Tyepyedong Noodle Bar, 175 Sidwell Street, Exeter EX4 6RH

tyepyedong   is a small café that describes itself as selling oriental fusion food - a mix of Japanese and Chinese food with other Asian influences.  This is a good description and it is quite similar to places like Wagamama but it is smaller and it feels less impersonal than Wagamama while food is generally cheaper and portions are good.

 

More information including menus can be found at http://www.tyepyedong.com/tyepyedong.com_website/Homepage.html

 

For starters I had duck spring rolls and a Miso soup which is a Japanese soup that shouldhave bits of spring onion and tofu in it.  This soup had the right taste but with no bits in.  Right idea but not quite of the quality of some other miso soup I have had but then the price was cheaper!  The duck spring rolls were like the kind I have had in thai restaurants.  They were a little bit spicy and they came with a small salad garnish.

 

For the main course I had Wandering Dragon which was a mildly spiced dish with beef, prawns and chicken in it with various vegetables and sticky rice.  I also had warm Saki with this which is a Japanese wine made with rice.

 

This is decent relatively healthy food that you can eat for well under £10 for 2 courses.  It is served quickly and staff were helpful.  I have had better but paid more for it and I think Tyepyedong would compete very well with some of the noodle bars found in London and it would beet the noodle king in Bethnal Green hands down!

 

So, top marks for speed helpfulness of staff and value for money.  You should not be expecting anything like real Chinese or Japanese food but you will find strong echos of these in a no fuss eating environment where customers are made welcome.

 

I would give this café 7.5 out of 10.

 

La Perla, Charlotte Street, London

I visited this restaurant 2 weeks ago for a friend’s birthday meal.  The website does not seem to give me the info about the location in a form I can read so Charlotte street will have to do.  The nearest station is Goodge street.

 

Staff were generally helpful but it was perhaps a little pricey.

from a food point of view I have always found Mexican places to sell various kinds of wrap such as soft tacos, burritos or chimachangas filled with mince that tastes like average chili concarne with lots of tomato in or spicy chicken. There was always lots of cheese, refried beans, rice, guacamole, sour cream and salsa. I haven't been to a Mexican for 10 years or so as far as I remember. Today I had Chorizo sausage with smoked chilli mayo as a starter.  This was a generous portion served  with a nice smoky reasonably spicy mayo.  For main I had Surf and Turf Fajitas which contained steak, prawns and scallops. You had to role them yourself which was a little messy perhaps and that main came on 4 plates, the meat and fish nicely sizzling in the pot it was cooked in with a nice spicy sauce, a plate of guacamole and Salsa, a plate with refried beans and some thin pancakes a bit like the ones you get in a Chinese to rool duck in. All ingredients that you would expect were present but no rice or cheese and not too much sour cream either.  This was a really nice main dish but at £17 it was a little on the expensive side.  The staff did not seen too keen on promoting the pudding. Maybe they wanted us out but I had 2 scoops of rice pudding to finish which may have been chocolate but can’t remember.

 

So in short staff were ok, prices were on the high side and food was  better than a lot of Mexican I have had.  I give this restaurant 7 out of 10.  If I was invited by someone on a birthday I would happily go to this restaurant but I would not travel miles on my own just to seek it out either.

 

Over all I give La Perla 7 out of 10.

 

The Clipper, 33-34 The Strand, Exmouth Ex8 1AQ

This is a part of a chain of pubs run by a company called Smith and Jones.  They are like a number of other companies who have taken the wetherspoons  idea and modified it.  This particular pub plays music which becomes somewhat loud after about 9 in the evening and people can dance.  I describe it as modern cheesy club style with quite a lot of tracks remixed.

 

Before then, the pub really is like a wetherspoons with quiet music.  When I went to the Clipper with 3 friends at about 9 o’clock yesterday evening we were told that there was a beer festival and that there were 4 ales on.  Not a massive selection.  I had Brains SA from Cardiff which is a pleasant enough pint.  It cost £2.20 and even if this pub did 2 or 3 real ales all the time I would still say it is worth going for if you want cheap but reasonable fodder.

 

I had chicken strips for starter which were a bit like chicken dippers in burger king.  These are made with mostly chicken I think covered in a spicy southern fried style coating served with a sweet mayo type of sauce.  Another friend had the Indian delight which had onion barji, vegetable Samosa  and Pakora with a spicy dip.  It seems that many starters and mains came with a salad of cherry tomatoes, red onion, lettuce served with a mayo that seemed to be flavoured with a hint of mint and mustard though I can’t remember how the dressing was described on the menu.  One friend had a burger and chips which he liked and I had a baguette with slow cooked shredded pork, barbecue sauce and apple sauce also served with chips.

 

Yes I was the only one greedy or hungry enough to have 2 courses.  My baguette was toasted and fairly crisp with a generous filling of very shredded but tender pork with a generous but not over the top portion of both apple and barbecue sauce.  Often I have found that baguettes  in wetherspoons pubs taste as though they have just been thrown in the microwave for 30 seconds.  They are often quite soggy.

 

This is not gourmet food but it was freshly cooked food and the menu was varied and well rounded with meals to suit most people including chicken tikka masala, sausage and mash, ham egg and chips, fish and chips and bacon carbanara.

 

This was a Saturday night at the end of October. The pub was busy. The music volume was just starting to crank up.  Service was still efficient however.  We did not have to wait more than 2 or 3 minutes at the bar.  When the food was brought to the table staff put the food down, told us our starters were there and asked if we wanted anything.

 

When it is busy I often find that wetherspoons have delays, staff seem rushed and a bit rude sometimes and the quality of the food can suffer.  I am sure this is prepacked food that is just fried, grilled or microwaved where appropriate but it was all served to an acceptable standard.

 

Knives, forks, salt  and pepper   and napkins were all in a box on the table which was convenient.

 

I did think the chips tasted as though they had been left around for a while.  They had been cooked well and they could have been hotter but these were not the worst chips I have had and it is these that drag my mark down a bit along with the limited ale selection.

 

However I still give this place 7 out of 10 and with better chips 8.5 would have been more like it.  I believe the spoons can learn something from this chain of pubs.

 

R Bar, 237 Mile End Road, Stepney Green, London E1 4AA Revisited

 

This pub used to be Loasis which was a gastro pub and I wrote a less than complimentary  review about it back in March when it opened as the R Bar.

 

Well since then it has changed a bit as there is a new manager and some attempts are finally being made to make the place a bit more interesting.  I visited this pub last Thursday after being told the menu had changed.  The steak sandwiches, chicken sandwiches (both with or without chese) Lamb shank and pasta have been swept away.  This was ok but 5 average dishes was never going to be a sustainable menu.  Now we have Mediterranean  tapas with a Turkish or greek feel including coftas of chicken or lamb, Pickled Octopus salad, filau pastry filled with cheese or lamb, calamari and mixed olives to name a few dishes.  Also they have taken my and a few other local suggestion to heart and started doing bottled real ales, currently including the range available from the wichwood brewery such as Hobgoblin and Scarecrow.  The place is a little busier now and staff are a bit more friendly.  You are for example far more likely to be asked if your food is OK.  Prices of dishes vary but expect to pay around £2.50 per dish.  3 of these dishes with pitta bread should fill most people as portions are quite generous and some dishes come with rice or mixed vegetables on the side.

 

I had Lambs liver fried and served on a sizzling  hot plate with onions and peppers, Calamari with mayo and lemon, pastry stuffed with chese and mixed olives and toasted pitta.  I was bursting after that lot and with 2 pint sized bottles of scarecrow the total came to just over £15.

 

I’d like the option of a full meal or tapas some tapas dishes consisting of rice, vegetables or fried potatoes or similar to give dishes a bit more bulk.  Now some dishes come with rice and others with mixed veg and others nothing at all.  There are too many chill out sofas and not enough eating space perhaps but over all new management arrived at the R Bar not a bit too soon.

