Had an evening meal with the family here recently. I read a newsflash about it a while ago and it looked good.
From the outside it looks really nice, but the moment you step in, there is this smell of, I don’t know how to explain, but it comes close to toilets. You know, when you smell a toilet. Like a sewer smell. I think, I was the only one who smelled it. Despite, it really bugged me, it took me round about 30 minutes to neutralise the odour, as in, I was there long enough not to smell it that much.
Service was good, thoug, I think a little bit too much staff, so they chatted behind the bar and eye-contact was difficult. So when we were really ready to order ( I must say, the waiter did come to our table 3 times to ask if we were ready to order), it took a while before he looked at our table.
We started with 3 shared starters. 3 dips with pita-bread, olives and bread with balsamic vinegar dip.
– pita-bread was a bit cold and hard
– dip 1: humus (tasted a bit too strong)
dip 2: tzatziki (I doubted if they made it fresh from scratch – not that they claimed that, but it just was a bit lame)
dip 3: beetroot spread (I am still not sure about that)
– olives, well, can’t go a lot wrong with an olive
– bread: maybe a bit too chunky and dry. As in, imagine a loaf of bread (from 2 days ago), cut into 4 pieces. Oh there was also some kind of, I think it was like herbal bread, or something like sundried tomato bread, but both of them…pretty dry.

When we finished the starter, the main course came not too long afterwards. I ordered the:
Roasted Pumpkin, Sage & Ricotta Tortellini, White Wine, Cream & Parmesan Sauce £12

 

Meanwhile copy and pasting this from their menu, I remember again what I should have tasted, like the sage and the ricotta and white wine.
Luckily I like pumpkin, pumpkin was there, I actually only tasted the pumpkin and the parmesan sauce. Maybe…maybe they should call it, Giant Pumpkin Tortellini with Parmesan sauce. If it would be like that on the menu, I probably would not have chosen it.
The tortellini-pasta dough was a bit too thick and too chewy.

I finished my plate, it was not grotesk or so, but it was also not haute-causine. They tried to make it sound and make it look like it was something delicate and tasty. Well…it was not delicate and tasty. It was OK. But, next time I would not order it. And I also would not order the pita-bread or normal bread.

I shared a Chocolate Tort(e) with my son. That was nice, rich, and 2 spoons were enough for me. My son, the chocolate lover, killed the rest of the chocolate cake. He loved it, including the salty-caramel ice-cream.

All in all, I had worse food in England. And I have been to less atmospheric pub restaurants. This one was not bad at all when it comes to a pub restaurant. Though, I still continue my mission to find a decent, affordable, restaurant in the UK.

This is to see what happens to the rating