The Three Fishes Review

Sitting neatly in the village of Great Mitton in the Ribble Valley area of the Lancashire countryside, The Three Fishes is a long established gastropub, reopened in it's current form by well known and TV featured chef Nigel Haworth in 2021. With the restaurant holding both a Michelin guide listing and two AA rosettes, I was optimistic about our chances of seeing some high quality cooking as I rocked up for lunch with my wife and two children, on a gloriously sunny June Saturday.

There's a sizeable car park behind the pub which is always appreciated, and externally the grounds and building look very smart, it's a nice looking venue for sure. That theme continues inside with everything you could hope for really from top end gastropub decor, including flagstone floors, wood panelling and exposed stone walls. The welcome on arrival was friendly and we were shown to our perfectly comfortable table in one of the dining areas. The restaurant was pretty quiet when we first arrived, but did fill up as the afternoon went on.

We weren't given any food menus initially, just drinks menus, but this isn't the first restaurant I've been to with that approach. Drinks wise there's a wide selection on offer including a sizeable range of cocktails (including a couple of non-alcoholic options), plus a solid wine list. I just stuck with my usual Hendrick's and tonics on this occasion, whilst my wife and kids had various soft drinks.

After ordering drinks we did then receive our food menus; on offer at lunch is a full carte menu plus a five course 'farm to fork' set tasting style menu, which contained many of the same dishes as on the carte, although presumably the portions would be smaller. There's also a three course children's menu available which was good to see.

I have to say, the staff setup here immediately felt a bit off. The manager (I think) presented us with the food menus, and then said "if you have any questions, ask the staff" (rather than him) which I found slightly odd to be honest. After our food order had been taken by one of the waitresses, another gentleman (who seemed more experienced than most of the staff) came over and asked if we'd received any food menus yet. He asked in a perfectly nice way, but right from the off I could see the internal communication here between the staff seemed to be lacking.

That continued with the delivery of our starter courses. They came out fairly quickly which was great, but whilst the kids had a portion of bread each, neither myself nor my wife received any cutlery to eat our starters with. Two different members of staff delivered each of our starters, but neither seemingly considered the fact we might not want to eat them with our hands. We couldn't get anyone's attention following this, so my wife had to get up and go towards the pool of congregated staff near us to request some metal we could eat our food with; it was all just a bit amateurish and unnecessary.

Once I was able to eat it, my starter of tempura scallops and king prawns, served with a jalapeno tartar, was actually very tasty. The scallops and prawns were very well cooked, the tempura batter was light and delicate, and the tartar packed a real flavour punch; it was an enjoyable dish. My wife was also impressed with her starter or asparagus with a carrot puree, whilst the bread for the kids (sourdough and a cheese roll) was pretty decent also.

The mains didn't take long to come out (and this time we were provided cutlery in advance); I went for the roe deer with a mushroom puree, carrots and a truffle sauce. This was a decent main course but I wasn't blown away; the meat was well rested but chewier than I would have liked, and the other elements although tasty enough didn't combine very elegantly to create the dish I was hoping for; it was all just a bit underwhelming.

My wife was happier with her main of herb fed chicken, with peas broad beans and an onion fritter which she enjoyed, whilst my daughter went for the fennel dish with many of the same accompaniments as the chicken. They arrived a bit after the rest of the dishes, but my son also enjoyed a sizeable portion of triple-cooked chips; these were well made and suitably tasty.

Because the chips arrived later and it was a big portion, we'd finished our mains sometime before my son had finished them, but you'd still ordinarily expect a restaurant at this level to wait for the full table to finish before clearing plates. That didn't happen here though as not only were our plates cleared but dessert menus were brought whilst my son was still eating; it did feel quite a lot like they were trying to turn the table as soon as possible, which was a bit of a shame.

Of course despite that, there was no chance of us leaving without trying dessert, but these proved to be a bit of a mixed bag. My lime souffle with a basil ice cream was a decent effort; it wasn't the best souffle I've had but it wasn't the worst (and tasted of the promised lime). The ice cream was pretty much liquid by the time it made it to our table though which was unfortunate.

My wife and daughter had the mango dessert consisting of mango sorbet, coconut cream and a sharp mango coulis which they did enjoy, albeit the cream lacked any of the promised coconut flavour. For my son, we asked our waitress if he could just have some vanilla ice cream as we'd seen this was an option on the children's menu. Instead we were served (and charged for) the full adult carte three scoops of ice cream which I found massively disingenuous to be honest given how we'd framed the request when we asked.

The ice cream wasn't even very good; it was super smooth but lacked any of the sweetness or flavour you'd want from a decent vanilla ice cream, it was literally just like frozen plain cream. My son ate half a scoop then didn't want anymore, and I couldn't blame him after trying some.

To finish the meal, our bill (complete with 10% service charge) was accompanied by a little Eccles cake and piece of chocolate fudge each which was a nice touch and appreciated. And that as they say was pretty much that. Overall, this was a curious but ultimately quite disappointing meal. The food on the whole was good, but there were definitely some underwhelming dishes as well as some technical issues with some of the food we were served.

The biggest issue though was the service which was, at best, poor. As well as no cutlery for our starters, there were multiple other issues. Only the starter courses were explained to us when brought out (none of the other dishes were, even the p4's were just put on the table with no explanation) and the issue with clearing mains and bringing dessert menus when someone is still eating was frustrating and unexpected.

On top of that, during our meal we ordered another apple juice for our son; this took an inordinate amount of time to arrive so we had to chase, it then arrived but around five minutes later a different gentleman arrived with yet another apple juice (which they didn't charge us for fortunately), it's like the staff here just don't communicate to each other at all, it was so bizarre.

It was clear that at least a couple of the staff who served us were very new and I fully appreciate everyone has to start somewhere, but at the prices being charged here (which I'll come on to), you can't just throw people with no idea what they're doing in front of paying customers and expect them to learn on the job, there has to be some training first, but that was very evidently lacking here.

Which brings me on to pricing; this place is expensive, and for me the prices charged are not in line with the quality of food and service we received. Just to give you a very genuine comparison, as the same family of four we've eaten at four Michelin 1* pub restaurants in the past year or so, and just for good measure I'll throw in we also ate at a three AA rosette / Michelin Bib Gourmand pub in that time also.

That's five restaurants where the food was much better and the service was much better than here, and the major food guides would echo that on the food side with their ratings. Yet our meal here was more expensive than all five of those nationally renowned gastropubs; it's slightly unfathomable to be honest.

The food, with quite a lot of work, could potentially get to that level, but the service was absolutely miles away from the standard it should be for the prices charged here, and despite what we know are very challenging times currently for hospitality, there's not really any excuse for that in my view. I wish everyone involved all the best going forwards, but although the food on the whole was decent and the venue is lovely, this isn't a restaurant I'm likely to revisit in future.