Wro Bar
We arrived at West Kirby for our annual crabbing day. Every year we’ll head to the water front armed with plastic buckets, fishing line, nets and smoked bacon and we capture poor, unsuspecting crabs. When we’re done we go drinking. We’ve done this as a group every single year since Captain Grimbag’s Stag Do last year.
“But, Toast… Why did you go crabbing for a Stag Do!?”
Because fuck you that’s why. It’s awesome. Go do it and tell me I’m wrong. No, you wont be able to, will you? Because crabbing is awesome. You know what else is awesome? Breakfast is awesome.
Clarence Boddicker – “There wasn’t much choice on the menu, breakky, veggie breakky or bits from a breakky on toast. I am always suspicious of reductions shown on a menu with the old prices slashed out like some kind of Easter DFS sale. But I opted for the £9.50 large breakfast SLASHED to £7 odd.
It was rather uncomfortable though to watch the other guys having their orders messed up, especially when I received a huff down my neck from a disgruntled waiter. I was there when they took the order 12 breakfasts with a few alterations shouldn’t of been too much of an epic or am I living in the land of make believe. All in I would return but in fewer numbers. 7.4“
The Prince – “A quick visit to the bathroom revealed very well maintained and clean facilities. The sink was nice and large and the taps automatic. The decor was very nice with a good colour scheme, nice tiles. And. Some reindeers which really set the look off. A credit must be due for the executive choice to install a Xelerator hand dryer though. Simply marvellous.
I ordered the large Veggie breakfast. The sausages were Quorn sausage. I prefer the proper veggie ones my ex’s parents used to get. Fuck I miss them. (the sausages). Quick note if the management read this. Try out the proper veggie sausages lad. / bird. They are banging.
Portions were OK. With the hash brown fillers OBVO. Unsure if they’ve heard us. But we were offered a free drink for the inconveniences we encountered. 6.49 (extra .49 points added for the complimentary Shandy). Nice one”
Sea Burger – “After turning up late, we found a seat and had to wait a fairly long time to be asked for a drink order. Shouldn’t turn up late then. As I was sat nearest the kitchen, mine came out first. The hash browns were missing, which is a pretty fundamental part of a veggie breakfast. When asked, the waiter said they’d be coming out separately, but I doubt they’d have come at all if it hadn’t been queried.
There was no sign of cutlery or condiments, and both had to be asked for a couple of times before they appeared which was pretty poor. They brought a thimble full of ketchup out too between six of us which was lame.
I’d say the service wasn’t great, as there were a lot of mix ups and a long gap between the first and last meals coming out. But, the staff were very polite and dealt with the problems well. Especially dealing with Jungle Trouble’s bean juice paddy! (I would have gone rogue too). I assume they had overhead us talking about the review as we were all offered a complimentary drink to make up for the mistakes. Nevertheless this offer was appreciated and clawed some much needed points back! Overall rating: 6.5/10“
Grill Scoff Herring – “So there we were. 10 men on a train Thierry En Route to West Kirby, in a scene reminiscent of the Grimbag Stag a year previous.
The menu. Nothing of note save for the Bucks Fizz option (which we did take advantage of I’m glad to say) I opted for the large FE as the standard Grimbags plump. The mushroom replacement test was unfortunately completely vetoed by the waiter, which did come as a surprise to me although there is a rumour that the challenge was accepted further down the table. This didn’t bode well, but when the breakfast arrived I quickly forgot about the lack of a changeling, as the present ingredients were more than plentiful.
A few errors down the way, wrong coloured toast, missing hash browns, elusive cutlery, downright minuscule condiments & the Jungle “bean juice” debacle, were all dealt with patiently, in good humour & with a free round of drinks in apologia.
I have to agree with Clarence of this one though, despite it being a large order, if the breakfast variants were written on a note pad, how did it go so wrong between the table & the kitchen? Order bumbles, no budging on the replacement test & a pricey menu (the Olympic discount is not a permanent feature for future reference) but a decent meal & a classy joint.” 6.8/10
Minute Man – “My second Toast and already we were on safari. After some time, drink orders were taken (I decided to spoil myself with the maverick Bucks Fizz option) and after drinks arrived, our breakfast orders were also deftly taken. I chose Full English and settled in… time passed, we talked about Intellectual Property and flanges, then food began to arrive. With a big order, you can excuse some delays and the food taking time to reach everyone.
However, my position furthest away from the kitchen seemed to be fateful and serving the 13 breakfasts quickly became something of a farce. Items were mixed up, requests forgotten, ingredients missing and as the mistakes were corrected, I sat with no food whilst others were already well underway. Eventually i received what i ordered, but the portions seemed a bit paltry and comparing it to my fellow Toasters, wildly inconsistent!
