14th July 2016 We were recommended to eat here by the staff at the hotel we were staying at. They were locals and stated that they ordered there a lot. Seemed like a decent bet. Got through the door and asked for a reservation, we stated we did not have one as we just arrived to town and the place was suggested to us. They told us it would be about 15 minutes to wait. We sat in the bar area to wait and everything seemed well. Place was busy, we were informed later that is it "always" busy like this, that is a good sign.
Placed the drink orders, we were given complimentary drinks from our hotel, (ploy to get us in there) and were informed it only worked on Wine, juice, coffee, and soda pop. Mother got a wine and I choose a soda pop as I was uninterested in the other options. I did state I was interested in ordering a beer though and ordered a bottle. 10 minutes later the drinks arrived. No beer. Asked the drink server and she stated these were the only 2 drinks on the ticket. Did not see the waitress anywhere to ask. Here is where it got poor.
We ordered the two chicken salads on the menu. If you order ANYTHING at this place ASK "EXACTLY WHAT DOES THIS DISH CONSIST OF" Include any dressings, spices, marinades, sauces, etc. My mother does not do well with spices. Her chicken was not sauce marinated but spice crusted, and apparently the bacon was a smoked bacon. It did not specify that it was a smoked bacon on the menu so she did not think to ask. Needless to say she picked at it left the most of the $24.90 salad on her plate. My food was quite the disaster. I am mildly allergic to tomatoes. I informed the waitress of this and asked if there would be tomatoes on the salad, as over time I have noticed most salads do have them even if they are not listed. She said yes but she would make sure to have them removed. I also asked that the dressings be on the side as I do not like my salads swimming. When the salads came out to the table the first thing I noticed were 3 fresh tomato slices on my plate. I informed the food runner of this and she took it away, then came back after a few minutes with what I thought was a new salad. She said that they could not do anything about cross contamination, which in a busy kitchen I understand that there could be a potential issue, but I said it should be alright. I was very wrong. The salad was the same salad and the tomatoes had just been taken off and probably put aside. I found this out after I had already eaten half of the salad and pulled a tomato seed out of my mouth. Because I am mildly allergic, Not anaphylaxis shock allergic, I didn't think it would be too much of a problem. I must have taken a good bit of juice or seeds on the greens as within 25 minutes I was beginning to feel quite nauseous. My beer finally did arrive, 15 minutes after the food. Apparently this is just "how it works" as I was told.
At this point thought I was starting to feel more ill, but did not want to push my mother to hurry up, but we decided to pass on dessert. When the waitress showed up to see if we wanted anything more we explained the situation and asked for the check. We were informed that we needed to go to the register to pay. Went up there and stood around. Nobody came to assist us. The waitress was talking to the man dressed all in black, Guessing the manager, and he promptly went to the talk with the kitchen. A young man came and asked how everything was. I told him disappointing and why. He wanted to get the manager but at this point I was about to vomit and we needed to leave. So we paid our bill and left.
I am going to talk to the hotel staff and inform them of the bad experience so maybe they will think twice before handing out the free drink coupons. Honestly I would not go to this establishment again. The price was too high and the service/quality too low for my standards. I understand that standards are different here in NZ, but I have been working in the Food Service industry for over 20 years, in many different countries. Being a Kiwi, I am almost ashamed of this place.
love coming here, good food, good service, plenty to choose from on the exciting menu.