On Saturday night Mel and I went to Bolliwood for dinner to celebrate the fact that Bobby has been in New Zealand for a year. We’ve been there before, for Ryan’s birthday a couple of years ago (about a week before Harrison was born) and I had memories of good food.
We arrived and were seated at about 7:3o. It was a table for 14 (although due to a few late cancelation there ended up being only 11 of us) and the waiter came to take our orders just before 8. Unfortunately no one had given us menus. After being supplied with menus we finally placed our orders at about ten past eight. One end of the table just ordered a main course, while those at our end ordered the set menu banquet options. 5 normal banquets and one vegetarian. About 10 minutes later the waiter returned to tell us that we couldn’t order a single vegetarian on it’s own – so I said we’d change one of the normal banquets to a vegetarian, making it four and two. The waited said he ‘check with the chef’ to see it that was okay – which seemed absurd, as the menu state minimum two. Around 8:30 our entrees arrived, which we promptly finished. At this point one end of the table was completely without food (although the wait staff insisted on putting our entrees down at their end). Shortly afterward main courses arrived for the table behind us (who had arrived after us and ordered after us). Upon enquring about that we were told that as we had some entrees the mains were delayed for our table.
For nearly an hour we sat with empty entree plates at the table, while the rest of the group had now been seated for nearly two hours with no food. There was also the conspicious lack of any wait staff offering more drinks. Water had also run our by now. When I asked for more water, the jug directly in front of me was replenished but the other two on the table remained empty.
Main course finally arrived at around 9:30. The set-menu banquets were delivered as two groups, Bobby and I shared three dishes as the vegetarian option, while four dishes were delivered in front of Richie and Luke. After waiting for a further 10 minutes we enquired with the waiter where the other two banquets were only to be told that the four curries delivered to Luke and Richie were actually to be shared amongst all four people who ordered that option, but would be replenished if need be.
About 10 minutes later, after we’d already made a good start on our food the condiments arrived. Too little too late.
Unfortunately Mel’s general constitution does not enjoy eating late, and any meal after around 9pm tends to make her feel unwell. So she ended up not eating very much at all – a sad repeat of our visit two years earlier when her hyperemesis had restricted her to rice and soup.
In the end, we left as soon as we’d eaten, as we needed to collect Harrison and get home. Sadly the food was wonderful but the service was terrible, especially given the size of the group. We did comment on the poor service on the way our and were met with excuses and a small discount, but no apology.
The food at Bolliwood is great, and the prices are good, but in this case the service was terrible and has likely ensured that we’ll never return.
But Bobby, congratulation on a year in NZ, hope to see you here for a lot longer.