please note - reviews on this site are purely the opinion of site visitors, so don't take them too seriously.
Good beer, good food and good service at this pleasant pub. Eight of us had lunch
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Charged �3.50 for a 275ml bottle of Becks that costs 65p in Sainsburys!
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Pleasant enough location, cosy and inviting interior BUT... The service although friendly wasn't particularly efficient. The beer, Sheperd and Neame isn't my favourite but what I had was well kept. The food could have been a whole lot better especially given the prices they charge. Kingston is an affluent village so I suppose the locals are happy with it but there are equally nice pubs with better food and service within a few miles so we probably won't bother with this one again.
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We were pleasantly surprised when we went here for lunch today after reading some of these reviews. The six of us had a splendid time sitting outside in the sunshine. It is a beautiful pub, the helpings are generous (particularly of pudding), the beer is well kept, the staff very friendly and the menu interesting; I had the venison in apricot sauce which was lovely but the sauce could have been thicker and more of it. We spent an average �25 each over three hours for lots of drinks and two courses. We definitely plan to return again this year for their buy one get one free birthday outing offer, for which we all filled in our email addresses.
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Had an absolutely great time on my last visit to this pub earlier this month. In my eyes if a pub is warm, serves well kept beer and with friendly staff its a winner. The Juggs fulfilled all three of my usual criteria happily. The fire was roaring away (maybe a tad to ferociously!), my pint of Late Red was clear as day and had a great bit of crak with the barman serving me.
The menu is huge, and with a great variety of pub grub, it was slightly over priced in my opinion but the portions sizes were very good. A piece of Cod that resembled Moby Dick's bigger cousin and a banoffee pie the size of an iceberg!
All throughout our time in the pub we experienced friendly and casual service even though they were busy. I think i even got a sun tan from the fire, that was fed as much as we were!
My only suggestions to improvement would be slightly cheaper meal prices, it misinterprets the standards of the food, which is simple honest pub grub, but could be seen as high end Gastro.
However I will most definitely be returning once again to this charming little pub.
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wow im so amazed about some of the comments posted i would just like to say that we where driving past the juggs when we decided to pop in for a bite to lunch a spare of the moment thing. and we where pleasantly suprised we had a fantastic lunch the food was very good at a average price the staff where lovely and made us feel very welcome my wife had a lamb shank (i was very jelous) i had a chicken curry and both of us shared a masive desert the whole meal was fantastic and we are already planing our next trip to the south just so we can take some friends to this delightfull pub
Thank you the juggs
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Having used this pub for years not just for eating but also as a meeting place for family and friends we have just been for what we thought would be a lovely family meal we found that only curry is served on a sunday night , which in our opinion was the worst curry we have ever had and i love curries so this is saying something as i have eaten many over the years. i know you can get better ones out of a tin . very very disapointed and will not be hurrying back.
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Not been here in ages and thought we would go for Sunday lunch.
As soon as we walked in the door and looked for a seat I was greeted by "Sorry kids are through the back" no hello or hi.
We then went through the back and where seated at a table that was so dark, I needed my torch to read the menu "no really, it was that dark"!
Then a seat came free in the "conservatory" or "lean-to" which was cramped and a bit like a dodgy old front room.
The looked at the overpriced menu and and saw what was coming out to other tabled and thought, naahh!!
Went up the road to a place called "The Rainbow" which was fantastic, less expensive and much much better quality.
You may have a charming old pub, but you certainly don't know what to do with it.
I would say see you again, but it's very unlikely.
Banny - 30 May 2011 10:21 |
Well this says it all we have been using the pub and others in the shepherd and neame group for the past 6 years and have never had any issue with any pub we have visited in that time.
Until the past year all the places we have been too seemed to be going down hill we just assumed that it was the pressure of the economy driving the quality down but sadly its not that .Infact the truth is after speaking to a member of staff we found out that as a group they have been forced to buy all the proudce from one supplier (the worst of them all brakes) which in turn means that they have to buy the worst and cheapest proudce that is avaible to them. gone are the days of buying using and cooking with fresh local proudce now its all about buy cheap rubbish and pass it on at the highest possible price fair enough to buy this crap if your a weatherspoons etc and sell 2 meals for a fiver but not okay for what was a group that are known for there amazing old pubs and great local food. so all i can say is dont blame the monkeys blame the organ grinder and if enough of us stop using these pubs maybe someone will see sence and go back to doing good quality hommade localy sorced food.
please please mr neame see whats going on in your pubs and get back to doing what you used to do best.
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had a birthday meal booked and after reading the reviews on here was going to change our minds but as it had been arranged with family decided to keep the booking glad we did as when we got there the staff were extremley friendly and couldnt do enough to help there was 5 people in the party and every single one of us enjoyed the food and would defiantly eat there again.
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We have eaten here over the past 2 years and there has been a steady decline in the quality of the food. The place is so perfect and in a lovely location but they just cant get the food right on 5 occassions it has been mediocre to awful. Our last meal in September was outrageously expensive �13 for some dry salmon with burnt asparagus and some veg that had been re heated in the microwave. They are rude to us when we try and redeem the birthday vouchers and its just not worth the effort anymore, the Cricketers are worth driving on to instead of stopping here.
