I have been to many Michlen star restaurants in my life and I have to say that Purnells has been the very worst for food and the cost of the food. £68.00 the 6 course tasting menu for tiny quenells of food on a plate with a sprinkling of leaves is just sinful in this day and St Austelle musselsconsisted of 2!!!! Mussels in a dish with about a tablespoon of Finely shreeded pickled cucumber!!!!!As 2 of the partu were not able to eat shell fish the only alternative was A sliver of Monkfish at an additional cost of £10 per is unbeliveable that if one has an allergy to a certain food that they should be asked to pay extra or do without that sliver of the course.Another member of the party had an allergy to fish The Scottish halibut! I asked for an alternative and was presented with approximately a serving spoon of Beetroots!!I Just unreal!! All of our party are good meat eaters and would have no problems with any normal cuts of meat. I asked the head waiter prior to taking the order about the Slow Cooked Daube of beef. I advised him that I would not like it. He went to great lengths to advise me that it was superb and I would enjoy it, I asked for an alternative like a vegetarain option instead but nothing could be offered as an option. It was indeed a daube!!! of cows Cheek. When I realized what was on my plate I had to excuise myself from the table due to feeling ill. he lemon meringue pie was the tin hat of the meal. 2 little pies were brought to the table and ceremoniales cut in half!!!! served with a quinell of ice cream. !!

We were a party of 4. We had been given a voucher as a christmas gift for 2 and we invited another couple to join us for the evening. our voucher was for £150.00 and our bill was £371.70 which included discresionary ervice charge. As we were in company It was not suitable to challange all this at the time as it would have been an embarazzing situation for our guests. We also flew over from Ireland to go to Purnells. In hind sight we would have been better off to have thrown the voucher away.

Opon our return to Ireland last evening I called Purnells to outline exactly what I have stated in this review. The Manager said he would bring the comments to the attention of his manager and the hef.

In conclusion we feel that is just immoral to charge such prices for food whereby the actual content or amount of food served to a client would cost undet £7.00 at max. We dine out a lot and we have no problem paying for beautiful good food with flavours and we like tasteful food.

We had really been looking forward to visiting Purnells but what a LET DOWN .

Maybe the chef should watch Masterchef The Professionals for a few lessons to see how food should be served and give some decent portions of wonderful food not just the content of a decent starter over 6 courses. a starter for £68.00