What's your worst restaurant experience?

[RainbowsAndCrystals]

Had one where I was with two friends having breakfast and coffees ... they kept asking friends if they wanted another drink and ignored me every single time.

there's been worse and places I would never go back to.

Different bad experiences in different places.

One was at a restaurant which was part of a Roman ruins site. Looking upmarket. I ordered picanha, which is a brazilian type of beef cut (this was not in Brazil, though). I've had it before and it's delicious and tender.
It came virtually raw, hard as shoe soles and with stringy tendons. I'm sure it was not what they said it was. The side was also awful.
I almost left without paying for it.

Then recently, at a beach restaurant, they brought us the bill before we asked, and had our coffees. Then when we did ask for the bill, they brought us the same one, without the added coffees. Then looked fed up when we pointed out that it was the wrong bill. We should have just paid what they asked for.

There was a dinner at a Berlin restaurant for a large group that became legendary. The food was awful, and for some people it never came. At the end, I went out with another woman to find pizza.

Finally, it was not the restaurant's fault, but after almost two weeks of very hot food in the Indian subcontinent, I went to Pizza Hut and ordered something that was not supposed to be spicy. I'm not a fan of spicy food. The bloody thing was still spicy hot.

Harvester - just came back from there in fact. First off we weren't given any drink menus - they'd thrown them all out apparently
My meal was fine, but a friend's was ice cold. The bread rolls were hard, there was hair in the food. No salad dressings. The refillable cokes were weak and watery. When it came to dessert, there were only four things available from the menu - the explanation for this was 'we're having a total renovation of the menu and have thrown things out and have low stock' - this would be understandable but the particular Harvester we went to had been fully renovated the week before - you'd think the menu would've been sorted too?!

Awful.

A very expensive restaurant that we'd saved to go to. We'd eaten there previously on an early bird deal middle of the week, and decided to save up so that we could go there on a Saturday night and be able to enjoy a meal from the a la carte menu.

It was in the days immediately in the run up to Christmas, so extremely busy. We'd had to pay a deposit to get the table (this is relevant). We get there and we're seated, drinks arrive and we order starters and mains.

The starters arrive and are wonderful. So far so good and we're looking forward to the main courses. An hour later we are starting to wonder when they are going to turn up. After another 30 minutes they arrive but missing most of the vegetable accompaniments that they are supposed to include. Waiter promises to chase them up but they never materialise. Plates are finally cleared after half an hour of sitting and waiting and we ask for pudding and coffee.

At this point it becomes apparent that there is a queue of people in the foyer. These are the people who have booked tables for later in the evening and have arrived for their bookings only to find that the tables are still occupied. The waiting staff attempt to tell people - including us - that they need the tables back. People - including us - politely point out that they've taken over 2 hours to serve us 2 courses and that we are still waiting for pudding and coffees which have already been ordered.

After almost another hour of waiting pudding turns up - by which point the people queuing are now sitting on the floor of the foyer as there isn't even a bank of chairs for them to sit on whilst waiting. We ask for the bill as pudding is served, thinking that we will eat, pay and leave as quickly as we can because we now feel so sorry for the people waiting. When the bill does turn up there is no mention of the deposit we paid when booking. Waiter is very stroppy about knocking it off the bill and only the threat of a formal complaint convinces him to check the booking system - at which point he grudgingly agrees that our bill is incorrect.

I wrote to the restaurant afterwards to tell them how disappointing and upsetting it was to have saved for months to eat there and receive such shoddy service. They emailed back a very defensive response basically blaming customers for 'ordering 3 courses and taking too long' - absolutely no acknowledgement that it was their own service at fault. They didn't apologise either. I wrote a scathing review on Trip Advisor and we've never been back since.

Valentines Day in a lovely restaurant in Paris about 20 years ago. Obviously very busy, but lovely food and wine. Unfortunately the couple on the next table didn't agree. They had ordered the most expensive thing on the menu - a joint of beef for two that was served rare carved at their table with a flourish. They complained it was too rare and sent it back. It came back out well done and they complained it was like shoe leather and had obviously been microwaved (microwaved! In Paris!). So they got a whole new cut of beef and ate it.

When the bill came they refused to pay for the beef, even thought they'd only been charged for one of the two they had been served, and they'd eaten that one. The poor waiter went and spoke to the manager, who politely told them they would have to pay. They then refused to pay for the second bottle of wine, because they'd only ordered it because they'd had to wait for the second cut of beef.

By this point they were getting loud and stroppy and people were starting to notice. We started sniggering to ourselves and they noticed and the woman came over and hissed at my then boyfriend that he had a tiny dick. Classy.

