Duke William

Terrible Sunday Roast. Being part of a pub company (whoever is the front personality) is not always a good idea. From the owners perspective its makes commercial sense probably, benefits of scale, sharing resources, suppliers and even having the same (simple) menu in many of the pubs. But this is to the detriment of individuality and any real effort. I think the DoW is still trading on past reputation and experiences, which will soon dry up unless they make some changes. I went the first time over a year ago before we moved to Kent. Fairly positive experience. Perhaps was seduced by the sunset in the beer garden. Now I'm a 'local' we went back for Sunday roast and that was a bad idea. The staff were hardly inviting. I understand they had to wear a mask, but would only let us in when we had our masks on and then immediately ordered us to download track and trace app and notify of our presence. We hadn't even got to our table yet. Slightly paranoid service from the staff maybe. To the food. Sunday roast had ran out of lamb. First disappointment as my wife only wanted this off the menu. I ordered the beef and my, what a disappointment. Beef was overcooked, no flavour, and only the slightest hint of pink on one of the slices. Very chewy meat. Like leather. One long bland carrot and a massive wedge of diluted cabbage on the plate. Definitely not fine dining but you can forgive it being a pub and all. Menu suggested 'garlic and rosemary seasoned roast potatoes', but the 3 small ones I received on my plate had no flavour whatsoever and I think were frozen. Cauliflower cheese was decent, but literally 3 small florets in a small cup. I was just shaking my head in disbelief. We had kids with us so I didn't want to make a fuss as promised them pudding. Sunday roast is usually a nice relaxing experience. This was neither, and I couldn't get out of there quick enough. Poor experience and won't be going back.