The Old Thameside Inn, London Bridge

Twice I ordered drinks at the bar. The concept of good customer service was clearly as complex and alien to the first barmaid as the 63 moons of Jupiter: she was terse, unfriendly, disinterested and seemed slightly taken aback by all these strangers asking her for drinks on a scorching Sunday afternoon. The second barmaid was only slightly better in that she did me the favour of actually looking at me when serving me, albeit for a couple of seconds. Lucky old me!

They did tell us that the food would be a half hour wait, which was good. However, while the gammon and eggs was mediocre, the fish and chips were atrocious. The fish batter was caked in oil; you only had to press it slightly with your fork to see the oil come oozing out; and the fish inside was hard and rubbery. I pointed this out to the "deputy manager" but, rather than take this on board so as to put it right, he proceeded to tell me how he'd taken the dish back to the kitchen before it was served to us because he'd seen something wrong with it. The fact that the dish had still managed to reach our table in this sorry state did not seem to register with him. He seemed more concerned about telling us what a great job he was doing. I've had better service in post-communist Russia. Avoid this place like the plague.

12 Jul 2010 19:40