 

I give it 7 out of ten and look forward to seeing how things develop.

 

Denleys, 61-64 High Street, Topsham, Exeter, Devon, EX3 0DY

 

Denleys is a curry house that is also a wine bar so it sells a decent range of drinks as well as excellent food.

 

I visited Denleys last week with 3 friends.  The curry is not like the cook at home kind of curry you will find in the best restaurants in Leeds, Bradford and parts of Birmingham.  In stead I would describe it as banquet style with lots of rich thick sauces but all fresh spices.  For starters I had a dish called Roshini Mushroom  which was mushrooms with loads of garlic in a fairly mild thick sauce.  I also tried a starter that one of my friends had which was Haryali Piazee Mussels which was mussels in a rich curry sauce.  The other 2 people had Chicken Chat and Mulligatawny soup and both said the starters were good.

 

For main I had a dish called Tava which was described as being made with whole kashmiri spices.  It was about madras strength and again it was a thick rich sauce with a bit of cream in it I think.  The lamb was gorgeous.  2 often in curries the lamb is chewy or rubbery.  It is often old and very poor quality. This stuff was as good as the best Sunday roast lamb!  It was tender and really tasty.  I had mushroom rice with this which   had plenty of mushrooms and chunks of onion in it. Lovely!  I also tried my friend’s duck balti which was of a similar strength but the source was slightly less thick.

 

My only real criticism of this restaurant is that in a couple of instances they got the food descriptions wrong.  One of my friends asked for a chicken  Passanda which was described as being cooked in a cream and wine sauce.  In fact it had loads of coconut in it which was a surprise as coconut was not mentioned on the menu when describing this dish.

 

I rounded things off with a chilli nan which was fresh and there were plenty of chillies in it.  2 of us also had liqueur coffees to finish with and these were well prepared.  2 of us had pints of Otter bitter, one had a pint of cider and the other had a large glass of white wine.  The total came to about £102 which is not mega cheap but the quality of food was excellent and the staff were friendly. 

 

For menus visit

http://www.denleysessenceofindia.co.uk

 

I give this restaurant 8 out of 10.  Ingredients were top quality. The staff were helpful and the website is informative and up to date.  My only criticism as pointed out here is that a couple of dishes are not described properly and on the main menu dishes appear in an odd order with desserts being listed before the traditional curries.

 

everest karahi 31 longbridge road, Barking IG11 8TN

I visited this curry house with 2 friends at about 9 o'clock on Friday
evening. It claims to be Nepalese.

This is a relatively new curry house and I was told it was good when it
first opened. Indeed, staff were friendly and reasonably helpful though for
much of the time we were the only customers there.

I had a dish rather similar to Chicken Chat for starter and something called
Lamb Sherpa for main. These were average curries with a fairly thick sauce
which I personally think probably came from a packet. There were some fresh
spices but really I can't say the food was anything special and it was a bit
on the greasy side. 2 of us had 2 large pint sized bottles of ale each and
the other of us had one glass of wine. We all had 2 courses each and the
price came to about £63

There are better curry places to be found. In general the meat was of low
quality with chicken being watery and stringy and the lamb being tough and
chewy. My understanding is that quality has gone down and on the evidence
of my visit I would say this curry house is nothing to write home about. At
the time of writing a tandori chef is being sought and I understand why.

The website is badly constructed and some of the pages don't work but for
more info visit

www.everest-karahi.co.uk

I can only give this restaurant 5 out of 10. It is expensive and while not
absolutely horrible it is not worth travelling any distance for either. .

cask pub and kitchen, 6 Charlwood Street, Pimlico, London SW1V 6EE

                this pub specialises in northern beers and the food is gastro pub food, a primarily modern European format that typically leads to pubs selling food at

mid range restaurant prices. I stuck to a relatively weak beer called W90 which had a strong hoppy taste despite being only 3.8 percent volume. it was

brewed by the Marble brewery in Manchester.  The Cask pub and kitchen is not cheap.  This beer cost £3.35 a pint but then Pimlico is on the posh side.  This pub should be visited by all people who think the British can’t brew beer.  They will taste some British beers that prove Britain is just as good as Belgium and Germany when it comes to brewing.  In Belgium and Germany however they had the sense to produce bottled versions of ales as well.  We are starting to do this as you can tell by visiting any supermarket but I digress!

 

for food I had baby squid stuffed with chick peas and chorizo Spanish sausage served with French bread. this was a beautiful starter and a small meal in

itself. for main I had an 8 ounce rib eye steak served with béarnaise sauce and home made chips. they insist on calling them hand cut on these stupid gastro

menus but the way the chip is cut is not the point.   The real question is whether the chip is fresh or frozen and it would be good to know what kind of oil it is fried in. The chips were good and crispy anyway. the Béarnaise sauce was not quite as buttery as some I have

had though there was plenty of pepper corns in it.

 

The food in this pub is not cheap though it is pretty good.  Words like “Hand cut”, “placed on a thick bed of”, and the use of terms like Jus all point to   a gastro menu.  My squid starter cost about £7 and the steak cost me £15 but at least portion size was quite generous.

 

The web site for the pub is

www.caskpubandkitchen.com

If you visit the home page you will get an idea of the music that is played.  It’s all background jazz music and for me all this does is to make the atmosphere slightly pretentious and arguably even intimidating or elitist, not to say a little boring for those who work there.  I would even say that I visit this pub because of its great beer and I go back despite the slightly ponsy up its own arse atmosphere.

 

Despite the music however I have generally found staff to be helpful and quite knowledgeable about their beers.  I would give this pub an over all mark of 7.5 out of 10.  If I were just going on beer alone it would get 9 out of 10.  High prices would mean that it would be hard to make this pub a real local visit for a few beers a day job.

 

Suvai Chettinaad 207 High Street North, East Ham, London E6 1JG

The Suvai Chettinaad often just known as the Suvai has been one of my favourite south Indian restaurants for a couple of years now and the quality has remained generally very high and the value is unbelievable.

 

There is a website at

www.suvai.co.uk

and you can take a look at the menu there for proof of good value.

 

Yesterday I visited this restaurant with a friend and we had 3 courses and a mango lasi each.  I also had a masala tea and a diet coke and the lot cost us £20.  Certainly some of the English spoken by staff is a bit limited but staff are generally quite patient and it is generally possible to get what you want.

 

Yesterday I had a   lamb fry, and Egg Bonda, an Indian dish like rice pudding but made with thin noodles, a diet coke and a masala tea.  My friend had a fish roast (fish cooked in chilli powder with onions and peppers)  a potato bonda (spiced fried mashed potato balls) and a chicken biriani.  We also had a mango lasi each.  The lot came to £20.

 

I have been here with friends that have guide dogs in the past and there has been no problem.

 

For more info including menus visit

www.suvai.co.uk

 

I give this restaurant a 9 out of 10.  The only problem I have is that if you do not know the menu, getting what you want can sometimes be tricky due to lack of English but staff try their best to be helpful.

 

maedah grill, 42 Fieldgate Street, London E1 1ES

Last week I visited the Maedah Grill which is a Turkish restaurant hidden away in Whitechapel  where the restaurants are generally low budget and fairly low quality Bangladeshi curry houses.  The Maedah Grill itself is on the same street as the ridiculously busy but ultimately fairly average New Tayyab which is famous throughout London.

 

Maedah Grill is an average quality Turkish restaurant based on my one visit and my reading of reviews.  For a starter I had a Turkish pizza which consisted of a thin layer of bread covered in spicy mince.  This was certainly quite tasty but it was prepared so quickly I suspect it had been microwaved.

 

My main was a lamb shish kebab served with rice and salad.  This was unremarkable though it was quite large.  I could actually distinguish the meat as being Lamb and this is not always the case.