Tucking in, the food itself was good quality. Decent eggs and beans, crispy hash browns, nice black pudding, good Toast and actually some of the best sausages i’ve had for a while. However, i was short changed on the bacon and the mix ups did dampen the experience a bit. They may not be used to such big parties, but to get seemingly all of the orders wrong seemed pretty bad for a respectable eatery. We were compensated with free drinks (without prompting) which was a nice touch but sadly, Wro has definitely lost points this time round. I would visit again – the lunch they began to serve as we left looked delicious – but maybe keep the numbers below 10 next time! My rating – 6.8 / 10. Glad i spoiled myself.”
Mr. Kirk Douglas – “The venue was slightly more salubrious than the past haunts, which sometimes led to the usual loudness of our banter being stifled somewhat but it was still evident. The muck up came when the orders weren’t taken properly and I would have rather the waiter just re-asked everyone again what they wanted instead of guessing and continually getting them sent back.
The portions were well out of whack and I don’t know what happened when they took Jungle’s beans off his plate, but I would have LOVED them on mine as the ratio was like Picasso had drawn my breakfast. The eggs were amazing, the sausages were the best I’ve had for a while but the bacon could have been better. It was this that made me wish I’d gone for the regular breakfast instead of the large as initially ordered, I couldn’t have got less beans and would have been happy with one less sausage for a whole £3 less.
The free drink was a defo saving grace for them in the face of our troubles as it gave us time to sit back and reflect on what had been a lovely morning with the staff remaining really friendly and attentive when they could have been flapping and Basil Fawlty style apologising.
Overall it was highly enjoyable, they couldn’t even come out with the excuse that we sprung it upon them as we had booked it in advance, so it was just down to a lack of communications between the waiter and the chef. Had that been spot on, the whole experience would have been too. 7.5“
Jungle Trouble – “They fucked up my meal 3 times, as well as everyone else’s at least once, and it was only that they gave us free booze that my score isn’t any lower. 6“
Luther Two-Tashe – “It was a classy affair, befitting of the executive shirts I had opted to don for the day, and deserving of the bucks fizz aperitif in which we all indulged (nice touch). I ordered the large breakfast with poached eggs and white toast, which at the olympically discounted price of £7.59 was good value. Unlike others, I got exactly as I ordered.
I did my best to ruin it all, however by forcing it in my hungover face so fast that it felt like it was coming out my skin. You’ll be released to know that I recovered sufficiently after a 2 minute break to finish, except for one sausage. This was promptly skewered on a fork and handed over to a fellow toaster, in the style of the classic grange hill intro. Hilarity ensued.
The free round of drinks as an apology for the mistakes was also a fine gesture. 7.83“
Plotatron 9000 – “The meal itself was grand, that’s grand in an Irish accent not grand in a posh toff accent i.e. ok to not bad levels of goodness, the sausages were flavourful and the portion size was good but the beans were lacking in viscosity and numerousness, the bacon varied from barely done to crispy dry, the single big mushroom was cold and the hash browns were missing-although presented on a medieval platter some 5 minutes into the eating as though they were the centrepiece of a banquet – but they’re not they’re hash browns, an egg dipper at best greasy stodge bodger at worst.
It also took about 5 minutes and several requests for my cutlery to make an appearance during which time the temperature of the breakfast-which wasn’t piping hot to begin with-plummeted to just barely sufficient levels of warmness.
Factor in the laughable tiny pixie buckets of ketchup and brown sauce they brought out- after several requests again and you get a breakfast that could have been great but kitchen incompetence coupled with a hangover of doom forces me to give it 5.6/10. Not even a free lager shandy saved this crab of hope from dropping off the net of chance into the bucket of inadequacy.”
Jester Fortune – “Third train lucky, I finally joined this band of merry toasters.
Once there we were seated promptly and issued with menus and the drink order taken. The breakfast menu was limited, full English or vegi option. This is not necessarily a bad thing as it’s more likely food is cooked to order. I opted for the discounted large breakfast. As a veteran of café culture I always found it more efficient not to swap produce you don’t like and it paid dividends as a couple of orders were cocked. All the ingredients were of high quality, particularly the sausages.
There was lack of condiments and cutlery and for £9.50 (currently discounted to £7.59) one should be getting a coffee or tea included. Overall I was very impressed, the quality of the food matched the venue. Others in the group did have issues with their orders and portion sizes did vary drastically. That said there were 13 of us and a free drink was offered by way of atonement. My official Toast rating is 7.33 recurring.”
Terry Snatchett: “I got FOUR sausages! 9/10“
Overall Score – 6.76/10
Final Thoughts – Yeah, Wro Bar fucked up royally with our order. The round on the house certainly helped and, don’t get me wrong, the food was good. But the whole breakfast was a bit of a debacle. Don’t go there in big numbers.