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Grange Garden Centre

 Garden Centre Reviews


Grange Garden Centre


Entrance to the Grange Garden Centre
Click the picture to enlarge it.

The Grange Garden centre really has the gardening business tagged onto a large and up-market restaurant and a shop selling a full range of  skiing equipment and accessories.

This is a totally independent GardenAction opinion of the Grange Garden Centre in Melton Mowbray, Leicestershire. Click any picture to enlarge it.

PLANTS AREA

The outdoor plants area at the Grange Garden Centre is attractively laid out and had part of it covered with what looked like fine mesh. The weather was dry at the time of our visit but the mesh cover didn't appear to be water-proof although we may be wrong.
There is a medium sized selection of shrubs and ornamental ornamental trees. The range of pots was good for a garden centre of this size.

Outdoor plants area


Picture of primroses with damaged flowers

Click the picture on the left to see a larger version of primroses for sale at the Grange garden centre. The flowers on all of them have clearly been damaged by the weather. A nearby garden centre visited at the same time had undamaged primroses which gave a superb, healthy display. We were not impressed by the quality of the plants at the Grange. They all looked a bit worse for wear compared to other garden centres at this time of year.

INDOOR SALES AREA

Indoor sales area at the Grange Garden Centre

The indoor sales area at the Grange Garden Centre consists of three sections. The skiing section (see specialities below), a gift and card section and finally the gardening section. The gift area (larger than the gardening area) is well laid out and stocks a good range of gifty items. The gardening section stocks a small range of gardening accessories and equipment. Far less than it should for the average garden centre.

CAFE

Beef burger The food at the Alpine restaurant of the Grange Garden Centre is top quality and the prices are good. The beef burger on the left really was homemade and consisted of top quality beef perfectly seasoned. It was cooked to perfection.

Panini

The panini on the right was a far throw from 90% of the paninis we have been served at garden centre cafes. Real tasty slices of bacon smothered in brie and then freshly cooked. It was a real panini not one of those massed produced ones with fake brown marks on them to fool you into thinking they had been char grilled.

The prices were very reasonable for such top quality food. The panini cost �6 and the burger cost �7. Other prices were soup �4.50, toasties �4.50, jacket potatoes �5, main meals around �8.50, breakfasts �5 to �7. There is a licensed bar which serves beers (real draught beer as well), wines and spirits.

On Sundays the Alpine restaurant serves a roast dinner type menu and judging by the food we sampled on a Saturday, it will likely be a delight.

Alpine restaurant at The Grange garden centre The restaurant was very unusually and attractively laid out. Not surprisingly the theme was alpine with wooden clad walls and real solid chunky tables and chairs. The legs of the tables appeared to be made from reclaimed beamed ceiling rafters, a great effect. It was spotlessly clean.

The only down side to all this praise was the appallingly slow service we received.

From being directed to a table through to receiving our food took us over 50 minutes, something which is not acceptable in a top restaurant let alone a garden centre cafe / restaurant. This was on a Saturday lunch time in January. The bottleneck is caused by all the food and drinks being waitress served to your table. You can't even collect your own coffee and cakes.

After about half an hour of waiting for food we began to look round to see how long it was taking for others to be served. To be truthful, it seemed that the service we received was the worse in the room. It seemed that average wait in the restaurant was 20 to 30 minutes.

PET CENTRE
There is no pet centre at this garden centre.

AQUATICS
There is no aquatics centre at The Grange Garden Centre.

GARDEN SHEDS / GREENHOUSES
None were seen at the time of our visit.

WATER FEATURES
We saw none.

SPECIALITIES
The Grange Garden Centre specialises in ski equipment. From skis to cold weather clothing, it's all here. They will even hand service your skis for you and they provide a complete hire service.

TOILETS
The toilets were clean and functional.

CAR PARKING
The car park was gravel which would make wheelchair access to it difficult. At the time we visited (January) it was about 65% full.

DIRECTIONS AND CONTACT
The address is:
The Grange,
Asfordby Hill,
Melton Mowbray,
Leicestershire LE14 3QU

Tel: 01664 812802
Email: http://www.houghtys.co.uk/contact-us/
Website: http://www.houghtys.co.uk/

A map can be found HERE

Our sat nav had difficulty getting us to the Grange Garden Centre. However, there are tourist signs once you get to the area.

DISABLED ACCESS
Disabled access was good all round.

OPENING HOURS
Monday to Saturday 9.00 to 6.30
Sunday 10.00 to 4.00

SUMMARY
The garden centre aspect of this business appears to be secondary to the skiing and restaurant side. The plants didn't look as healthy as we expected and the range was limited. The selection of gardening accessories was also limited. The indoor sales area was adequate but uninspiring.

Clearly the ski side of the business was doing well and to our uninformed eyes, the range looked extensive. However we have not taken it into account in the ratings below because it is not gardening related in any way.

The restaurant offers top quality home made food at very competitive prices. It was totally spoilt by the long waiting time we encountered. Other customers were subject to a shorter waiting time but even that was unacceptable.

STAR RATINGS
The lowest rating is 1 star, the highest rating is 5 stars.

AREA RATED STAR RATING

Plants

Indoor sales

Cafe (but see the summary above).

Overall rating

UPDATE
A few days after this review was first published, the owner of the Grange contacted us. He was aware of the service problems in the restaurant on that day, and explained that this was due to unavoidable staff absence. He also noted that that quality of the plants in the outdoor area had been badly affected by the recent snow. This was being remedied immediately.

We will visit later in the year to check progress and look forward to the excellent quality food served at the Grange Garden Centre.

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