The Hare and Hounds, St Albans

petemac,
I was one of the party with caesar last week.We did not wish to indulge in the blame game as mistakes can and will happen however, in response to your reply,your staff initially took our order at the bar but came to our table when advising us that one of the dishes we had ordered was off the menu.At that stage, your waitress double checked the complete order for 6 people.However only 5 dishes came out! Even at that stage we did not want to make too big an issue out of it.We simply asked them to provide another meal, any meal!This was refused apparently by your Australian chef who had "closed the kitchen"! Not because you had run out of food but simply because at 9.30pm on a saturday night - he decided to close the kitchen! Please bear in mind that we made our request immediately we had been served and discovered there was a meal missing, this was no more than a couple of mins after we had been served our meals!! I find it rather incredulous for you to write that your kitchen closes at 9.30pm on a saturday. perhaps it might have appropriate to tell us that when we made a reservation for 6 people at 8.30! Does that mean that we would not have been able to order a dessert if we had stayed?? Your passion for your pub does you proud but unless your staff learn the first rule of any restaurant is to keep the customer happy, then i fear the worst for your establishment. For the record, on such a busy day I counted 4 other people dining in your establishment -This on a saturday night.The tables had not been cleared of glasses(I got up and did it!)my burger would have been very acceptable were it not for the fact that the bun was stale and hard. The decor was dull, drab and oppressive and totally unrecognisable from the image portrayed om your website.Iam sorry your staff feel hard done by - funnily enough the member of our party who did not get to eat also felt hard done by!!!! Your effort to put things right by telephoning one of our party and offering a complimentary meal was commendable. However, this has been undone by your posting and I am afraid that not even a free meal could tempt me to frequent your establishment again.

3 May 2008 18:35