It's rare (actually this is the first time) that I have ever felt so strongly about a dining experience that I have felt compelled to write a review.
The food was standard Indian, quite tasty, a little too greasy and overpriced in my opinion (average dish price £10, average side price £6, small bottle of diet coke £3), but the friends accompanying me thought the food was good.
The reason I have given the place one star is because of the appalling service we experienced. I eat out fairly frequently and I could actually go so far as to say this was possibly the worst service I have ever received.
We booked a table for 5 friends at 8.30pm on a Saturday. Some of the party were on time, and a couple of guests were late, but the staff refused to allow the guests to sit at their table until the full party had arrived. When the full party had arrived 15 minutes later we were informed that we had lost our table, but not to worry they would give us the next available table. We were told repeatedly over the next 40 minutes that this table would be ready in a few minutes. Whilst we were left standing, thirsty and hungry. If we had known the wait would be 40 minutes we would have certainly gone elsewhere.
We were finally seated at a table that appeared to be squeezed into a corridor around 9.30pm. This was almost definitely a health and safety risk and was uncomfortable as the chairs from the diners behind us were pushing onto our chairs. It wasn't the most pleasant of experiences.
Shortly before 10pm, we received some Popadoms - without plates. The plates didn't arrive until we had pretty much finished the popadoms. Members of our party had to ask for drinks repeatedly before they arrived. We had asked for a jug of water for the table 3 times this had still not arrived. Our main course arrived around 10.30pm (2 hours after our arrival)! We then had to ask repeatedly for the bill and it was another unacceptably long wait before it arrived. Put it this way, our original plan to go to a pub for a drink after dinner was no longer an option.
When we remarked about our poor experience to the staff, they were not particularly sympathetic, but responded with things like 'well it's Saturday night, what do you expect'!
Maybe it is not alway this bad, maybe this was a particularly busy night, but I certainly would not recommend it to anyone based on this experience.
It is also a very loud restaurant, and whilst we wanted somewhere with a bit of atmosphere and had chosen it because our friend had told us it was quite lively, it was difficult to hear each other speak over the table. They were playing loud music and there were a lot of large parties who were also shouting over the music. Definitely not the place to go if you are hoping to catch up with friends and actually hear your conversation.
Dine there at your own risk....you may be left standing for ages, being lied to, feeling very hungry, thirsty and wanting to go home but not being able to pay the bill for a service that you feel really doesn't deserve your hard earned money. read more