Oldfield’s The Restaurant

What a mess. Walked in on a Sunday at 2pm for Sunday roast. Waiters are terribly trained and they all look like they have been dropped in the restaurant business randomly. Food was incredibly bland and meat was overcooked. Lamb, pork, beef… it all tastes the same. Beer came to our table almost room temperature. Asked for a dark beer they brought out a light lager. This is one of those places that it looks better on paper than what it does in real life. Keep your money, cook a nice roast at home and invite some friends over. You’ll be better off than trying to find a little bit of substance at this overly-​hyped place.

Always good food, always, no idea why it has scored so low, really good ethical business, using local and smaller businesses, excellent value for money, always busy. Great menu’s simple but delicious, fresh wonderful!

How did you find your pâté sir? I lifted my small piece of toast and there it was. There are people in this kitchen who can cook, no doubt about it. But they have an overly high view of their own ability to a) charge such stupid money for it b) give such ridiculously small portions as to be funny and c) ignore the idea of seasoning to any degree at all. The food is a bit dull, not nearly as good as it sounds on the menu and tries to hard to be achingly cool. It’s pub grub but at restaurant prices and there are many better places for both food and value in Durham. Service is carried out by willing, but terribly trained young people and overall the place is not really worth it. I went for chips afterwards!

Went for the early bird menu the other night and had a totally delicious meal. The menu is local and seasonal, meaning that it changes every month, but there is clearly a lot of thought and effort put into these dishes. The lunch and early bird deal of £10 for two courses or 12.95 for three is extremely reasonable and makes it an ideal choice for a pre-​theatre meal.
My only slight problem was waiting 45 minutes for the bill once we had finished eating, but I eventually gave in and went up to pay at the bar.

Oldfields generally has a good reputation. It is well situated near the Gala theatre in Durham. The outside, menu and interior are all promising. However, I regretted visiting. The food was merely ok, not inspiring as I had been led to expect. The portion sizes can definitely be only described as small, and I also think given the quantity and quality was on the pricy side. Maybe having a bad night?

Conveniently located at the bottom of Claypath in Durham City near the Walkergate complex, Oldfields is handy to get to, whether you’re a local or just visiting.
We went for an evening meal (5 of us) and when we went in the place was dead, there was us and another couple. We quickly decided what we wanted and ordered. The service was very quick and efficient. When the food arrived however, we got a shock. Four of us had ordered a side portion of chips costing £3 each, when they arrived they had been all put onto a single plate which amounted to what we would call a single portion elsewhere, and we ended up with about 5 chips each and at a cost of £12 total!
Aside from this, the food was really nice, but the portions were on the small side. The house wine was fairly expensive, but we still managed 4 bottles! The total cost for five meals and four bottles of wine was £175.

I’ve eaten at Oldfield’s 3 times over the last 18 months and won’t be returning there again. On each occasion, I have been disappointed. First, a Sunday lunch: the roast beef was overcooked, the purple potatoes were hard and not at all tasty and the overall experience was poor. It felt like they’d thought a Sunday roast was easy and hadn’t put enough care into it. Second, a midweek evening meal: the menu promised much and each of the 3 courses was acceptable but uninspired — nothing wrong as such, but not living up to the expectation suggested by the menu and not good value for money. Finally, a weekday lunch: the menu promised an appetising selection of cold sandwiches with hand-​cut chips; we ordered these, which then took 30 minutes to arrive, even though the restaurant was hardly busy. The sandwiches were tasty enough, but the chips were disappointing; they evoked memories of collegiate catering roast potatoes. We received no apology for the delay in our food arriving and as such asked for the discretionary 10% service charge to be removed from the bill; the waiter did this but didn’t bother to enquire why we had not wanted to pay this. 3 disappointing experiences at a ‘noted eating house’ that clearly has too high an opinion of itself and prices to match.