The Orange Tree Thornham

The location on the North Norfolk coast road allows for bird watching and easy access to beaches and shops. Guests praised the cleanliness, additional amenities, and friendly staff. The breakfast was also highly appreciated.

Disappointed by our recent dinner at the orange tree. As a family we are a fan of the orange tree, we went twice in one week when visiting thornham in 2023 we liked it so much and made sure to book ahead of time for the first night of our holiday this year. However, our recent visit on a sunny Saturday evening left a lot to be desired. The only reason I’ve rated average rather than poor is because the food, as usual, was delicious. The thing that let us down was service, for the entirety of our evening we were left wanting. The service staff seemed overwhelmed by a busy evening service as though it was a surprise on a sunny Saturday evening to be pretty fully booked. We arrived at 7pm, our drinks order was taken in reasonable time but none had arrived before we ordered food (waitress didn’t offer to check on our order for us). We asked for a jug of tap water for the table but were told to DIY, we could see it was busy so attempted to help ourselves but only enough for 2 glasses in the water dispenser. Drinks took 40mins to arrive with our bottle of rose room temperature at best, with sparkling water missing from the order and required asking for another few times, when it did arrive it came with comically small (just larger than shot glasses) water glasses. You could expect on a 28degree day most diners would like some water so maybe providing this as an option for a jug per table on arrival would be nice. Although 4/5 of us had starters our mains did not arrive until 9pm which was disappointing for my poor brother who hadn’t ordered a starter but wasn’t expecting such a delay to mains. We had to request cutlery for starters and mains as seemed to be a surprise that we might need some. As I said the food was very good, but we didn’t bother with dessert given how long it took to make it to mains. I have worked in the service industry previously and I appreciate a warm summer evening, likely a popular spot all day, may have left staff a little frazzled but it seemed understaffed and those that were there inattentive or maybe just undertrained? I wouldn’t normally leave a review but we weren’t asked on the night how we’d found everything so perhaps highlighting we did have an issue with the service may help improve it for the rest of the summer evenings.

An excellent dinner chosen from a good comprehensive menu well served by happy & obliging staff although probably on the expensive end of my price spectrum. Pub well located in Thornham with plenty of outdoor seating for the warmer days of summer.