we had been as we had been fairly regular customers. That was several months ago and I have not even had the courtesy of a reply. I have just discovered this site to leave a review so bear in mind things may have changed for the better - but beware!
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One of the three pubs closest to me, not the worst, by no means the best. After a poor experience about six months ago I ventured back in Saturday last and got a pleasant surprise. TT's Landlord, an excellent pint and a half of an excellent beer. The cask beer quality here has always been pretty good but the choice poor. Glad that's changed.
The place was cleaner than ever and the staff were cheerful, if not that quick. Can't comment on the food, still the standard menu. I will say I have had some enjoyable meals here and a couple of complete bummers. Competes in the same market as the Hall & Woodhouse Dining Pubs but comes off a poor second to most.
That TTL was great though, you don't get that in H&W pub..........
My rating? 6, built largely on the quality of its cask beer and its friendly staff.
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This is a classic Mitchells and Butlers pub. Chocolate box looks.
Brake Bros nuked/fried food.
Warm beer fidges.
Daily Torygraph paper.
Under paid staff, that have no product knowledge.
Unclean glass-washers that add funny smells to a pint of beer.
Deeply unhappy and depressing managers.
GET ME OUT OF HERE
anonymous - 30 Jun 2007 06:58 |
Visited in mid-Jan '07, late lunch-time. Partner's parents are moving to Ashley Heath and as we're in Verwood (5' in the car) then we really needed to visit.
First impressions, hmm, next to Ind. Est and farm. Second impression, nice building and garden - it's accessed directly off the main road but set back - and walking in, third impression was okay but smoky. Well come July that'll change.
It's got a varied food menu (too large for me) but very reasonable priced and portions were good sized.
It's clearly very child friendly, with several family groups eating lunch. Wide selection of beer and wine, I really wanted a Hen but settled for a Ringwood Best. Local beer, one I know well and can easily compare with others. I give the pint I had 9/10.
As a pub, it's not really my bag; a bit too smoky and a bit too 'pub-chainy' but there was plenty of staff, I was served by a courteous barman but some of the clientele put me off. (That'll be the bunch of 20s something, pushy and rude mob)
If you're in the area, with whiny kids and need a break, then it seems ideal for a stop off for lunch, or early supper. Garden, kids area, seperate area off to right as you enter (conservatory?) and what appeared to be rapid service, means they'll be entertained and you can relax. As a local, not much chance for me but then I'd go to The Monmouth in Verwood anyway.
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Beer tasted bad, because the glasses contain a metal taste from the dish washer. Landlord/Landlady stop your staff washing metal items in the glass washer and use some cleaning chemicals you can get free from Coores on your extented order on the back office system.
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We have just spent a very cold lunchtime in this pub. Do not get anywhere near the ventilator high on the wall to the left hand side as you go into the pub. The manager said it was beyond her control.
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Mitchells and Butlers pub!
Becks about �3
Served from a warm fridge.
Tip to manager : hover your fridge air filters, defrost the fridge once a week and if that does not work call property line or your contractor.
I expect my Becks to be cold.
You will increase sales and cash margins (Becks has a good GP% as it is a smaller bottle)
anonymous - 23 Nov 2005 11:44 |
things were not half as bad in September as the 12th June entry. No problems with the staff or their attitude. Just wish the Vintage Inns could offer something other than the national menu!
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Truly dire: The beer is fine and yes it is packed but the the staff are rude , stick bills under your nose as you are eating and drinking and a manager adept at saying it's group policy. The plus side is the location and the pretty thatched roof hiding a cynical corporate brand (vintage inns UK) and a customer hating manager who seems to be moulding her staff in her own self image-go anywhere else but do not let the look of this place fool you, you will be ripped off and you will be treaed with contempt, ther are plenty of other places to go to. And by the way ignore the warning, treat the user comments with respect, we are the same as you: paying customers not a website trying to woo advertisers.
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Has good food,good selection of drinks, good atmosphere, skittles alley only lacks a tv for sport and general entertainment in the evenings. Alwats packed in the summer.
Tim - 4 May 2005 11:50 |
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