Brasserie Gerard - Guildford

Lee Brown (24 May 2008)

My partner and I go to Brasserie Chez Gerard for a meal once a month, which we usually enjoy but this time it was an exception. We had snails, which were great and I had chicken and fries, which tasted okay. My partner had poached salmon salad, which was half frozen and as a restaurateur, I was not happy. I never complain unless it’s serious and a half frozen meal in my eyes is. After a long while the manager came over and explained that the chefs had not defrosted the salmon correctly, which was okay but I wondered why it was brought in frozen, and what happened to the good old fashioned cooking – it was disappointing. We won’t be going back as we felt the matter was not correctly rectified. If it was tasteless, I could have accepted that, or if it was cold or we waited too long etc, but frozen food is totally unacceptable.

AJB (30 January 2008)

In general I am a fan of Chez Gerard. The onglet steak is a good cut and good value, though I feel the price varies from restaurant to restaurant, which seems inappropriate. I have eaten at the Guildford restaurant three times. The first two meals were okay, but not especially memorable but on the third visit, for lunch, the service was very slow, despite the restaurant not being busy.

My starter was French onion soup had burnt onions and the soup had apparently been finished with vast quantities of Worcester sauce. The waitress ignored me as the soup sat there uneaten. Eventually I gained her attention and sent it back, but a pressing appointment did not permit a replacement starter so I refused her offer of one. More time passed and after seemingly an age and whispered discussions with the waitress, the manager arrived and inexplicably made exactly the same offer. Rather oddly, like the waitress, he was uninterested in what was wrong with the starter. The main course was okay in that the steak was cooked perfectly but let down by a thin and insufficient béarnaise sauce, but for me the lunch had already been spoilt. To their credit the starter was removed from the bill without quibbling.

This restaurant needs to get its act together. It is a shame and the one in Reigate is much better, largely due to far more friendly and switched on front of house staff.