 

For main I had Baklava which was pretty standard.  The Turkish coffee was strong and welcome however and this meal cost me less than £20.  Staff were generally helpful and they spoke reasonably good English so as I live in this area I will happily  revisit this restaurant.

 

I would give this restaurant 7 out of 10  and I look forward to visiting it in the future.

 

the rumblin tum, Prince of Wales Drive, Exmouth, Devon EX8 4SW

This is a pub in Exmouth selling traditional food of decent quality.  I visited this pub last week with 2 other people.  Staff were on the whole quite helpful and competent  though special mention needs to be made of the trainee who provided my friend with a fork for eating soup.  Let’s give him the benefit of the doubt and say it was beginner’s nerves!

 

There’s none of your gastro pub stuff here.  The menu looks rather late 1980s and belly pork or  field mushrooms with a blue cheese sauce is as exciting as it gets.

 

I had Chicken Goujons  with a garlic mayo for starter and an American Combo for main which consisted of a rack of barbecue ribs, spicy chicken wings, a breaded chicken breast and chunky chips referred to as fries on the menu.  Home fries or Chunky Fries might have been a more appropriate description.  Another friend had tomato soup for starter and beef lasagne for main.  He said the Lasagne was a bit overcooked.

 

My other friend had Mushrooms in blue cheese sauce for starter and a seafood pasta as a main.  She liked the mushrooms but said that the seafood pasta was rather bland.

 

Portions are generally of a decent size and I was the only one   piggy enough to have a sweet.  I had a white chocolate  and raspberry tart which was well flavoured with a thick creamy filling.  I also had an  Irish  coffee which was well made with cream floating on the top.

 

This pub served generally good food though it is a little out of the way and the choices are rather unadventurous.  Food quality was generally good but overcooked lasagne was a concern.  Over all the Rumblin Tum serves decent sized portions of reasonable  if rather unadventurous food.  A 3 course meal and a drink will set you back around £25 with starters and sweets costing around £5 and mains costing around £10

 

This is really more of a restaurant than a pub and I can’t imagine going to the Rumblin Tum just for a drink.

 

Over all then meals were unadventurous but mostly of good quality.  Staff were helpful on the whole and I would give the Rumblin Tum 7 out of 10.

Graham

 

Carluccios 1 The Brunswick Centre, London WC1N 1AF

Carluccios is an Italian chain of restaurants based mainly in London but with branches opening up in other cities.  I have heard the food there is pretty good so myself and 3 friends went there yesterday for a meal.  I had heard that Carluccios was expensive but a look at the menu suggested otherwise.  For more info including an accessible PDF version of the menu visit the website at

http://www.carluccios.com

 

Myself and the other 3 people I ate with have  no sight or at least not enough to read the print menu at the table.  In this situation good service is critical.  It is simply not enough for some brain dead waiter who can’t even speak English to come to the table and expect people to point at the menu because he or she can’t even read it!  I am very pleased to report  that we had none of these problems.  In fact all the staff we met were courteous and more than willing to help.  The whole menu was read to us and, despite the restaurant being quite busy, time was taken to help us choose and queries were answered by staff who had some knowledge of what they were serving to us.  This all helped to make it a pleasant evening.  We did not have a guide dog with us but I have heard of people being let in to other branches of Carluccios with no problem so guide dogs should be let in without the need to bring your own personal lawyer to explain the legal position!

 

For starters I had home maid  fish cakes which were not perhaps  that Italian but they were very pleasant and served with a garlic mayo.  I also got to try the garlic bread which was quite pleasant and very plentiful though perhaps slightly over done.  I love my garlic bread to be intense and full on and this was acceptable but I have had better.  Another person had the brochette and I am told that this was also good quality and tasty.

 

For mains I had the seafood linguini which contained mussels squid rings and prawns without shells and heads but with tails still attached.  The portion of sea food was quite generous and the linguini came with a decent amount of garlic.  I also got to try the chicken escallop which was quite bland but that is what was offered on the menu so fair enough.  Another friend had the Penne with sausage sauce  and liked it.  The pasta with capers anchovy olives and garlic was also good so no complaints about main courses.

 

I had chocolate Fondant pudding for dessert.  This had a nice soft centre  but I would have liked it to be pure chocolate with maybe almonds on the outside.  Having the almonds mixed in with the melted chocolate in the centre detracted slightly from the experience though the pudding was quite acceptable.  2 of my friends had the Italian ice cream and one had puff pastry with cream and strawberries inside and they both really liked it.  My only other complaint was that Carluccios does not offer liqueur coffees.  Instead we finished off with a hot chocolate which needed a good stir but which turned out to be dark and quite strong.

 

So on the whole while I can think of some improvements that could be made, the whole evening went very well and my criticisms of the garlic bread, the chocolate fondant and the lack of liqueur coffees are minor points that should not deter anyone from going out for a decent meal.  I almost forgot to mention that we had a house bottle of red wine which for a house red was really very acceptable indeed with a good rounded slightly spicy flavour.  One member of our group had apple juice and this seemed quite acceptable.

 

So we had 3 courses each, a bottle of wine, 2 of us had a beer and we all had a hot chocolate and the total bill came to £105 between 4 of us which I felt was a very reasonable price.

 

 

Over all then I give Carluccios 8 out of 10 and would recommend it.

Gold Mine, 102 Queensway, W2 3RR

This is a decent Chinese restaurant  In Bayswater.  I have been to this restaurant twice and after a little bit of uncertainty at first, staff have proven to be really friendly

 

They did not object when we went there with a guide dog either and that is worth noting.

 

So far I have tried szetsuan  pork, chilli crispy beef, Prawn Kung Po, special fried rice, mutton with ginger and spring onion spare ribs in chilli with sea salt and hot and sour soup.  Most of these dishes were generous and not at all greasy, though I thought the mutton had surprisingly little taste.  There are cheaper restaurants in this area but if you go to eat in the evening they get incredibly full.  Decent food and helpful staff mean that I give this restaurant 7.5 out of 10.

Il Padrino 115 Oxford Road, Manchester M1 7DU

This is a large take away which apparently looks quite inviting from the outside.  It is certainly large and when I visited on Saturday it did not smell bad at all.  The member of staff who served me had a Manchester accent and his English was good.  Communication was no problem at all.

 

That is where positive comments stop however.  This fast food restaurant sells Jacket Potatoes, Burgers, chicken and kebabs.

 

Now admittedly I chose a Lamb Doner Kebab.  This is usually one of the lowest quality products on offer but I do expect some standards and the only good thing I can say is that there was plenty of meat for the price of £3.00 in every other way though the quality was poor.  There was no cabbage or cucumber for a start.  These are important constituents of a kebab in my opinion.  The nearest thing to cabbage I could get was Coleslaw which is cabbage I know but it’s also full of mayo!

 

The meat itself was spongy and it only tasted a bit of lamb. It also had a strange taste that reminded me of the meat I once had from an illegal hotdog vendor I once used near Embankment station in London.  I am no expert in the taste of off meat but I do have to say I wondered about the state of this low quality rubbish very much indeed.

 

I have looked on the web and found 4 or 5 reviews of Il Padrino  and all of them give the place 2 stars or less.  The unanimous advice is to avoid the place and I can only agree.  If you want disappointment and you feel like running the risk of being layed low for a week or 2 with the gurgles then go there by all means.

 

I can only give Il Padrino 2 out of 10.  The only saving factors are communicative staff and a lot for your money.  What you get is of a low standard however and there are plenty of other places near by.  In comparison, Stepney kebabs near where I live are beautiful and that shows how poor this place was.

 

 

The Brewery Tap Cliff Road, Cliff Quay, Ipswich, Suffolk IP3 0AT

 

The Brewery Tap is what I would call a proper gastro pub.  Interesting food is served and some of the dishes may sound a bit ponsy to some but the flavours work well together.  The portions are very generous and generally speaking the quality is quite high though I was told that the roast dinner was not up to previous standards when I ate there with 2 friends yesterday.

