Blackburn with Darwen
The Arches

The Arches

581 Preston Old Road, BB2 5HD, Blackburn with Darwen, United Kingdom

Cafe • Vegan • British • Vegetarian


"Visited the cafe on a Sunday 14/05/23 after recommendations from friends who had been before. What a complete mess! Staff are so unorganised. There was literally 5 tables to serve so half of the cafe. The staff appeared clueless and looked like they were running round like headless chickens. After waiting for 15 minutes I asked a young girl if we could order and she said yes. Walked off told a older lady that we was ready to order. She replied I'm busy. A further 5 minutes we finally ordered. The food then arrived around 20 minutes later. Full of grease, sausages were had black crispy bits all over them, the bacon was like cutting into a brick. I went to cut it and it literally broke like a crisp. I don't mind crispy bacon but that was absolutely burnt to a crisp! I cut into the hash brown oil poured out and the whilst we was sat with our awful breakfast. The security alarm went off for over twenty minutes and all the staff were stood there gormless not having a clue how to turn it off including the owner! So poor service, dreadful breakfast, alarm going off for nearly half an hour and the most unorganised staff I have seen. To top it all off the bill was just short of £30 which is on the more expensive side for breakfast so I would expect food to good standard. Needless to say I won't be visiting again and I won't be recommending to anyone I know. Furthermore, a friend visited the same morning and rang us the day after to say it was the worst breakfast he'd ever had! So that's two lots of unhappy customers. Seriously need to sort your standards out because you definitely should not have a good rating on here. Anyone wanting a good breakfast go elsewhere!"

Anaz

Anaz

Duckworth Street, BB3 1QE, Blackburn with Darwen, United Kingdom

Meat • Asian • Indian • Chicken


"Dissapointing. I haven't been to Anaz for some 35 or more years, but I remember it well. As soon as our party of 4 walked through the door, we knew things wouldn't run that smoothly. It was absolutely heaving. Our table was at 6:30, and 7:10 we were seated, and poppadoms were promptly provided. However, no sooner that we started to eat those, the starters arrived. The table was cramped, to say the least, and we were taken aback as we felt like we were rushed, but then.. it was 1hr later and our mains hadn't arrived. I asked where they were, and an apology was provided, that they were very busy. Then...their thank you drink arrived, you know the one you get at the end of the meal! eventually, 1hr 20 mins later, our mains came, and at that point, the table became way too small. We all commented on how bland and watery our curries were, there was no individuality to any of the dishes, the naans were good especially my fresh garlic and chilli, but that didn't make up for the curries. Oh, and 1.5 hours from entering, I was still asking where my water was. I'm sorry, Mr Ali, we won't be returning. Your curries were nothing like what you used to make me, way back then. It was you who worked me up to a naga curry all those years ago. Your tables are too small, and your staff were overwhelmed by the number of people they had to deal with. It seems you have put quantity over quality, which is a shame."

San Marino

San Marino

Belmont Road, BL7 8AE, Blackburn with Darwen, United Kingdom

Steak • Pasta • Pizza • Italian


"We visited the restaurant as a family (4 adults) and whilst the food was lovely we wouldn’t return after having continuously rubbish service. We were seated, it wasn’t busy as you’d expect for a Tuesday night but our table was really affected by the freezing temperatures every time someone opened the door so we asked to move to the table behind us where there was a wind break considering 3/4 of the restaurant was empty I’d assume this would be a simple ‘yes’ but instead our server had to check with 2 people by which time we had moved ourselves because it was freezing. We ordered drinks and the waiter (gave his name as Giro but not sure if that’s correct) came over. I wanted to ask some questions about the menu and there was some difficulty in me understanding what he was saying, because I’m partially hard hearing and when I asked him to repeat himself he rolled his eyes at me. When he came back to take our order I was trying to pronounce the items on the menu and as I’ve done in plenty of other restaurants I asked how to pronounce my dish, he very abruptly just kept saying back to me you want the goats cheese, I said yes but I’d like to know how to pronounce it again he repeated goats cheese and rolled his eyes. After clearing our starter the waitress asked if we wanted the dessert menu, she was polite so I said we will but wanted our main first. The mains arrived and Giro was very abrupt in telling us what he had in his hands. He then told my dad off for holding his plate when he told him it was hot, but he didn’t mean the plate was hot he meant the dish on top he then told my dad he wasn’t stupid and was telling him not to touch it again his tone, choice of words and attitude was aggressive at this point I was desperate to just get up and walk out after asking a chat with a manager, but having driven from Dorset for this family catch up I decided to stay. After dinner we ordered another round of drinks, by this time we were the only table left in the restaurant still dining and there were 5+ staff around. The drinks took 15 minutes and a reminder to reach us. Giro then placed every drink infront of the wrong person intentionally as we had the same drink glasses in front of us, one beer, two cokes and a water not difficult to figure out and if he was confused he cold have said what he had on the tray and we would have helped him. The food was good, we had the 3 course deal but wouldn’t recommend this restaurant based on the service and particularly the attitude of that one waiter I’m not sure if he was just having a bad night, or if he is just too rude for a hospitality role but if I wanted that kind of service we would have gone to Karen’s"

The Willows

The Willows

Haslingden Road, BB1 2NG, Blackburn with Darwen, United Kingdom

Cafés • Sushi • Steak • Mexican


"I got home from work today and my mum, who had been looking after my little lad, said she couldn't be arsed cooking so did we want to go to the Willows for a burger. It was a no brainer. I picked the Mrs up and mum picked my dad up on the way. We all just fancied a drink and a burger, except my lad who loves cheesy pasta! So we ordered 4 Cowboy burgers (2 3oz burgers, bacon and cheese on a toasted linseed bun) a starter portion of mac n cheese (mac n cheese, bbq sauce and crispy onions) We were told before we ordered they had 3 big tables so there might be a bit of a wait, which to us was perfectly fine. We sat outside next to the kids play area, the manager and his family introduced themselves to us which was lovely, and we met the Head Chef, Ben, which you don't get everywhere! Then around 10 minutes after ordering our food all came out hot and fresh. Like steam off the burgers fresh! The burgers were top tier from the spot on buns to the fresh crispy lettuce from the streaky bacon to the smash style burgers, and the fries! Best fries around! The cheesy pasta? Didn't touch the sides and my Mrs had to give our 5yo lad half her burger and fries on top of the mac n cheese! The lovely girls that took our order, and poured us great drinks were amazing too, a mention to Liv, Elley, Laura and Keeva! An absolutely lovely pub looking over the reservoir, with attentive caring managers and a superb team of staff!"