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.