 

 

Yesterday I started off with Devilled Chicken Hearts which came in quite a garlicy sauce with a few onions.  I would have liked a touch more spice with this but it was a thick warming sauce and the portion was generous.  They were served on toast using good quality home made bread.  I also got to try smoked prawns that a friend had and these were gorgeous with a deep smoky taste which suggested proper smoking rather than just liberal use of liquid smoke.

 

For mains, 2 of us opted for smoked chicken and one of us chose belly pork.  The chickens are locally reared using free range rather than battery farming.  You can tell the difference when animals are bread naturally rather than being closed in and fed chemicals to make them artificially fat.  They have more taste and a firmer texture.  This was clearly good quality chicken with decent texture.  The roast potatoes were slightly disappointing.  They were crispy but soggy rather than fluffy in the middle.  I also found there was a lack of gravy.  The roast on its own cost £11 and at this price I would expect the gravy to come out in a boat allowing me to choose how much gravy I wanted.  In fact gravy was hardly in evidence at all.  The vegetables were peas, squash and well something    rather over cooked and indeterminate.  The stuffing was I think, home made sage and onion.  It was perfectly pleasant though something a little more exotic might have been in order at the price.  I can’t complain about the size of the portion.  It was really quite hearty!

 

One of my friends had belly pork.  I tried this and it was beautifully tender with plenty of good crackling. He says the mash was also really buttery and excellent.

 

Only one of us had enough space left for dessert and to my shame it wasn’t me!  Still I tried some of the baileys cheesecake and it was beautifully rich and overindulgent.

 

I had 3 pints of Blond Mermaid  ale brewed on the premises.  This was a pleasant fairly well hopped beer with fruity flavours mixed in.  surprisingly easy drinking for its 5.2 percent alcohol content.  The other ales brewed here are very much worth drinking though some may find them a little sweet.

 

The food and ale served in this pub are excellent.  This is a pub worth travelling to.  I will give the roast a low mark because while it was plentiful I did not think it was quite worth £11.   I did not quite think due care had been taken with it though I am told some staff were away on holiday.  Given the quality of the rest of the food I sampled I would give the benefit of the doubt and go back again (and again and again if I lived in Ipswich)!

 

This being said I could only give the roast itself 6.5 out of 10.  Great quality roast chicken.  Not enough gravy and not enough variety of vegetables.  Roasties were soggy in the middle not fluffy enough!

 

I would give the Devilled Chicken heart 8 out of 10 however.  I would have liked a little more kick in the source but well done to the chef for running with a dish that many would run a mile from before even trying it!

 

More info about the  Brewery Tap along with sample beer and food menus and an events list can be found by visiting

http://thebrewerytap.org/  

 

 

The Park Hotel, 114 Exeter Road, Exmouth, Devon EX8 1QH

I visited this pub 2 weeks ago on a Sunday for a roast dinner.  The pub menu is replaced by a roast dinner menu on Sundays.  I opted for pork.  Beef and Chicken were the other choices on this particular Sunday.

 

A soup is included with the meal which costs £7 in total.  The Mushroom soup was tasty but a little watery.  The pork was perhaps a little thin but there was plenty of it.  There was also a decent amount of crackling.  The potatoes were quite crispy and fluffy in the middle.  They were well above average for a pub.  The roast was served with peas, carrots,  parsnip and swede mash and cabbage.

 

This was a well rounded roast at a good price.  The meat was rather thin and perhaps a little dry.  The vegetables were not overcooked but they were a little plane.  This was a simple but well cooked roast.  I like something a little more imaginative  myself but at the price it’s hard to grumble.  If you like your roasts traditional and quite simple then this could be the roast dinner for you.  I would certainly go to the park hotel for dinner again though I wouldn’t make a special journey to Exmouth for it.

 

I would give it 7 out of 10 because the quality was generally quite high and it was great value for money.  Thicker meat and a little imagination would have really increased the mark here as the roast potatoes were a highlight and roast potatoes are often the most disappointing part of a Sunday roast.

Top Chef, 14 Berry Street , Liverpool L1 4JF

I was staying with friends in Liverpool over the weekend and on Sunday we visited the Top Chef for lunch.

This cafe sells a bit of everything including jacket potatoes, roast dinners, a full range of breakfasts and a number of different kebabs  as well as burgers, sandwiches and salads.

I had a special mixed kebab which was served with rice and a pita bread.  the large pitta bread was slightly toasted and it was warm and slightly cooked without being over brittle.

the meat included chicken, lamb and Kofta.  the lam and chicken were quite high quality with the  kofta being a little soft and not quite up to the mark.

The lamb was quite thinly sliced but it was propper meat and not too tough. the chicken was acceptable while not being the highest quality.  The chicken was still quite ok however.

Another of my friends had a liver kebab which was thinly cut pieces of liver in a spicy sauce containing tomatos.    I was tempted by this dish and I believe Another friend had the mexican burger which he said was not the highest quality nmeat but the sauce really made it.

No main meal at this cafe cost more than £6 and most cost around £4.00 so over all the value for money of this  cafe is excelent and the quality is at least at the very high end of average.  Staff were also quite helpful.

Over all I would give this restaurant 6 out of 10 on what I have actually tried there.  This mark could increase if 

Graham Page
Home Phone: 0207 265 9493
Mobile: 07753 607980
Fax:  0870 706 2773
Email: gpage@useit.plus.com
MSN: gabriel_mcbird@hotmail.com
Skype: gabriel_mcbird

Akbars, Minerva House 16 Greek Street Leeds LS1 5RU

I visited this curry house recently on a trip to Leeds. It was not the
cheapest I have ever been to but the food was excellent.

I started off with 2 starters! Each came with a salad of mixed leaves,
olives, cucumber, peppers, onion, sweet corn and a few chick peas. I had
Liver Tikka and Chicken Shami Kebab.

The liver tikka was chicken livers marinaded in spices including ginger
garlic and coriander and cooked under the grill. It was mouth-wateringly
tender, quite spicy and really flavoursome.
The chicken shami kebabs were burger shaped and fried so they were crispy on
the outside. Again, bursting with flavour and really spicy.

For main I had Lamb Handi with garlic nan. Lamb Handi is slow cooked lamb
in a spicy rich sauce. Bones are included for extra flavour so you need to
be careful but this is what a curry should be. I could identify bits of
spices and there was a proper sauce rather than a pool of grease which is
what too many of the local curry houses in London serve up.

The garlic nan bread was also extremely fresh. It was hung vertically on a
rack placed in the middle of the table hung by its top as though it were
hanging up in a shop! It had plenty of garlic in it and it didn't go soggy
even when it got cold.

I paid about £21 for 2 courses and a beer which is not the cheapest but the
food was of high quality and you pay for what you get! I would have liked
the choice of a large bottle of Cobra perhaps but that's a minor criticism.

More information and menus as well as location of other Akbar restaurants
can be found at
http://www.akbars.co.uk

staff were very helpful and spoke a decent level of English.
I would give this restaurant 9 out of 10 and highly recommend it.

midnight cookies

This is an online store selling cookies, ice cream, other desserts and some dishes with fresh fruit.  They also  sell hot and cold drinks. 

 

They deliver until 1 in the morning and the website is http://www.midnightcookies.com.

 

Thanks to Caty Colman for alerting us to this in her facebook status.

 

A few people are trying these and I will let you know if the store is as good as it’s made out to be.

 

The Oxford 256 Kentish Town Road, London NW5 2AA

                The Oxford   this pub is near Kentish Town   underground station.  Exit the station, turn left and it is the first pub you come to about 100 yards away.

 

This pub has a website which is:

http://www.theoxfordnw5.co.uk/
 There is a link for food but not drink.  When I visited this pub about a week ago there was the choice of 2 beers from the St Austell  brewery called Proper Job and Tribute.  Proper Job is a really nice hoppy beer and I am pleased to say it was kept very well.

