Hawes Inn

Nice place but service is appalling. You have to order at the bar but that doesn't make things quicker as there's usually only 2 bar staff and a huge queue of people, including hotel guests wanting served. Food takes an age to come and while it isn't bad, it probably isn't worth the money either. If you ask for sauce, a glum looking waitress comes with a platter and stands over you while you spoon from one of the jars she presents! Do they not trust us to take our own ketchup??"

Its a shame as the place is nice enough but the current owners are missing out on what has a huge potential.

We visited the Hawes this afternoon for lunch after various times stopping for a few drinks and liking the place and hearing good comments we decided to go for lunch on the last day of our fortnights holiday.

However we didn't even make it to drinks or food after leaving after 30 minutes of trying to get served.

We arrived to hear talk of shortage of staff and after waiting at the bar we were asked to sit down while the waitress would come to our table to get orders. The waitress went to other tables but never arrived at ours, the waitress decided to serve the people she seemed to know even though she could clearly see we had been waiting before the other people. After a 2nd attempt at the bar which was extremely busy we gave up extremely disappointed.

I appreciate there being an issue of short staff but there was no service to us at all which other people were graced with.

Really disappointed.

Since this pub has such a wonderful reputation, we decided to have a family lunch here. I met my family here for Sunday lunch today - 6 adults and 5 children. When we arrived, the staff showed little interest in helping us get seated, and so we explored ourselves and found a corner with a few tables. We asked if we could move some tables together and were told to 'go ahead' (no help offered). My dad went up to buy us all drinks, but was told that no drinks could be served until 12:30. Opening time is advertised on the website as 12pm, so you would think they could serve soft drinks from this time. It was about 12:20, but when you have impatient toddlers who are thirsty, it can be hard to explain why their drinks are not available.
I ordered a starter for my 2 year old son, as he was really hungry and I wasn't sure how long the main meal would take. The Chicken and Chorizo Skewers starter was £4.25-ish and it was pathetic. Two tiny skewers, each with two bits of chicken (very low quality) and one bit of chorizo. We had ordered pitta bread with it, but that wasn't brought. When I asked the waitress for it, she just shrugged and said ok. She did bring it out pretty quickly, it was more the attitude I felt uncomfortable with. I think we ordered the meal before 1 and it wasn't brought out until at least 1:45. The food was really disappointing and in my opinion, not worth the money. In fact, if I went to somebody's house for dinner and was offered these meals, I would feel hard done by. A few of us ordered roast dinners and the quality of the meat was not good. The roast potatoes were soggy and burnt (yesterday's? maybe last week's?) and the veg was overcooked. The carrots were unpeeled and still had their tops on, which is lovely if the carrots are good quality but not if they are not! One of our party ordered 'double chicken breast' and chips. The chicken was two small butterfly pieces and looked pretty miserable. A lot of us were so hungry, we just ate - especially the kids - but a couple of us couldn't bear to eat the food. One of us got given a rock-hard Yorkshire pudding. The manager was very nice about it, and refunded us for two of the meals as well as giving us one free dessert. However, I will never go back. Most of the staff were young and unwelcoming and unknowledgeable about the menu. I felt really uncomfortable and unwelcome and I feel that the food was not fresh and poor quality for somewhere that has such a brilliant reputation. Felt I had to share my experience.