The Smithy in County Durham

We recently visited this restaurant that we had previously enjoyed for its great food and service. Unfortunately, our most recent experience fell short of expectations in several ways. Upon ordering drinks, we had to wait 20 minutes for the first round to arrive- it was two cocktails but this is an awful long time bearing in mind our table was booked for 8:00pm so quite late really On to the starters, compared to previous visits, a bread bun was served with hummus instead of the usual flatbread or breadsticks, which was a bit unusual. My husband enjoyed his meatball starter. The service further lagged as we waited over 15 minutes for our empty starter plates and drinks to be cleared. The next round of drinks took as long as the first. On to the main course, despite the understanding that meat needs to rest, the steaks we ordered arrived cold. The waiter took them back and returned them warmed, but all of the accompaniments were cold as a result. Additionally, the chips were disappointingly rock solid, and there was a lack of butter on the dry steaks and the promised greenery was missing from the plate, both stated on the menu. It was evident that the restaurant was understaffed, as indicated by the delays in service for both drinks and meals. Even when we expressed our concerns to the waiter, the manager, in the background, did not make an appearance or address our dissatisfaction. It’s really disappointing that our recent dining experience here was marred by slow service (not the wonderful waiters fault who was running around), cold food, and a lack of attention to detail. I hope that they can address these issues- really unexpected from The Apartment Group. We’ve eaten in many of their venues and this visit was by far the worst.

Overall this restaurant has so much potential however our experience was sadly quite disappointing. The food when it finally came out was overall, very tasty, apart from puddings, they were average and the crumble was awful! The problem was the wait for each course was extremely long and the lunch we booked in for really became dinner. There was a wedding on and I feel this impacted our dining experience, this was a shame as we were celebrating our mums birthday and had travelled a long way. We were a table of 8, portion sizes were great but the pork was very fatty and the beef was lovely but they were extremely stingy specifically on the beef meat (1 slice per meal), we spoke to the manager and he sorted this out immediately. The Yorkshire puddings were the best I’ve had not at home, the cauliflower cheese barely had any cheese on. Gravy was amazing. We did have to wait a while for some of our drinks, eventually we got so sick of looking at them on the bar we went and got them ourselves. Toilets were clean but no loo roll! Tables were spaced out so even though it was busy you didn’t feel crammed. My advice would be to check if there is a wedding on when you are booking. Dog friendly which is a plus.

We stopped by to look at Runa Farm as our potential wedding venue. Little did we know that we were also in for a treat for our lunch! Super fresh and generous portions - the choice consists of British classics and some modern Asian-inspired dishes. The restaurant itself is very stylish and you feel like you’re in a Spanish villa, rather than in the middle of Yorkshire.

We had a fantastic experience. Our waiter was Luke it was his first day I can honestly say he was so good, great manners and outstanding service from start to finish. He was so friendly and made us feel more than welcome

Visited this place in the past and it was very good unfortunately this was not the case on this visit we sent two meals back and my meal was cold and seemed as it had been standing waiting to be served before I received it. Very disappointing