Old Grey Mare Restaurant in York

I can't remember ever given a negative review for any establishment let alone a pub but unfortunately this one deserves it. We came to York for the weekend before New year's and I had a list of pubs that I was looking forward to visiting. I was looking forward to visiting the house of trembling madness as I'd seen it on a couple of youtube craft beer channels and the selection looked really good. We went to the pub (the Lendal one) with our friends and our teenage children to finish off a busy day sightseeing with a ghost walk (the deathly dark tour was excellent by the way) on the Sunday evening (29/12/24). I spoke to the bar man to check that kids were allowed, and he said they were. The rest of the party (7 of us in total) came into the pub and went to find a seat upstairs (there weren't any downstairs), it was 9.45pm. I went up, dropped my coat off and asked what everyone wanted and returned downstairs to the bar. I queued up behind a couple of people who were being served and asked for a pint only not be told by the same barman that he had just called time and the person in front of me was the last person he was serving. He had said not 5 mins before that kids were allowed and watched us all come in and go upstairs to get seated without saying a word before announcing it was time at 9.55pm? I said he could have told us this, but he arrogantly ignored me and carried on busying himself behind the bar with his co-worker who was just sitting on a stool at the bar repeating that he had called time (obviously while I was upstairs). I have never known a pub that calls time before 10pm even if it was 10.30 closing (it actually says 11pm on the website) We had no choice but to go back upstairs and tell everyone that we couldn't get served and left. As we were outside, we saw the barman topping up someone's beer who was already in there, so his time announcement was obviously selective. I've never been treated in this way in any pub I've visited and can now see why there are a lot of negative comments about staff on trip advisor. There are some fantastic pubs in York, the golden fleece, Guy Fawkes in and Valhalla being three and how a competitor can be so poor compared to them is unfathomable. Unfortunately, the previous negative comments are all fully deserved. They seriously need to look at who runs their bars, we certainly won't be returning.

Lamb Rogan josh with garlic Nan the best. Tasty as always.

Well worth a visit when visiting York. Good selection of real ales.

We had our annual family Christmas meal here yesterday for the first time and it didn’t disappoint. It’s beautifully decorated for Christmas, everyone who served us were polite, friendly and we felt really well looked after, the food was absolutely fantastic. It’s the best Christmas meal we’ve had and the best venue we’ve been to, we already can’t wait to book again for the first birthday of the year. Thank you for making our evening so special, Merry Christmas

very busy on Sunday afternoon,carvery quite good,only downside is the sauces are never full,ok they get them when asked,but the wait time is too long,your meal is cold by the time it’s filled and brought from the kitchen. So I will knock one star off for that.