L'Orée des Chênes, the Originals Relais

Good food but expensive. Location is good and the staff are friendly ..however do not stay here if the temperature is above 25 degrees. They have no air conditioning in any of their rooms and we were unable to sleep for two nights despite fans being placed in the room. Also their Internet service is absolutely terrible with no viable service in the room.

What a fabulous location the grounds were stunning. From the moment my Sister and I arrived nothing was too much trouble for any of the team. Our rooms were spacious, yes I agree with other comments the bathrooms could be more modern but I always think that's the charm of a French hotel. Our rooms and bathrooms were spotless. We were served g&t's on the terrace in the early evening sunshine. Later we dined and were looked after by a delightful waiter as we were at breakfast when we had a lovely waitress. A wonderful nights relax and in the morning a walk around the pond seeing the different animals was a lovely way to start our day. Our only negative was!!!! ...... We could only stay one night as our next stop was a villa we had booked for a few weeks. Thankyou to everyone who looked after us so well, you should be very proud of the standard of service you provide. We WILL be back!!

For some reason our otherwise excellent SatNav couldn't find this place so I had to resort to asking for directions in the town. Having finally arrived we agreed that the hotel is in a lovely country location and looks very attractive. The lady on Reception was very helpful and friendly and pulled my wife's case to our, outside, room. The room was large, comfortable and warm, although rather dated with a large pale blue corner bath. I think that the hotel prides itself in it's cuisine and the prices certainly reflect that; my wife's 'Men des Chenes'' was 47 Euro and my 'Thyme crusted rack of lamb', which was in reality two lamb cutlets, was 27 Euro alone. We chose a bottle of Rose from the lower end of the list and it was only 52 Euro. The food was ok but nothing more, although our two servers were charming. In the morning we went in to breakfast at just after 9am and we were alone; as we had a long drive ahead of us we wanted a good cooked breakfast but there was only a smear of scrambled egg and one small sausage left. I asked the waiter if we could have some fried eggs but he had no English so I asked for "oeufs frittes" but he did not understand; I even tried pointing to the scrambled egg and miming breaking an egg into a frying pan but still nothing. He brought his phone and tried a translation and finally we were there - however, his reply was "pas possible". I was astonished that a kitchen that had prepared our dinner could not rise to frying some eggs! The waiter disappeared and, after some time, reappeared with two plates each containing a fried egg and three rashers of bacon, without a word. The (different) lady on Reception asked if everything had been good and, when I explained about breakfast, she deducted 20 Euro from our bill. A very good gesture but it should not have been necessary. No, we don't plan to return. My apologies for the long winded review.

The setting is lovely and our room was pretty good with a super bath. It would have been nice to have tea or coffee making facilities. My big criticism is the food. It it relatively small and expensive and only one ‘Menu’ is available - a three course offering for €47 with cheese extra. There are only two choices for each course with no vegetarian option. If the chef is giving you so few options it should suggest supreme confidence in his dishes and we expected to be blown away but we weren’t. My wife emoted her two fish dishes but certainly didn’t rave about them. My foie gras starter was good but small. My main course consisted of two very small pieces of pork, a couple of bits each of broccoli and butternut squash and a thin jus that was supposed to taste of liquorice but didn’t. All was tepid and quickly cooled further on a cold plate. If the ingredients cost €1 I’d be surprised. VERY disappointing. We both quite enjoyed the mango sorbet covered with a lattice of crisp meringue described as a vacherin for dessert. We opted for the sommelier’s selection of wine. The first two glasses were appropriate for our respective food choices. The liquid described as orange wine served with the pudding was horrid. The staff were OK but slow to provide the bread which would have made the little freebies at the beginning more enjoyable. Over all, pretentious and totally overpriced!

Un diner de la St Valentin gâché par un manque de respect des clients par la direction. En arrivant, nous avons traversé un restaurant chaleureux et accueillant MAIS ... l’hôtesse nous a invité à sortir de cette salle pour rejoindre une autre salle située à environ 50 m ou se trouvait une trentaine de personnes. Changement total de décor ! Nous étions dans une salle de séminaire triste avec un éclairage froid (appliques au mur datant des années 80, aucun aménagement festif pour la saint valentin). Cette salle n'est pas reliée aux cuisines par un passage intérieur. En conséquence la porte d'accès a été quasiment ouverte en permanence pendant le service avec une température extérieure de -1°. Il faisait donc froid dans la salle ce qui est particulièrement désagréable pour diner. Le service fut très long: Nous sommes arrivés à 20h comme demandé. 20h 15 - Apéritif. Servi sans le feuilleté prévu qui est arrivé froid à 21h en même temps que le saumon qui était la mise en bouche ! 21h30 - L'entrée. Le foie gras (assez quelconque et servi, dans un premier temps, sans son accompagnement) Le dos de Bar, le granité au whisky et le veau étaient bons. Le dessert était visiblement pas fait maison et peu gouteux. Pendant le service un des deux serveurs est parti laissant une seule personnes pour servir 30 personnes. Celui-ci a fait le maximum pour assurer le service mais sachant qu'il devait aller chercher les assiettes deux par deux c'était un peu chaotique et nous sommes partis à presque minuit gelés et très déçus de cette soirée qui aurait du être festive. Il est en effet apparu qu'il y avait eu un surbooking . Il était impossible de mettre tous les clients dans la salle habituelle du restaurant et donc nous avons été relégués dans une salle totalement inadaptée à la soirée. C'est un manque total de respect pour la clientèle. Votre résultat financier à court terme a du être excellent puisque nous avons payés le même prix, soit 90€ par personne, que les convives installés dans la salle à manger habituelle. A long terme je pense que vous avez perdu l'opportunité d'avoir de nouveaux clients. En sortant, nous avons demandé à voir le directeur qui n'était pas dans les lieux d'après l’hôtesse !!!