 

The food is a bit along the lines of a typical gastro pub where for example you get hand cut chips  (not including part of the hand, hopefully ) Pan fried Pork and various meats in Jus, what happened to Gravy?  I actually had the steak sandwich with hand cut chips which was quite large.  The steak was particularly tender and indeed the chips were home made.  That meal came to  £8.00 which is not too bad.  Other main meals at lunch time include rib eye steak and chips which costs about £16.  Most dishes are round about £10.  There’s more to choose from at night but the prices go up!

 

As gastro pubs go the Oxford is definitely one of the better ones.  Staff were very helpful and they read the menu out to me willingly.

 

Over all I give this pub 7 out of ten.  Portions were generous and helpful but I have a pet hate of pubs such as the Oxford that describes itself as the Oxford Pub and Dining room.  It’s really a restaurant that sells real ale of which I’m in favour but don’t pretend it’s a pub!

Graham Page

Home Phone: 0207 265 9493

Mobile: 07753 607980

Fax:  0870 706 2773

Email: gpage@useit.plus.com

MSN: gabriel_mcbird@hotmail.com

Skype: gabriel_mcbird

 

Byrons 222 Kensington High Street, London W8 7RG

Byrons is a chain of burger restaurants located in Central London and the west end.

 

I was looking for somewhere to eat in the Kensington area and checked this place out as I assumed the  prices would be reasonable as this is just a burger place after all.  It is a posh McDonalds.

 

For what it is, the prices are staggering in my view.  This is listed in the Time Out magazine cheap eat section but I don’t think it belongs here.  There are a few places in that guide that are cheap compared to a posh restaurant but not at all cheap  for what they are and Byrons is an example of this.  More information including the locations of the 7 restaurants in the chain and  the menu can be found at:

http://www.byronhamburgers.com

 

When I visited I had the 6 ounce classic burger which costs £6.25 on its own.  This is quite a lot to pay for a basic burger.  The quality of the burger was good.  The meat  was not too dry.  The salad was lettuce, onion and  tomato  with a little mayo.  The pickle was just a gherkin  on the side of the plate.  This was perfectly acceptable though the price was a pound or 2 over the odds but quality was well above average.  Its the side orders and some of the drinks that really crank up the price.  I had a Cream Soda which cost £2.75 and was just a standard can that you could get for 60 pence or so in a sweet shop.  I got caught out by that and decided not to go for any other side orders.  Chips were £3.00 and fries were £2.75 which is robbery in my opinion.  Someone heard me asking about the courgette  fries and offered me one to try.  Thanks for that!  These were just courgettes fried in breadcrumbs.  They had no flavour at all. Definitely glad I did not buy them.  In the end I went to Starbucks which may feature in a future post despite it being a chain.

 

Over all I can’t complain about the quality of the food but its far too expensive.  It Byrons is also licensed to sell alcohol  and this may help push up the price.Staff were generally helpful and they were prepared to read all the menu to me.

 

Price is really what drags my mark down here and despite the much better than average burger I can only give Byrons 6 out of 10.

TheOval Lounge, 24 Clapham Road, The Oval, Kennington, London SW9 0JG

on Sunday I said good bye to my laptop and met my friend that I passed it on to along with her friend with whom she was staying.  The Oval Lounge is quite a trendy bar restaurant that serves a wide range of bottled beers and some on draft though I was on coffee after a gentle beer or so the night before!  I am glad to say that the coffee was of decent quality.

 

This pub sells a decent  range of food that I would describe as modern British which means British with a silly twist such as crispy leeks which means they can bang up the price!

 

The food in this bar is not cheap.  Roast lamb with the trimmings cost just over £11.  The lamb was of high quality and was advertised as being Welsh lamb.  There were various vegetables including carrots broccoli and shallots as well as courgettes that tasted as though    they had been cooked in vinegar.  Generally though the veg was well cooked.

 

The roast potatoes were rather a disappointment.  They tasted as though they had been roasted and then put in the microwave.  This gets rid of all their crispiness and this is the whole point of roasting potatoes in the first place.

 

Generally,  the portion size was excellent.  The lamb was generous and thick.  There were plenty of vegetables  and though the courgettes were not to my personal liking I would say that the only part of the meal that let it down was the potatoes.  At this price I expect everything to be of decent quality.

 

One of The 2 people with me had Tuna Steak and mash with Crispy Leeks.  She said the tuna was good and the mash was excellent.  Tuna is easy to overcook so this is good news.  She said the crispy leeks were paper thin and crispy but pointless.  I think they were more there for decoration which is a shame as they were the only veg with the meal.

 

Coffee was over £2 a cup and a pint of admittedly real apple juice cost over £3.50

 

The staff were very helpful and more than happy to read the menu.  This counts for a lot if you go out with friends or for a business meal when you want things to just go smoothly without a hitch.

 

I would give this place a 7. It was let down by price and the roast potatoes and rather pointless way in which leeks were served.  I would visit this place again I think.  It is only about 3 minutes walk from Oval Station.  For anyone interested its out and head right, over a couple of side roads.  Someone suggested I should put some brief directions in my blog and that’s a good idea I think.

 

rocket diner, 556 Mile End Road, MileEnd, London E3 4PL

Rocket diner describes itself as an american restaurant. It sells Steaks,
TexMex food such as Enchiladas, Fajitas and Chili concarne, a few pasta
dishes, burgers and of course chicken!

I will try something from all categories more as a labour of love than
because of any deep yearning to go back to the restaurant. I have been
there twice and I would say the staff have been helpful. the music has
varied from modern R & B and rap to 80s and 90s rock. The music can be
quite loud so if you don't like the music playing at the time its no fun.

The food takes about 15 minutes to arrive in my experience, slightly less
sometimes but its obviously cooked fresh in the main which is good. It's
another halal place so no ribbs available as a starter unfortunately.

The first time I visited I decided to try a burger. I don't havfe burgers
very often but I've lived in the area for over 12 years now and I recognise
the burgers that a lot of these places buy in or at least the meat they use.
There's quite a high beef content I think but it's seasoned to hide the fact
that its not that tasty. The seasonings are quite subtle, just a touch of
mixed spice perhaps and probably salt but the result is quite uninspiring.
Stupidly I went for a topping that included cheese and I'm not a great lover
of processed chese I just didn't remember how processed the cheese would
probably be when ordering. The fries were totally unremarkable. they are
also sold in a lot of the local places and they are just cotton wool! The
salad included a bit of cabbage, lettuce tomatoes, onion, peppers and
cucumber. I also had to ask them not to cover it in mayo. It's fattening
and as far as I am concerned its bland and just unnecessary

That visit was friday and the next visit was Yesterday, the sunday. This
time I made my visit the main feed of the day and opted for Barbecue Chicken
Strips for starters, and an Enchilada with spicy rice as a main. i had a
diet coke to drink which came in a glass bottle. at £1.50 a pop its not
cheap compared to the food prices

The chicken was a real disappointment. It was cooked far too much, to the
point where the chicken was tuff and somehow dry even though it was
smothered in barbecue sauce which was actually nice with not too much
vinegar in it. The chicken was plentiful but nearly inedible. If this was
fresh meat they had cooked it far too long. I suspect it had been cooked
and warmed up more than once and I joked on facebook that it may have been
seagul. Some chav could end up gunning you down in anger if you serve that
rubbish too often!

The Enchilada and spicy rice was better and edible at least though again it
wins no prizes. the Enchilada is a filling with chilli sauce rolled up in
something like a flexible pancake. traditionally I believe they are made
from Corn. It was a foot long and as wide as a thin baggett. there was
loads of filling and I didn't really need the rice. The filling was mince
meat and a bit of salad and sauce and while it was plentiful and quite spicy
I couldn't have told you what the meat was. I suspect beef but that is more
by texture than taste. It could have been just tough old chicken!

