The Old Ship Pub, Lee-on-the-Solent

We have just returned from a sunday lunch at the old ship and in short it was shocking. We went there four months ago and the sunday roast was lovely. Today my daughter and I had the Sunday roast beef which was two slices of defrosted beef that had been over salted, broccoli and cauliflower that had been boiled to a mush and mash that was yellow with butter. In short ate little and left hungry . Will not be returning.

I have given it one star for the service; the staff are young, keen and polite.

Typical fast food pub chain, this is part of the Mitchell and Butlers Sizzlers chain of pubs, with two main courses for £5 etc. Three of us went in on a Wednesday evening February 2010. Having sat and decided what we wanted they then advised us that they had run of quite a few items including Chicken & mushroom pies, Timothy Taylor pies, quarter chicken, ribs and advised there were only two pieces of fish left so we chose again. When the meatballs turned up they were cold and were sent back. The tipsy pie and pasta were very nice.

Whilst at the bar two ladies returned their smothered chicken, one cold, the other still frozen in the middle.

The puddings are excellent value.

It was difficult to see why they should be so short of food in the middle of the week when they were not particularly busy and left us feeling decidedly grumpy when there was no advance notice or apology. In the age of digital food thermometers I am surprised this pub fails to correctly heat the food so frequently.