What a terrible disappointment my purchase of a Living Social Voucher was for a meal for two at the Wilmslow Tavern. Having read the appalling reviews on other websites about the restaurant, I sent an email to Living Social pointing out the terrible reviews but have not even had the courtesy of a "receipt". Anyway, after giving the matter a lot of thought, we decided to give the Wilmslow Tavern the benefit of the doubt and see for ourselves. We really should have believed the reviews. The only half decent thing about the place was the young lad behind the bar who was at least efficient at serving drinks and friendly!
We were told we only had a choice of starters (which were questionable and the fish cakes looked like burnt potato slices), three choices of meat (gammon, chicken or beef - chicken seemed the best option) for the main course (described by the waitress to another customer as "a carvery" - when the customer asked where the carvery was, she was told it was a roast dinner already served up) and the choice of desserts was three scoops of ice cream, hot choc fudge cake or sticky toffee pudding.
The chefs were "out front" at times getting drinks - their clothes were dirty and I would question whether suitable to a professional kitchen. The starters were served on wooden boards which were marked and deeply scored and were clearly a vessel to harbour germs. The main course was served on huge plates - but they were half empty - 3 black roast potatoes (which had clearly been deep fried - cremated!), 3 tiny tiny new potatoes from a tin, two small slices of beef which were tough and very fatty, one small piece each of cauli and broccoli (frozen) and a sea of frozen peas (my husband chose chicken and, in fairness, it was a chicken breast). The gravy was like dishwater! Oh, and half a frozen yorkshire pudding too. The desserts were clearly frozen and microwaved. My small jug of custard had water on top - admittedly I was able to stir it but the sponge was so hot it would have been dangerous if served to a child. There wasn't any offer of tea or coffee to us or anyone else there at the same time - which was part of the deal.
Living Social sales spiel shows a photograph of a lovely piece of meat and yorkshire - but the reality is nothing like that. It really was awful. In fact, I would go so far as to say it is a misrepresentation and a con - the place was truly awful, it had an air of menace about the place and the locals made me feel wary. I didn't dare use the loos after reading some of the reviews but my husband did and said they "stank", were dirty with the loo roll holder open and the loo roll just chucked in.
Service was slow. The place was filthy, cobwebs, rubbish, dirty toilets, so clean eating implements would have been nice! And, to put the icing on the cake, I've now got dreadful indigestion!
I will never ever use LivingSocial again and will never recommend them to anyone else, ever! Absolutely disgusting. Not sure which was the worst experience - the Wilmslow Tavern or the "promise" from Living Social! The "experience" wasn't worth £11 - never mind the £39.80 full value quoted by the site.
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