Food & Drink
Chef calls out ‘opportunists looking for a free meal’ who refused to pay bill after eating ‘70%’ of their food
‘Everyone’s after something for free at the moment, which perhaps comes from their lack of respect for the industry’
A chef and restaurant owner has opened up about an incident in which a couple refused to pay for their bill, despite having eaten the majority of the food served to them.
Luke Payne has owned and run The Pack Horse in Hayfield with his partner Emma for the last five years, and prides himself on serving ‘up market’ contemporary food not found in your typical pub.
According to Luke, 99% of The Pack Horse’s customers are ‘lovely’ and ‘have an amazing time’, but, on Saturday night, one couple refused point blank to pay up for their bill despite having eaten the majority of their meals.
Luke has since spoken out about the incident, saying the couple were simply ‘opportunists’ on the look-out for a free meal, clearly oblivious to the crippling impacts the Covid-19 pandemic has had upon the business and the rest of the hospitality industry.
Speaking to Proper Manchester, Luke detailed how, despite the couple being checked on by his waiting team several times throughout their meal, they never once complained about their food until they’d eaten ‘around 70% of it’.
The Pack Horse Hayfield / Facebook
He explained: “Despite having being checked back by our waiting team to see if everything was okay, the woman brought her pork chop up to the bar and compared it to ‘fatty bacon’, saying ‘this isn’t what I expected, I don’t really like it, I’d like another meal to replace it for free.’
“She had the opportunity to say if something was wrong or not to her liking, and in that scenario, we would have absolutely done everything we could to have made their evening better. She wanted a replacement for free, but she’d already eaten her meal essentially. So I said no, and informed her that if she wanted anything else she’d have to pay for it.”
At this, the woman’s husband allegedly became aggressive and claimed to be ‘in the right as the customer’. The couple then refused point blank to pay any of their bill, which amounted to £106, before leaving the premises.
Luke said: “Obviously we don’t live or die by £100, but it’s still a lot of money. That’s a young waitress’ wage for the day.”
Luke ended up charging the couple using the card details they had submitted when securing their reservation online – however, they threatened to get their card insurers involved so whether or not the money will actually come through will only be determined in the next couple of days.
The incident has understandably left Luke and his team disheartened and frustrated, with him noting: “When it’s your business and your livelihood and your passion, you want to make sure that everyone leaves having had a great time. So these kind of things do stick, and it is really frustrating.
“I take stuff like this really personally, because this is all we know, it’s all we do and we do it for love. The backbone of what we do is making people happy, so this kind of stuff brings out a certain level of upset.”
And sadly, this isn’t Luke’s first experience with customers attempting to get their meals for free; he told us that since restaurants have reopened after the lockdowns, he’s noticed a rise in diners complaining about food to avoid paying their bill.
“The customer always thinks they’re right, even when they’re not. We’re professionals at the end of the day, if something is wrong with the food and drink and the service that we’re providing, we’ll know about it. So people should be a little more respectful of what we do.
“Everyone’s after something for free at the moment, which perhaps comes from their lack of respect for the industry and the hard work and the graft and the love that goes into it… People only see the end product, they don’t understand why things cost as much as they do and why they take as long to prepare as they do.”
Since sharing his experience on Twitter, Luke and the Pack Horse team have been flooded with messages of support from adoring customers. One person wrote: “Corr, I wish I was having that pork chop for lunch. I love The Packhorse. These miserly chancers do not deserve your incredible food.”
Another noted: “We came in last week and 2 of our party had the Pork and absolutely loved it. Urrrgghh chancers trying to pull a fast one on a local business – hate it!”
You can stay up to date with The Pack Horse on Twitter, Facebook and Instagram.
Food & Drink
Italiana Fifty Five’s new winter menu features pasta so fresh it’s made in front of you
So, so good!
Italiana Fifty Five, the popular Italian spot with locations in the city centre and Didsbury, has launched a brand new winter menu and it’s a must-try for pasta fans.
They’re serious about fresh pasta, and in the front window of their Wilmslow Road restaurant you can see chefs prepare various types of pasta on traditional equipment.
This includes everything from rigatoni cylinders to squiggly ribbons of reginette.
Manchester’s Finest Group
New additions to the menu include a carbonara, made to the traditional recipe with egg and parmesan, as well as a fresh ravioli with spinach and sage.
You’ll also find an eight-hour cooked beef shin ragù with pappardelle, and an oven-baked vodka sauce dish, complete with crispy bits on top.
Other new additions to the menu include a cappellacci di burrata, served in a meaty Tuscan sauce, and a mushroom-heavy reginette dish.
Manchester’s Finest Group
There’s a couple of autumnal-leaning starters too, including bruschetta topped with stracciatella di bufala, and some Sicilian-style arancini too.
