Do not go here just to eat! (Egypt Mill)

Name: jrst112

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Product:	Egypt Mill
Date:	06/09/07 (72 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Extensive and interesting menu, pleasant surroundings

Disadvantages: Dreadfully slow and patronising service, disappointing and very average food, questionable freshness

Summary: do not go to the Egypt Mill to eat. AA rosette standards must have fallen dramatically for this place to be awarded any at all.

Good points: extensive and interesting menu, pleasant surroundings.
Bad points: dreadfully slow and patronising service, disappointing and very average food, questionable freshness of ingredients, intrusive muzak.

The worst part of lunch at the Egypt Mill was that the service was unapologetically slow, even though hardly anyone else was there. We were seated quickly enough, because there was only one other occupied table in the restaurant, and we were given menus, but it then took nearly ten minutes before someone came to take our order. We all skipped starters and ordered main courses only. Then we waited. And waited. After forty minutes of being ostentatiously ignored by the staff, one of our group got up and went in search of service. After a hunt of a few minutes, he found a waiter, who said that the food was "just being plated". Ten minutes later, the waitress arrived with the food. When I asked what the problem had been, she gave me a look that suggested I was an idiot, and replied, "No problem, we just had several orders come in at once and were serving them in order." When my colleague asked why we had not been told that there would be such a long delay, he was also given the "you're an idiot" look, then told that "the lamb takes twenty minutes to cook". So (a) why not say so when we ordered and (b) what caused the other thirty minutes of delay? Above all, if they KNEW they'd be serving slowly, why not TELL us beforehand so that we didn't get cross?
Anyway, when the food finally arrived, the plus points were that the portions were big and hot. The minus points were that it was decidedly ordinary, much more so than the menu had suggested. Far worse, there was a distinct suspicion that the meat in the steak and kidney pudding was on the turn: both of us who had that dish were ill that night. With its rubbery pastry and suspicious meat, the menu has a real cheek to claim that this dish is in any way special or "award-winning".
The person who had the "crayfish and prawn" found no evidence of crayfish, just what looked and tasted like supermarket prawns cooked from frozen, not fresh. Only the roast lamb was fresh and tasty.

Needless to say, we left half our main courses and didn't even bother to look at the dessert menu or have any coffee.

Summary: AA rosette standards must have fallen dramatically for this place to be awarded any at all