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We ate here last Saturday and we were singularly unimpressed. The pate was lovely but served with a baguette instead of toast. Our main courses were very unexciting and average. We eat better than this at home on a daily basis. Much against my better judgement I had the cheeseboard and I expected a selection of regional cheeses, needless to say I was disappointed. We won't be going again.
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Had the worst meal I've had in ages in this pub. The food was inedible and when we complained we were offered a free dessert - why would you want to eat even more of it!!! Do not eat here if you value your health.
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It's a lovely pub in a beautiful location, but the food and service and quality of the beer are appalling and the landlord doesn't seem to care. The place is a complete Ramsay's nightmare, ingredients straight out of the packet and into the microwave . Friends who live in the village say they don't go there because there's no Harveys.
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Their free lunch on birthdays has been a good scheme, but things have changed recently. Staff uninterested, all the best menu selections were 'sold out', food ordinary and not worth the price. My curry was nothing special and at �9.95 one expects more. Won't be returning for a long time.
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we recently visited the pub whilst cycling the south downs way..the food was superb, but the staff were very unwelcoming - bordering on unpleasant. We were a group of 12, and spent a lot of money.... for such a nice pub and great location it was a shame .... maybe a bad day???
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More of a food pub but we did have a lovely pint of Shephards Neame Kingston which is brewed for this pub nice setting in a lovely village
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Had lunch recently and was disappointed, service was poor, food was not as good as we have had before, fire in main bar was so hot that you could not get within 10 feet of it, the three tables nearest were empty, people kept sitting down and then moving because of the heat, and the landlord was still adding logs to it when we left. (He must be feeling the cold).
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exceptional late lunch follwing a trot across the Downs. French Onion Soup, Stilton Ploughmans and a couple of pints of the bottom end best. Apart from good value, apart frrom a hot unny day, apart from excellent service, apart from bloody good food, apart from the beer being excellently kept. It was an average to brilliant first visit!
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This pub used to be fantastic. Brilliant old pub, brillant service, good wines, good beer and fantastic food. really perfect
It changed hands a couple of years a go. I have been back about every 6 months since, and each time dissapointed. Seems badly run, and most of the good staff are gone (which didn't seem suprising as the manager didn't seem to have a good rapour with the staff). Food is now slow, mediocre at best and often out of stock (and slow to update boards to reflect this). Service is ok, not a touch how it used to be (little things, you would order food from the food counter and they would gets any drinks you wanted and offer a tab, no problem at all, last time they seemed stressed when I asked for drinks and told me to queue up seperately), but still ok. Wine and beer both seem as good as before.
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re: JohnnyCrow - how is it 'sloppy customer service' if you asked for a pint of coke and could only get a 16oz glass? I would say it's 'fussy customer' rather than 'sloppy service'. It was part of the deal with Coke that the drink would only be served in those glasses. Yes, they have pint glasses, and yes there is coke on tap, but it strikes me that you visited in mid summer and so they would have wanted to keep the pint glasses for the beer drinkers.
Sloppy service would have been if they could have done it but wouldn't. As it was, they couldn't do it and didn't. Surely that wasn't the only thing that happened to you while you were there...
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Went there a couple of weeks ago and had a superb meal. The beer was good too, the best they had was Spitfire, not normally one of my favourites but on that particular day at least, it was perfect and most enjoyable.
We also met the landlord and landlady who were welcomming, friendly and had good senses of humour. Wish I lived closer so I could use the pub more often.
I was surprised at the low rating the pub was given because that was not our experience.
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Only visited a couple of times but hope to come back many times - in a delightful setting surrounded by dramatic downland. Cosy and friendly, it serves good food in an unfussy way. Very charming building, I didn't know it before, but I do understand the comments about an an earlier makeover as this has happened to places I like. It didn't seem at all plastic to me though, not knowing how it was before.
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I have been to this pub about quite a lot of times, most visits have been a Sunday. Every single time I have been it has been a fantastic meal with very pleasant and helpful service. The pub, regardless of original or contemporary features, is a warm and cosy environment. It is always a shame when a person has had a bad experience in a place that you regard a pleasure to be in. I can only hope it was an unfortunate one off.
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Asked for a pint of diet-coke.
Was told "we only sevre pints of coke in 16m glasses."
"Well that's not a pint. I'd like a pint please"
"I can only sevre it in 16m glasses.."
"But you've got pint glasses & the coke comes through a tap?? - can't you just fill the pint glass?"
In the end it appeared there was no key on the till for a pint of coke. So I had to go without.
Sloppy customer service.
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perfect setting for country pub and a pleasant place to stop awhile, BUT understaffed and very noisy (kids & rainy day bank holiday) when I last visited. Staff very apologetic for long delays, problems with till etc. However, children's play area has been removed (although there is nearby play park), which seems a shame. Beer and food fine.
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The comments posted above is nothing I recognise from my last visit, but this then was sometime last year!
THEN it had a very charming small pub in lovely suroundings. Maybe this has gone to the dogs?
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What was once a beautiful bozzer is now just a shell. With original fittings ripped out, replaced by a bland facsimle. Staffed by robots. Terrible food. Always packed.
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