The restaurant staff stayed polite but insisted they had to pay for the food and drink they'd consumed. They try and storm out of the restaurant but their coats are in a cloakroom out the back somewhere and the waiter is trying to stop the woman from getting through whilst she screeches "give me my coat! You are holding my coat hostage". She then bites him on the shoulder, he recoils in pain, and her husband follows through and punches him in the face.

My, that escalated quickly. After that the police were quite quickly called and they paid the bill and left. The poor restaurant staff were so apologetic and we got free champagne, but we'd mostly found it hugely entertaining, although obviously the last bit was a bit much. Memorable though!

Admittedly, this one wasn't the fault of anyone but on my 18th birthday the town I was living in flooded really badly. I'd made it to the Chinese restaurant and been seated with my mate to be told 2 minutes later that they couldn't serve us as the kitchen was flooding. We attempted to get to a pub through knee height water, found the cellars were flooded and so trailed through the now thigh height water to a Chinese on higher ground, ordered a takeaway and wine and called her dad to come and rescue us.

To add insult to injury, I was wearing my beautiful new dress (white cotton and flowy - it was the 80s). It always bloody rains on my birthday in sodding August .

You I admire your persistence.

Hobbes holy shit. Some people don't seem to have a clue how to behave in public.

At a local pub restaurant, my Mam ordered a roast dinner and found a fish bone in the peas... they'd scraped them off someone else's plate and re-served them.

pizzaria well known excellent food/ordered one without mushrooms on half,i am allergic.under all the cheese and other goodies were mushrooms.2 bites in hives started appearing.after lots of needles and oxygen.was called by owner of place and given free vouchers for a year.
he was going to fire cook ,talked him out of it.i figured lesson learned.cook was very sweet to me everytime i came in.
oh and it was a first date.
second date -lasagna beautiful ingrediants no sauce...another very embarressed chef,got my lasagna tho and didnt have to pay.nice bottle of red too

A group of friends went to a newly-opened Italian restaurant in a village.

We ordered drinks and starters, and that was OK. Then we ordered mains. The wait was ridiculous, but as a group we were chatting happily and ordered more drinks.

When the mains came out several were wrong. A few people accepted the alternative, but one person hated fish and wouldn't accept the tuna alternative to the chicken dish he'd ordered. My vegetarian dish didn't turn up (I wasn't vegetarian but I often eat meat-free). They said the chicken meal and mine would be with us ASAP. Everyone else started eating. Nothing was fantastic, but it was edible and we did speak with the manager and make it plain that the food was sub-standard.

About 40 minutes later our meals came. Mine appeared and tasted like a few vegetables in a few spoons of ragu sauce. My pasta however was so overcooked that it was bloated, and couldn't be picked up as it fell apart. Inedible. I sent it back and declined an alternative.

So we ordered more drinks, and decided that we'd have desert to finish off. Most of us ordered the chocolate mousse. Bad choice. It had been made with raw egg, which had separated. So we ate the slightly thick non-moussed chocolate, and then found a pool of raw egg white under. Bleuch!

When the bill came I calmly crossed off everything that had been inedible, and then put an alternative costing against sub-standard food so we made our own deduction. We wrote out a cheque paying for all drinks, the starters, the edible mains, the couple of edible desserts and a reduced price for everything else. On the back I wrote my name and address and why the cheque didn't match the bill.

The manger threatened to call the police and I said that would be fine. We were not stealing as I'd left my address and she was free to take me to court for the rest of the bill. I suggested she look up consumer rights and I worked in a restaurant myself and knew I was allowed to do this. The other tables in the restaurant seemed to take note of my comments.

It closed a few weeks later.

Red Hen, Birchanger Green services, M11, 2002.

Yes, I know, but we were mid-journey, we were hungry and didn't fancy a burger.

We should have had a burger.

The entire experience was so unrelentingly awful that it is quicker to list the good aspects: we didn't get food poisoning.

I understand that the entire chain was closed by Welcome Break a couple of years later. Good riddance, I'm afraid.

A restaurant in San Francisco, attached to a hotel. We booked for dinner on New Years Eve, bit of a treat as it was our honeymoon and had great reviews.

No mention of needing the table back when we booked but informed us on arrival that we had two hours to eat and leave.

Waitress spent the whole night fawning over a small group at a table who kept ordering champagne - she kept sitting down at the table with them. We would also have ordered champagne if she had bothered to take our order, had to go up to the bar instead. She came to take our food order after about 40 minutes - DH ordered and she walked off! I had to chase her through the restaurant to order mine. The meals came and were lukewarm, congealed and a bit like slop, we barely ate half. Asked to order some coffee and more drinks but were presented with the bill instead. Including a mandatory 25% service charge.

