Toby Carvery

Visited April 2015: «First time eating at this Establishment»
For those of you who do not know what at Toby Carver is, it reminded me of a buffet Boston Market or Kenny Roger’s — back in the States. When I found this hotel, I looked up the restaurant/​pub on their official website:
We both had the Famous Four Roast Carvery where you can choose from gammon (cured leg of pork), turkey, beef, and pork. You can have a sample of all of them, along with a Yorkshire pudding, and all the fresh vegetables and potatoes you’d like from the buffet. The side dishes can range from: mash potatoes, a hash, cabbage, peas, green beans, leeks, parsnips, carrots, cauliflower cheese, etc. There is a sauce station which holds: variety of mustard, ketchup, mayonnaise, a few different gravies, and some chutney. I had the Mini Rolo Sundae, which was just the right amount of chocolate, ice cream, and sauces. The wafer was a nice added crunch. There was also a pub attached to the restaurant and hotel, where we did get a drink while waiting for our table, and the wait wasn’t that long.
We also had out complementary breakfast, for our hotel stay, in the restaurant. There was a buffet table with granola bars, fruit, juices, coffee, and the buffet table at the carvery was filled with hot foods. Unfortunately all the eggs had some sort of meat mixed in them, that I was not able to partake.

All tobys offer pretty much the same thing — a decently priced roast with all the sides/​trimmings you can eat. My top tip is if you can bear to go without the meat you can choose one of the nice and still stodgy veggie options — which still give you access to the never ending sides (my fave part of a roast). The veg lasagne is nice, well sized and packed with veg. Yet I still also managed to eat an embarrassingly large amount of roast potatoes and mash (and veg and gravy etc etc). Signing up to their mailing list also usually means you’ll get a free ice cream or combo deal.

I’m not sure if my review would be fair since this is the first restaurant I’ve eaten at in the UK?
Came here on a Tuesday night with co-​workers because this place is close to our office and I wanted to try something «authentic British». When we first arrived (just before 6pm) the place was pretty empty but 30 minutes later the place was packed!
The menu is super simple. Their main thing is the carvery (choice of meat or all four, including roast beef, pork, gammon, or turkey) served with yorkshire pudding, and you can add on a buffet of vegetables and sides for £1.5. They also have some other entrée options if you want something else and a small appetizer section and an extensive dessert (pudding) section. I only tried the roast beef but my co-​workers tried all four meats and said they were all very good.
My only other «carvery» experience was back in the US, at Lawry’s carvery so this is really different. The roast beef was tender, but didn’t have much flavor. The sides included cabbage, cauliflower, peas, yam, potatoes, mashed potatoes, carrots, and parsnip? Most of them were also not very flavorful. At the end of the buffet line there are 4 – 5 different gravy sauces, and other sauces like mustard or some sort of berry sauce. Perhaps the idea is to use the sauces for flavor? I’m not big on sauces just because I feel guilty eating it so I naturally don’t put a lot on my plate. Maybe that’s why I thought they tasted a little plain?
I did enjoy the service very much, and the atmosphere too. I thought the price was good and their dessert (pudding) menu looked amazing but I was already full from the meat and sides.
Like I said earlier, I’m not a local so I can’t say if this is «good» for local standards but overall it’s a friendly restaurant, no frills, good meats, and fair priced. For another £1.5, you can «king-​size» your meal and get extra meat, an additional yorkshire pudding, and two sausages.

A nice pub, and at this time of year lovely and Chrismassy. They have a carvery. which when we went consisted of a choice of Turkey, Gammon and Beef. Of course theres other things to choose from on the menu but generally people opt for the carvery as it’s the best value. If you are a big eater they can be a bit stingey on the portions of meat given but you can help yourself to as much veg, roast spuds as you like and it’s a great selection and all freshly cooked. Another good thing (and watch out for this as they don’t always tell you) is that soft drinks are bottomless so you can go and help yourself to coke, sprite etc within the restaurant once you have paid for one. (especially good value if you can get the kids to share!) We enjoyed our meal and staff were very friendly.

Visited this place a number of times and it’s hit or miss here. I either had a good experience or a very bad one, equal amount of times for each.
Bad experiences are more likely to be talked about? Too right…
Mine and hubby’s last evening meal while living in the UK before emigrating was here and it was a huge disappointment. His parents had traveled almost 50 miles to come have dinner with us and we arrived there at just after 6, made to wait 45 minutes for a table and when seated were completely ignored.
After 25 minutes of not even being offered drinks we decided to then just go and que for food. Portions were tiny and when we asked as to why we were told they were running low on meat! Seriously, At just gone 7pm on a Thursday?! We were told that they will be bringing out sausages and Pie’s ect and we could then go help ourselves to that as well but they never appeared.
All throughout our meal no one came to see if everything was ok or offer any drinks so we ended up going to the bar and getting our own and then time to pay no less than 3 people saw us trying to get some attention and blatantly ignored us.
That being said a couple of meals here have been really good hence the overall 3 stars but I would suggest calling ahead just to make sure they’re not about to run out of everything! Plus the food is really good and I can just about cope with crappy (not nonexistent) service in return for the melt in the mouth Turkey.
I also liked the fact that they had their own self serve free soft drink refills so you don’t have to hunt down a server for one too and if you still have space for dessert I recommend the Fruit Crumble which also comes with bottomless Custard.
Mon– Sat £5.49 before 7pm. £7.75 after.
Sunday’s £9.25

This is not only a carvery restaurant but its also a hotel. Its good position close to the motorway but far enough away to prevent noise makes it very convenient.
I have stayed here once and will never stay here again.
This is a list of what i found in my room:
Hairs in bath, sink and all over the floor in the corners
Dusty and cobwebby behind the toilet
Bath was covered in mould. yuk.
Ceiling in bathroom was covered in black damp.
Room ceiling was full of holes!
Everything in room was dusty
Sheets smelt musty.
The restaurant was a little better. The food was good and hot, although even the restaurant was not overly clean. Makes you wonder what state they are cooking in if i am honest!
I will not be going here again.