You can drink the water, but don't order the beef

On Friday night, John and I went to a restaurant for a nice meal that we didn't cook ourselves, and which didn't come in styrofoam. John ordered pan-seared rainbow trout, and I ordered an 8oz sirloin steak. I really would've loved a t-bone, but the sale of beef on the bone is banned in the UK because of BSE (better known as Mad Cow), so sirloin was going to be the poor substitute. We waited aaaaaaaaaaages for our meals, we played with our new mobile phones, we drank our drinks, and then the food! My steak had a big piece of gristle running through it, but I was willing to overlook that and eat around it (though it did raise suspicions that maybe this wasn't the best sirloin available). It was rare, and juicy, and...fishy tasting? I ate another bite, and it definitely tasted off. I made John try it, and he agreed that it didn't taste especially beefy. So I took a deep breath and I sent it back. I have never, ever sent an entire meal back at a restaurant, except when I've been served something I didn't order. The waitress tried to tell me that they often have 'this problem' when people order their meat rare, but I wasn't buying it. The steak tasted gnarly. Ten minutes later I had a replacement, accompanied again by limp and colourless green beans and shoestring french fries, and this one didn't taste quite so funny. Was it the quality of the beef, I wondered? The last beef I had before I left Canada was a steak from an organically raised cow that my parents bought half of, so maybe I had been spoiled, but beef isn't supposed to taste fishy. We left a £1 tip (not for the food, but because the waitress was quite rude about me sending the manky steak back), and it wasn't until we were at the other end of the mall that I realized what the problem had been.
There were no grill marks on my steak.
John ordered pan-seared trout.

They fried my steak next to the fish.

I realize it's not fair to have high expectations of a country which brings us black pudding and roast pigeon, but I think it's reasonable to expect a steak to be grilled, non? I'll just order the bangers and mash next time.