The spicy rice was a little tangy and was full of bits of onion, and other
vegetable possibly carrot. It was spicy but not particularly subtle. I
ended up leaving a bit. I was quite full and certainly bored by the end.

Apart from the chicken I can't say the food I had was awful. It was just
uninspiring. I'm going to put the chicken strips down to a mistake but I
didn't really want to wait around while more were cooked.

Staff were very helpful on both visits . They were fine about leading me
to a table and seemed happy to read out the basics of the menu . They all
seemed to have reasonable enough english which is by no means always the
case!

So in short, food was a bit uninspiring but the staff were helpful so at the
moment I would give Rocket Diner 5 out of 10.

I don't know if I'll be able to do the pasta dishes. If its just Spag Bol
or Lasagne I just don't think I've got the heart or the resolve to plod my
way through something that will have probably come out of a cheap packet. I
will see what the steak is like next visit.

#End

The Clinton Arms, Maer Lane,Littleham Village, Exmouth, Devon EX8 2RL

This is a medium sized pub not far from the Sandy Village holiday complex
where many holiday makers visiting Exmouth stay.

While the Clinton does advertise locally to attract these people, it also
has a strong local trade and identity which is a combination rarely achieved
in seaside pubs. This is made possible in part by a number of separate
rooms. There is a restaurant where families can dine as well as a family
room and play area for children out the back and a more traditional bar area
where you get few if any young children.

This pub sold real ale in the form of Otter Ale and Courage Directors. I'm
not a great fan of Directors but the Otter was pleasant enough though
perhaps served 2 cold.
Myself and 2 friends ate at the Clinton last week. I had Garlic Mushrooms
in White Wine Sauce for starter which was very plentiful and it came with a
nice newly warmed crusty roll with plenty of butter. I would have liked the
sauce to be a bit more garlicky perhaps but that's just personal taste. My
friends did not have starters and judging by the size of the portions I
can't blame them. I had Swordfish in Cajun Butter as a main which came with
a choice of salad or veg and a choice of potatoes. My 2 friends had Gammon
and chips (known as hammy) and Liver and Bacon.

Again the portions were generous. my fish was well cooked with enough of
the Cajun butter to help enhance the flavour of the fish without ruining it.
The salad was quite varied. It contained Coleslaw, Raw cabbage, lettuce,
tomato, cucumber and peppers. I would have liked a little onion too. The
hammy came with peas and the liver with carrots, peas and cauliflower as
well as mash.

The only real complaint I have about my meal was the roast potatoes which
were a bit soggy and had a slightly burned taste as though they had been
cooked on an old grill with lots of stuff charred to it. they were nearly
inedible. The chips that came with the gammon were frozen rather than fresh
but of decent quality. The mash was good though perhaps a little
flavourless. My friend liked the liver but thought it was a bit dry as
their was not enough gravy.

The food at the Clinton is not bad but when you pay 8 or 9 pounds for a main
you should expect the quality of the food to be high and consistent. These
are after all heading towards restaurant prices and this is well outside
London so food should be cheaper. while portion sizes are good, I am a
little concerned about overall consistency.

Staff were generally quite helpful and over all I give the Clinton Arms a
mark of 6 out of 10.

Café Isha, 115A Roman Road, London E2 0QN

This is a restaurant offering lebanese and bangladeshi food under one roof.
I visited there yesterday.

My friend had Salmon and I had what was supposed to be beef steak made with
chef special sauce. both dishes came with rice, lebanese bread, corn on
the cob and Coleslaw. Chips came on a plate on the side. The quantity was
very plentiful and I would say I got over half a pound of steak.

The member of staff who served us started off very quiet and hesitant and i
thouggt she may have trouble understanding what we wanted but that turned
out not to be a problem.

The chips were also good and crispy. Service was also quite prompt.

The positives stop here though I am afraid. My friend's salmon was half raw
and had to be sent back. to be fair, the staff did not question this but
they did not apologise either.

My steak was really tough. It may have seen some spicy marinade in its
youth but it had been very well cooked since then and I was having trouble
cutting it. i did not finish all the steak as it gave me jaw ache! I
cannot recommend these house grills on the basis of what we ate. it really
was 2 extremes. Fish was almost raw and steak was massively overdone and
tough.

So, while staff were friendly and the stuff that came with the grill was
good, the meat and fish themselves were poor.

I therefore give the Cafe Isha 4 out of 10 due mainly to poor food.

The Grove, The Esplanade, Exmouth, Devon EX8 1BJ

The grove is a Young's pub in Exmouth which sells most of the Young's beers
and a changing range of local cask ales too. Myself and 2 friends went
there yesterday for lunch. The beer seemed to be generally kept well so no
complaints there!

This pub was recommended by a number of people but over all I was not that
impressed though I would not object strongly if I had to go there for a work
do or something similar.

The only starters were a soup of the day and a bread selection to share.
This seemed ridiculously limited to me. My friends had a roast turkey and a
roast beef dinner and I had a Guineafowl schnitzel which consisted of
guineafowl marinated in lemon and time then cooked in breadcrumbs. It was
served with sweet potato wedges and a salad garnish.

The schnitzel was well cooked and fresh. I got less than a handful of
sweet potato wedges. The wedges were well cooked and using sweet potatoes
was a nice twist but I would have liked more for what I paid. The salad
garnish of a small sprig of parsley, a few shredded leaves one segment of
tomato and a couple of small slivers of cucumber in a mustard dressing was
acceptable but uninspiring. I feel a more varied salad might have been
more appropriate.

One of my friends left some of her roast so I got a chance to try it. The
potatoes were quite well cooked. they were reasonably crispy and nice and
soft in the middle. The vegetables were a real highlight and they were
gorgeous. There were leaks, Carrots and red cabbage in a slightly tangy
white sauce and the vegetables were not too over cooked. The turkey also
came with home made stuffing which tasted as though it had sausage meat in
it. This was also very pleasant and went well with the meat.

The meat itself was a real disappointment. The turkey was cut very thin and
I am told the beef was little better. We got in the pub for half 1 and had
booked our table for 2. we actually ordered slightly earlier than this and
people who got served 5 minutes after us were told there were no roasts
left. I don't know if they sliced the meat very thin because of this or if
they always slice the meat that thin but I don't care. for the price we
paid, £8.95 this practice is unacceptable. If there was not enough meat
left we should have been told when we ordered and offered an alternative.
I have rarely had meat this wafer thin since I was at school!

Two of us had the cheese selection for pudding. Again, this was slightly
disappointing. We got some stilton, some mature cheddar and some Brie
cheese with a pile of water biscuits, celery and grapes with real ale
chutney. This sounds quite a feast and there was indeed about quarter of a
pound of cheese. this was almost bigger than the main meal and it should
have been listed in the platters section of the menu rather than the dessert
section as 2 people could have easily shared it. There was the choice of
buying a dessert for a pound if you chose to eat the roast but the cheese
selection was not included so I don't believe it belonged in the dessert
section at all.

The cheese selection should have come with butter for the biscuits. There
should have been a range of biscuits included, not just one variety of water
biscuits and though there was a lot of cheese it was unadventurous and it
was all cut into similar sized triangles suggesting that perhaps it came in
a preprepared pack.

It took us 3 quarters of an our to get our meals and we were not warned of
the delay. I know it was Easter and I know it was busy but surely this is
to be expected. I will probably give this pub the benefit of the doubt and
try it again on a quieter Sunday but in a seaside town like Exmouth any
Sunday can be busy if the weather is good.

In short, the vegetables that came with the roast and the stuffing were real
highlights of the food we ate. Main courses were small for what we paid and
the portions of the meat served with the roast dinners were miserly. The
cheese selection was uninspiring and in the wrong part of the menu.

Staff were courteous but the food was a little over priced and the service
was slow. The Guineafowl cost £11.50. the roast dinners were £8.95 and the
cheese selection cost £5.95

I therefore give this pub 6 out of 10. I paid London gastro pub prices but
the food was not good value for money though everything was quite edible.