Argued with the manager for half an hour, they said they would call the police if we didn’t pay it. And that we were depriving a mother of her wages for the evening.

Ended up back in our hotel being sick by midnight.

It’s not so much bad experience as a slightly hilarious one.

Went to a posh steakhouse once although I don’t eat beef. No reason apart from the fact that I just don’t like it. The texture and taste just doesn’t agree with me. The restaurant wouldn’t have been my choice but it was someone’s birthday so not the time to fuss about location.

It was one of these places where they bring raw meat to the table and talk you through different parts of the cow and wax lyrical about the provenance and quality of the beef.

For some reason the maitre’d who was in charge of “presenting” the meat focussed all of his French charms on me and talked through all the types of meat on offer while looking into my eyes.

At the end of it all, I ordered chicken.

Having left early, i was walking out alone and he chased me down to the lobby and asked why I didn’t order beef. I said, truthfully, that I simply don’t like beef.

His incredulity, shock and disappointment were palpable. I almost regretted that I didn’t lie and make up some other reason although in fairness I don’t think he would be satisfied with any reason whatsoever. His commitment to beef was his life.

After a hip replacement, I borrowed a wheelchair to go to the local Mall with DH and 3 children.
We went to cafe and I ordered 3 oj’s, A pot of tea and a coffee.
The waitress turned to my husband and said - ‘ does she want milk or lemon with her tea?’
😦

Risotto that was oily. It was like they had poured oil over it. I was starving but couldn't eat more than half. Bloody waiter didn't even have the decency to ask whether there was sonething wrong with the food. Needless to say I left hungry and waiter did not get a tip.

Prezzos. My sil ordered pasta with salmon. The dish arrived, but minus any salmon, so it was sent back. It reappeared with chunks of smoked mackerel in it. So bloody insulting to think she wouldn't know the difference.
A pp a few pages back spoke about mussel poisoning in Andorra, and vomiting in the Pyrenees. My mother had exactly the same experience many years ago. How strange!

On holiday in Sicily a few years back DH and I were loving the food. Hadn't spotted anywhere for the next night so trusted the thousands of very positive reviews on TripAdvisor and went to a restaurant that was known for authentic local food and wine.

Booked a table over the phone but was no record of booking when we arrived. We were seated at the far corner of outdoor area next to the busy road and told all tables were reserved when we asked to move (even though 80% stayed empty for the duration of our meal, apart from staff using them to smoke). Surly waiter brought drinks after 20 minutes. Starters came after another 20. Stone cold tempura vegetables in thick gloopy batter and Antipasti served on a clingfilmed plate. Someone had clearly taken a bite out of the cheese.

We complained, said we didn't want the rest of the meal and would just pay for the drinks. Before we could leave they brought the mains (rock hard overdone lamb chops and burnt pizza).

Spent half an hour arguing with the manager about the bill and had to physically push past a waiter to get out while the manager was on the phone to the police.

My DH is a very fast eater. He had finished his food and popped to the loo, I still had my cutlery in hands and was chewing when the waitress came and cleared DH's plate...and my plate, with my food on, that I was still eating. I tried to call after her but it was really loud and busy and she didn't hear my shout which was slightly muffled by the mouthful of food I was chewing. I was flabbergasted (and hungry!)

I nearly died on Christmas Day after a Christmas Eve Mexican Leicester Square. I don't think my body ever fully recovered

Biting into a green and pussey abscess in my Kentucky Fried Chicken* when I was about 13.

My parents, being Very British, would not let me complain.

I became vegetarian not long after that.

• Disclaimer - counts as a restaurant when you're 13.

On holiday in Egypt. We stupidly went into an empty restaurant. Charged for a starter we didn't order and thought was free. Sole member of staff pottered round for hours before serving bad and expensive food. Everybody got ill with food poisoning.

Many years ago I was in a nationally known pizza house in South East London. It was busy but not massively so. We got our starters at the same time as our mains and tbe bill came five minutes after that. In and out in 25 minutes.

Another one was this smart new Italian place that had just opened near us...it was pricey, but always busy, and it was my birthday, so we booked. I don't know how it is possible to make Italian food utterly bland but this joint managed it. Totally without flavour, at all. We asked to see the manager to tell them about the problem, and he said that no-one else had complained. I wondered, because it was the place to be seen, the food quality didn't matter. We gave up, paid 100 quid and went to the chip shop.