We visited Marton Hall for the first time recently and the food was out of this world. If you are a foodie this is a must place to visit. You would have to travel to London to read a menu as good

We visited this place as a family treat for what we hoped would be a nice meal in comfortable surroundings. The evening turned out to be memorable only because it turned into a cross between a pantomime and a disaster.

The surroundings of the Brasserie are attractive in a rustic sort of way and offered a lot of promise. Canapes before we started set the tone nicely.

Things started to go wrong when my starter arrived. A clumsy variant of Eggs Benedict, costing more than £5, proved a total disappointment. Unprepossessing black pudding was slapped on a muffin which had the consistency of an overbaked communion wafer. The poached egg was boiled to rubberiness, topped with the seared, crusty remains of what had presumably once been hollandaise.

It was pretty obvious that the chef was completely overworked – the starter had taken 45 minutes to arrive – and the main courses turned out to be another disaster. I ordered rack of lamb (£17+) and my parents both chose chicken breast at over £11 each. All three meals came with what appeared to be a uniform thin gravy unceremoniously slapped over them. My lamb was dull, lifeless and overcooked to insipid grey. It sat next to a soggy mass of thick chips and a hideous, gelatinous sauce which tasted like some sort of packet hollandaise spliced with mint.

My father pronounced his chicken utterly tasteless. My mother cast down her knife and fork after two bites, pronouncing hers vile.

We'd had enough. I complained to the waitress and asked to speak to the manager, pointing out firmly but politely that I quite simply wasn't prepared to pay such high prices for food of such unmerchantable quality.

The manageress's response was astonishing. "You won't be paying anything as I'm asking you to leave now", she exploded. "Get out. People like you clearly don't know good food when you see it."

She then continued her tirade, calling me a "sad little fat thing" and claiming "I know people like you - always on the hunt for a free meal. Well, you've just had another one, haven't you?" This interesting observation ignored the rather pertinent fact that we hadn't actually been able to stomach or eat the food she'd consented to give us for nothing.

As someone with a broad experience of dining, from chippies to the Savoy Grill and internationally. I think I've a fair knowledge of what represents quality food, proper ambience and value for money.

We left quickly, with the manageress still shouting at us and a gang of rather unpleasant looking bouncers who appeared to be supervising a wedding reception in the same building starting to look uncomfortably threatening.

I have to stress that we did absolutely nothing to provoke this astonishing turn of events other than quite justifiably refuse to be fleeced for a meal which offered insulting value for money. I have never before had anything approaching this kind of altercation in a hotel or restaurant and sincerely hope I never do again.

The whole affair was so utterly surreal that it made Fawlty Towers seem positively civilised and genteel. Eventually, I had to laugh about it. But you won't if you go there. Unless you're some kind of supreme gastronomic masochist, avoid like the plague.