please note - reviews on this site are purely the opinion of site visitors, so don't take them too seriously.
Dropped in for a pint and a bite to eat, quite liked it, nicely done out without too much rustic bling, food, pint and service all good. Better than a lot of places around here
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OK pub for middling pub fare. Near where I own a horse and OK place for a lunch for 10 without being super. It won't blow your socks off but does the job.
3 ales 2 Brains but a nice 3.5% session beer called The Wanderer (assume 3rd beer is a guest) which was tasty.
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Now taken over by Vintage Inns and with a new guv'nor and sufficient staff the service has greatly improved. The beers are generally London Pride, Brians SA and Doombar and are all well kept and reasonably priced. The food is standard catering "pub grub" good of its kind but the portions are a bit stingy (except for the mixed grill which is massive!). The full carpark most evenings shows the Star is back to what it used to be 4 or 5 years ago.
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This could be a really first rate pub if only it had the staff. Early evenings there is usually only one person, rushed off their feet, trying to do both the bar and wait tables.
Also, none of the bar staff are trained. On one visit, the pump ran dry and the sole bar person did not know how to change the barrel and seemingly could not find anyone who could. As a result I was given my money back! Something that has never happened to me in any pub before.
In spite of all this it seems to have a good food trade. Maybe I just hit it at the wrong time.
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I visited this pub around the same time as the previous reviewer (Sept 09) and could not agree more with their comments. My visit was especially disappointing given that this used to be a half-decent pub with a good atmosphere and friendly staff. Sadly, the reverse is now true.
Bar 'service' was abrupt and rushed and there were clearly not enough staff (one woman taking bar and food orders). I went in for a Sunday roast - surely a staple meal of the good British pub? Well not this one. Half the menu had sold out but had not been rubbed off the blackboard. Beef was available and was about the only edible thing on the plate. The rest was pretty appalling and the portions small:
Roast potatoes - like moon rocks, we did complain to our waitress about this who looked at us as if I'd just asked her to recite the theory of relativity.
Veg - assortment of over-cooked frozen veg. The green beans tasted like wet string and the parsnips like polystyrene.
The Yorkshire Pud - looked like a new lifeform and had the consistency of sandpaper.
Gravy - gloopy brown stuff that had the consistency of treacle.
Overall a debacle, complemented only by the loud and foul-mouthed yobs by the fruit machine. A terrible experience and one made all the worse by the fact it used to be pretty good. I have given it 1/10 for the beef.
gg500 - 17 Jan 2010 20:03 |
This pub has gone downhill over the past 7 months. What once was a friendly cosy country pub has changed for the worse.
I used to visit the Star all the time, the staff were very friendly, helpful and looked like they were enjoying their work. They were always willing to help. Now the staff look as though its the last place they want to be and the atmosphere is not what it once was.
I suggest instead going to The Swan or The Crown as you will recive much better service!
x.x.x - 21 Sep 2009 19:42 |
Not what it was. Beer still good and staff friendly but far too few of them for a place this size and you can wait a LONG time for a drink if the restaurant is busy. Ten minutes on one occassion - and this is not a joke, we timed it.
The Star is on the main road round the village and you'd do better to turn off into Kingsclere village itself which has 3 pubs (The Swan being the best).
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The staff are friendly and the beer is OK. Not eaten there but those I know who have like it. If only they had some papers other than just the bloody Independent!
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