Central Cafe, 1 Station Approach, Selborne road, London, E17 7LP

Walthamstow is generally a pretty good place for food in my experience as it
is a racially diverse area and you don't get one nation's food dominating.
There are very few places to eat right near the main railway station
however. I was therefore quite pleased when I was introduced to this cafe
after doing an assessment and over all I would say it turned out to be quite
a find.

This is really your typical London cafe. It sells all the breakfast stuff
including bacon, sausage, black pudding, eggs, Bubble and Squeak etc. It
also does roast dinners with lamb chicken beef pork etc. and there are also
a few pasta dishes and the odd pie to be had. I chose a breakfast type of
meal consisting of sausage, egg, black pudding, Bubble and mushrooms with a
black tea and a diet coke. Quality of sausages is one of the things I look
for in a cafe. If the sausages are good then it is likely that other things
have been well taken care of. Here the sausages were better than many I
have had in local cafes. they had some meatiness about them and they
weren't just sponge. this being said they were by no means premium butcher
sausages either. They were probably at the top end of average, and in fact
they were better than many cafe offerings. The black pudding was quite
tasty and it again had some texture and spiciness to it. The mushrooms were
fresh and the egg was fried with a hard yoke which is how I prefer a fried
egg.

It was the bubble and squeak that really did stand out in this cafe. It was
clearly home made. The mash was smooth and creamy and there was plenty of
cabbage and peas in it. This is probably the nicest bubble I have had
anywhere in London and the cafe is worth a visit for this alone with the
rest of the food providing steady though not exceptional backup.

The staff behind the counter were generally helpful and I would certainly
revisit this cafe again if in the area. It is open quite long hours to,
from 6 AM until 7 PM every day accept Sunday when it does not open at all.

I give this cafe 6.5 out of 10 and would say that over all it is at the top
end of average with sensational bubble and squeak.

A'la Pizza, 201 Mile End Road, Stepney Green, London E1 4AA

This is another in my occasional Kebab Roll review series. When I first
thought of checking out some of these rather dodgy chicken shops and putting
my thoughts on them down for future reference, I rather liked the idea of
completing this little project in Lent. After all, most people give things
up for lent so why not take something up instead?

Well I'm going to fail I think. the quality of the kebab meat in many of
these places is really quite dreadful and eating it gives me no pleasure.

A La Pizza is poor. the meat is not as spongy as that from the Halal Bite
but it has no taste and in fact it actually tasted less than fresh to me. I
had a piece of Tandori chicken with my meal which tasted tough and old.
This shop does 6 inch pizzas for £1.50 but they are thin and greasy. This
shop actually used to be one of the better chicken shops at one time and it
was the first to bring in grilled chicken. The owners have changed and I
can say that the kebab roll now costs about £2.50 but it and the rest of the
food was not only of low quality but it was not fresh either . It also took
over 10 minutes to prepare the kebab even though the shop was empty so sadly
I cannot give this establishment more than 3.5 out of 10. It seems to me
that even the locals have abandoned this place as well!! I would definitely
give it a miss.

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E Pellicci Cafe 332 Bethnal Green Road London E2 0AG

This is quite a well known cafe which has been run by Italians since the
1950s at least. I have seen quite a few reviews that talk about the classic
looks and the friendly atmosphere of the cafe but I wanted to find out a
little more about the food so I went there yesterday lunch time.

This cafe sells a few home made pasta dishes and other dishes often found in
cafes such as chicken escallop with spaghetti or in a sandwich. On the day
I visited there was also a home made steak pie available as well as roasts,
chops, all day breakfasts and the other kinds of food one may expect to find
in a greasy spoon cafe.

E Pellicci is not really a typical greasy spoon however as many of the
dishes are home made and some attention appears to be paid to quality rather
than just providing cheap frozen products fried in the cheapest possible
oil.

I was told that ham off the bone was available and that chips were home made
rather than frozen so I chose Ham, chips, a sausage on the side and peas.
this gave me a chance to check out the basics which is often a good idea on
a first time visit.

The chips were hot, clearly home made, quite crispy but somehow rather
uninspiring. They reminded me of chips we used to get at school which were
also home made but a little tasteless. fresh fried chips should be a bit
comforting and warming and yes they do need to taste a little fried even if
they are fried in vegetable oil. These were better than fries but they did
not excite me.

The ham was of good quality and actually it was very plentiful though it was
cut rather thin. peas were frozen I think and quite acceptable for a cafe.
The sausage was not the thickest I have ever had and it was not up to the
standard of top quality premium sausages from a good butcher or supermarket
but they were a lot better than some of the economy poor quality sausages
found in many cafes and they at least met expectations.

I had a white coffee and a can of lemonade to drink.

The coffee may have been filtered but it was a little bitter and low
quality. It was better however than some of the really horrible coffee
offered in many greasy spoon cafes.

Staff were generally helpful and they did a good job of walking between
visitors and regulars alike and checking they were ok and the range of
customers was really quite amazing. there was an old guy and his mother
that I would have expected to see eating somewhere posher. I got the
impression this couple was known but that they were occasional visitors.
There were also a number of local construction workers some students and
quite a few tourists.

Over all, E Pellicci seems to be a good quality cafe that has become quite
famous. I have not tried the home made food and if I am back in the area I
will certainly check it out. I would compare it to Nico's cafe in many
respects. Nico's is Greek for sure but they also make quite a lot of home
made dishes. In E Pellicci the raw ingredients may be better. the
sausages are for sure. The ham was great though it could have been thicker.
Chips were disappointing and coffee nothing to shout about.

Over all I would go back to E Pellicci if I was in the area but I would
not travel a long way specially to go there. I paid £8.60 for one sausage,
ham, chips, peas and a coffee plus a can of lemonade to drink. I thought
this was a little overpriced so despite the helpfulness of the staff I can
only give it 7 out of 10

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The Fly in the Loaf, 35 Hardman Street, Liverpool L1 9AS

The Fly in the Loaf is one of a few pubs in Central Liverpool that sell a
good range of real ales. This pub has a lot of hard surfaces inside and it
can perhaps sound a little loud but it has plenty of space and it can
accommodate plenty of people. There are generally at least 5 or 6 draft
ales on as well as a good range of bottled European lagers and the usual
British lagers on draft. Staff generally seem to know something about their
ales and the service is efficient and staff are very helpful.

While I have visited this pub quite often in the evenings for beer, I
visited it last Sunday for the first time to try the food. I had a
Minestrone soup for starters which had plenty of vegetables in it as well
as pieces of pasta. the soup was also pleasantly spicy and due to the
chunky nature of this soup it was almost a small meal in itself. It was
served with good quality crusty bread.

The main roast consisted of Roast beef, Yorkshire pud, roast potatoes,
mashed potatoes, mashed carrot and Swede, cauliflower and peas as well as
gravy.

This was a good big roast and on top of the soup it certainly filled me to
the brim!

The meat was good quality, tasty and thick. I would say it was a little
tough but taste made up for this. the roast potatoes were crispy and good
though to match the very best I would have liked them to be a little more
fluffy in the middle. \The mashed potatoes and mashed carrots and Swede
were both rich and smooth. the peas and cauliflower were not overcooked and
the Horseradish sauce was plentiful and reasonably hot.

I love stuffing whether you normally have it with beef or not and its a
shame this wasn't offered. the beef and roast potatoes were both good and
my slight criticism should not put you off the food. at £10.00 for a good
quality soup and a very acceptable plentiful roast this is a worthwhile
place to go for a good roast and I give it 7.5/10

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Halal Bite, 169 Mile End Road, Stepney London London E1 4AQ

OK so here comes the first of the kebab roll reviews and I have to say It
does not start off promising.

