The Black Horse - Great Linford, Milton Keynes

After nearly completing this review twice already , I've sat down in a room with all distractions (Facebook) removed and blog deleting drunkards absent.

Two nights of heavy drinking left us in need of some quality pub grub, and The Black Horse in Great Linford, somewhere we'd been meaning to go for a while, seemed like the ideal way to spend a lazy sunday. I hadn't been there in months, and I had fond memories of the food, so was quite excited about my delicious lunch!

Seating ourselves (after being ignored by the bar and waiting staff for a good few minutes), we made our way to the only table left, directly below the drafty emergency exit, which people kept walking in and out of to smoke. Eventually, an overly friendly waitress came to give us some menus, and then left us in peace for far too long. Once the orders were taken, it took over twenty minutes just for the drinks to arrive. There is no way it takes that long to fetch two glasses of juice, it's not like they went outside and picked the oranges fresh from the tree, it was just shockingly appalling service. Unfortunately, this theme was to continue throughout our dining experience, and I can tell you, Ramsay would not have been impressed.

Now, I don't claim to be some sort of culinary master (not a man for one), but whoever thought that putting raisins in garlic ciabatta was a good idea is literally insane. For his starter, Rob foolishly chose that, much to his distaste. There was something that felt a tiny bit immoral eating such sweetness with garlic; not a good combination AT ALL.




My starter, french onion soup, came with a raisin filled, mozzarella topped "crouton", which added absolutely nothing to the lukewarm, bland soup. There was an excess of rosemary in the dish, which was just ridiculously overpowering. Needless to say, after waiting nearly an hour for our starters, and to be given this poor excuse for a "soup", I was less than impressed.

And then, our delicious main arrived!



We'd both decided on the handmade gourmet burger (lies), I'd changed my mind from the roast turkey on Rob's strong recommendations! Unsurprisingly, it was awful. Burnt, wilted and tasteless, I had to actually scrape the charcoal off of the meat.

During all of the food crimes going on at our table, looking around the restaurant, it wasn't just us that seemed to be having problems. A couple sitting near us looked incredibly angry at being ignored by the one waitress who seemed to be wandering around. It was a joke.

So, in conclusion:

Food:
If you are looking for somewhere that will give you fast service and a quality dining experience, this is not the place to go. Bearing that in mind, we did go on a busy sunday afternoon, if you go on a weekday evening, I'm sure it wouldn't be such a problem.

Service:
Ignored by the majority of the staff on our entrance, and then taking over twenty minutes just to get our drinks, the service was poor, until they brought us the bill.

Overall:
If you are looking for somewhere to spend an enjoyable afternoon, just come here for the overpriced drinks, not the food. There are much better places around.