The new menu is available at all sites, however you’ll only find the fresh homemade pasta in the Didsbury branch. Get yourself booked in HERE.
Italiana Fifty Five have extended their August 50% off deal on their a la carte menu, so you can now grab a bargain until Sunday September 15th.
This means dishes like their trofie with pesto, lobster ravioli and their famous linguine pecorino, served flambéed at the table from a giant wheel of cheese are still half price.
The a la carte menu is available all day, every day, and takes in a breadth of Italian classics, antipasti and pasta dishes, pizza, cuts from the grill and desserts.
Manchester’s Finest Group
You’ll be able to kick off with dishes like mozzarella fritta, calamari and capesante gratinate – seared scallops finished with parmesan cheese under the grill.
It will also, of course, include perhaps its most famous dish – the linguine pecorino, which is flambéed tableside in a huge wheel of aged pecorino cheese.
For pushing the boat out, there’s also a sharing slab of chateaubriand steak, carved at the table and served with parmesan baby roast potatoes and a cherry tomato and parmesan salad.
Manchester’s Finest Group
Then you can finish up with homemade desserts, like a panna cotta, pistachio cannoli or a classic tiramisu.
The offer is available at all three Italiana Fifty Five sites – Liverpool Rd, Great Northern and Didsbury Village.
Get booked in HERE.
Food & Drink
Popeyes opening new drive-thru in Manchester tomorrow with FREE chicken
It’s the second Popeyes to open in Manchester
Louisiana-style fried chicken chain Popeyes has announced plans to open more restaurants this year, including a second site in Greater Manchester – which opens tomorrow, Friday April 26th.
The chain opened its 33rd UK site in Piccadilly Gardens in October last year, which proved an instant hit with visitors forming queues along the street and around the corner just to sample its classic Southern fried chicken.
Regular customers have learned to take early lunches to avoid the rush as it fills up with hungry people every day.
Now its new drive-thru, located on Bury New Road, is opening tomorrow, Friday April 26th, with both the doors and lanes officially opening from 11am.
Greater Manchester and the North West’s first drive-thru location, the restaurant will mark the brand’s 11th opening in 2024 and 47th site in the UK.
And of course, they’re giving away FREE chicken on opening day, with the first three people queuing both on-foot and in cars winning free Chicken Sandwiches for a whole year.
As well as that, the first 25 customers in both queues will also be rewarded with a free Chicken Sandwich and exclusive Popeyes merchandise.
You’ll have to get there early if you want to be one of the first three, however, as fans queued for more than 16 hours when the Piccadilly Gardens site opened last year.
And from Saturday, April 27th, you’ll also be able to grab breakfast at the new restaurant.
The ‘Brekkie’ menu features British Breakfast classics with a New Orleans twist, like the Big Cajun Breakfast Roll, Cajun Hash Browns and Nutella-topped buttermilk biscuits.
Breakfast will be available until 11am every day, and will even include a Bacon Roll Meal for just £1.99, which includes a Bacon Roll, a Hash Brown and a drink.
For those who have not yet had the pleasure of sampling Popeyes’ crunchy flavoursome goodness, its menu features classic offerings like the Chicken Sandwich, with signature 12-hour marinated chicken and original Southern biscuits and gravy.
Additionally, a variety of side dishes like mac & cheese, mash with Cajun gravy, and original biscuits will be served, alongside milkshakes in various flavours including vanilla, chocolate, mocha, and specialities like Oreo, Lotus Biscoff, and strawberry cheesecake.
What’s more, fans across the UK can now start their day with a Cajun twist – with Popeyes Breakfast Menu now available nationwide.
Tom Crowley, Popeyes UK Chief Executive Officer, commented: “Following the success of our Manchester Piccadilly restaurant, we are thrilled to bring our newest Popeyes to Bury New Road, marking our third restaurant in the North West.
“Our new restaurant will also be a Drive-Thru, meaning customers in Greater Manchester can enjoy our Famous Louisiana Chicken by dining in, via the Drive Thru lane, or by ordering online for kerbside collection.
“Our most recent openings have been some of the biggest to date, not just in the UK but for Popeyes globally, and we’re confident that Bury New Road will be just as popular.”
If you fancy winning free Chicken Sandwiches for a year, but don’t have time to queue up outside the new restaurant, then keep your eyes peeled on our Instagram tomorrow, Friday April 26th, as we’re going to be running a competition where you can win just that!
T&Cs: Offer entitles the holder to 3 free Chicken Sandwiches per week for 52 weeks. The 12 months starts on receipt of the email containing the first 3 links. Available in any Popeyes Louisiana Chicken UK restaurant, only on our Classic or Spicy Chicken Sandwich. Non transferable, not valid in conjunction with any other offer. Offer is redeemable only when you order online for collection through our website. Over 18s only.
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