There are at least 10 chicken shops within easy walking distance of my
house. Halal Bite is one of the largest of these and to be fair it is one
of the cleanest too. It is next to the mosque and I believe this building
is actually leased from the mosque so its a shame that after what is
presumably uplifting prayer those who attend the mosque come back down to
earth with a very hard bump indeed after visiting this place, certainly if
the kebab roll is anything to go bye.

A full lam doner kebab costs £3.00 which is not much at all and the doner
roll costs £2 and is in truth not that much smaller. the meat was spongy
and it was difficult to determine exactly what meat it was. The meat had
been cooked in a spicy sauce with onions and chilli but the meat had no
taste itself and the soft texture was a real disappointment. There was also
no shortage of grease either. So this was a step up from the Snacksters
Doner Kebab mentioned in a previous post, but believe me that is not hard.
I cannot give this kebab more than a 5. In its favour there was plenty of
it and the price was cheap.

Against it was the fact that the taste was indeterminate and the texture was
rather spongy though not as spongy as the Snacksters offering. The meat was
also incredibly greasy.

The Dove Street Inn 76 St. Helens St, Ipswich, IP4 2LA

The Dove Street Inn is an excellent pub offering a vast range of real ales
at affordable prices. Unusually there is a live web-based stock list which
is updated at least once a day. More can be found at:
http://www.dovestreetinn.co.uk/

Beers are generally well kept and this is a must for people visiting Ipswich
who like real ale.

The food is generally quite basic and it includes home made chilli, curry
and some decent quality pies and pasties.

I visited this pub last Friday with a friend. we wanted a nibble and opted
for a cheese platter each. at £5.00 we did not think the platter would be
massive. We were wrong about size for sure. each platter consisted of a
whole packet of cream crackers, at least half a pound of mature cheddar and
most of a medium sized onion cut up into pieces. Neither me or my friend
ate even half our platter as it was so big and boring!! We gave them away
for the rest of the pub to nibble on.

So, while the ales are excellent and the food is generally very acceptable,
the cheese platter needs to be changed. there needs to be a variety of
biscuits and not so many of them. 2 or 3 different kinds of cheese would
also be good as well as a bit of celery to complement the onion. The cheese
platter did give us a laugh though if nothing else!

Over all I give this pub 9 out of 10.

It is not at all pretentious and the range of ales on offer is amazing for a
pub of its size. The live stock information is particularly welcome and
unique as far as I know.

Tiroler Hut Restaurant 27 Westbourne Grove London W2 4UA

This Austrian restaurant is a 10 minute walk from Bayswater station.
Upstairs there is a bar selling various Austrian beers and snacks and down
stairs is the restaurant itself. I attended this restaurant with a group of
17 people for my 40th birthday. You need to book a couple of weeks in
advance, even for a week day as this restaurant is popular with groups of
people celebrating various events. When I attended there was another
largish group of people celebrating a 40th birthday. Menus available
include a set menu for parties costing £23.50 for 3 courses at the time of
writing. Entertainment is also provided throughout the meal and people who
have been to Austria tell me that the entertainment as well as the food is
quite authentic. More information can be found by visiting the website at
www.tirolerhut.co.uk
I started off with a portion of pickled herrings which came with a sour
cream dressing, apple, onions and salad. They wer fairly sweet pickled
herrings and I enjoyed them. This was followed by Bauernschmaus which
consisted of a wooden platter with smoked pork, german sausage, a dish like
black pudding, dumplings and Sauerkraut. The meal was completed by chopped
pancake with raisins and Plum Compote. The variety of meat in the main
dish was pleasing and well bulked out by the dumpling. The Sauerkraut added
a welcome tasty vegetable accompanyment . the pudding was also a generous
portion and over all I was well filled up. While we ate, we got austrian
entertainment. Not surprisingly, songs from The Sound Of Music appeared
regularly.

Due to the entertainment this is not a place where a couple would go for a
romantic meal but if you are looking to celebrate an event with a group of
people this venue is ideal. the atmosphere was relaxed and informal. the
entertainment was fun and, most importantly, the food was excelent. There
was also a small range of german beers and other drinks. More information
is available on the website.

I did not inform staff that I am visually impaired and there were 4 people
with guide dogs and there were no problems at all. Staff were generally
helpful and attentive.

This was a hastle free enjoyable night out. Things can often go wrong when
there are large groups of people attending a restaurant but the Tiroler Hut
caters very well for large parties and I give it 8.5 out of 10. I have no
real complaints but it would have been nice to have tried some of the stuff
from the main menu.

supermarket Doner Kebabs

I recently bought an online order from Asda and one of the things I ordered
was Snacksters Doner Kebabs.

The area in which I live, Stepney East London, is full of low grade dodgy
chicken shops that the Bangladeshi community seems to have gone mad for.
The food is truly rubbish but though they all do Doner Kebabs and I would
probably not recommend any of them, none are as bad as the snacksters
offerings!

It's Lent and everyone is giving up things for a 40 day period that started
in mid February. I'm not interested in this abstinence rubbish so over the
next few days I will try kebab meat in a bun in some of these places and
compare/contrast. I have tried 3 of them already in fact and will report!

The Sea Cow 37 Lordship Lane London SE22 8EW

The Sea Cow in Lordship Lane near East Dulwich station in South East London
is best described as a very posh chip shop.

All fish is freshly cooked but the range on offer goes far beyond your usual
Cod and Haddock. choice is seasonal but when I visited last week there were
other choices such as Red Snapper, fresh Tuna steak and John Dory which
apparently is not the remains of the next door neighbour fried up in a pan!

Cod and Haddock are cooked in batter but the rest of the fish is generally
grilled. You will probably pay between £7 and £10 for fish and chips which
is not cheap but I found the quality astoundingly good. The Red Snapper was
cooked to perfection with no bones and the chips were crispy, fresh and not
greasy. OK so these chips were cooked in vegetable oil. everyone knows
that chips from a chip shop should really be cooked in dripping but for
upper class radio 4 chips these were not half bad!

Staff were attentive and friendly. the person who served me was happy to go
through the menu. There was even fresh ground coffee available! There was
no curry sauce or gravy available which is a bit of a shame!

There is a website available at
http://www.theseacow.co.uk
this is flash based but it will at least give you an idea of the choices
available on the menu.

Over all then the food was great and really very fresh. staff were helpful
and I would say this place is well worth a visit. You can eat in or take
food away though eating in is recommended because of the freshness. I give
the sea cow 8.5 out of 10.

breakfast on east coast line

While travelling up to York on the East Coast Line yesterday I opted to buy a full English breakfast from the buffet.
This is cooked fresh and includes smoked bacon, fried or scrambled egg, one sausage, a large flat mushroom, 4 cherry tomatoes, baked beans, black pudding and a potato cake.
This breakfast costs  6 pounds 95.
Generally the food was good though the sausage was no better than a Sainsburys butchers choice so it was of higher quality than a typical basic cafe sausage but not outstanding.  The black pudding had good coarse texture but it was not really spicy enough and it was a little bland.  The breakfast did not include toast but there was a potato cake which helped add bulk.  The cherry tomatoes were a nice touch as they are sweeter and more tasty than larger tomatoes.

 

The breakfasts are cooked fresh and served to passengers in first class on plates with proper knives and forks.  When you buy the breakfast from the buffet however it comes on a plastic tray with a lid and you only get plastic knives and forks which always feel a bit insubstantial.

I also bought a coffee which cost about £2.00.  . It was proper ground coffee and it was the best coffee I have had on a British train.
Amazingly there was also instant coffee available.
Are there really people who prefer instant coffee to freshly ground coffee

 

Over all I felt this breakfast represented good value for on-train catering.  It probably cost 2 pounds more than a similar breakfast would cost in a cafe but the quality was very higher than average.

 

I would give this breakfast 7 out of 10.  I would have liked a little more of it.  2 eggs and 2 sausages would have been good and the option of toast would have been welcome.