a hint of sarcasm

am i still ill?

Review: Cote Brasserie

June 21st, 2011

I like Cardiff Bay. I lived there for a while and it was pleasant, but lacking in community – but I guess that’s what you get when you build 10,000 plaster of Paris carbon copy apartments into a new area that’s inhabited solely by chain restaurants.

Cote Brasserie opened in November 2010 to little fanfare, taking over the spot previously filled by the “The Bay”, a Chinese restaurant which – despite being right on the “Sunset strip” of the Bay – always seemed to be closed or empty.

Cote Brasserie is a British owned chain of faux French restaurants with dining areas dressed up to look like Café René from “‘Allo ‘Allo”, because that’s what all French restaurants are like, right?

We walk in at 7:30pm, and the first thing I notice is that the dining room is half empty, with diners dispersed sparsely over the 30 or so tables that they have. The second thing that I notice is something I don’t think I have ever seen in a restaurant before; some of the empty tables weren’t completely empty – they were being rough ridden by dirty plates and glasses, complete with leftovers and everything.

Now, correct me if I’m wrong, but I’m sure the golden rules in the “front of house handbook” include;

Never start clearing plates before everybody on the table is finished eating.
Wait to be asked for the bill, don’t offer.
Clear plates before bringing the bill.

From what I know about restaurant etiquette, there should never arise a situation where a patron is paying their bill over finished plates of food, dirty knives and forks and empty glasses of wine. But here we have it (and not only at one table) – we’re talking at five or six tables. I could immediately tell that service at this place was going to be “different”.

Despite the numerous empty tables, and those that were “otherwise occupied” by our dirty friends, we were told to come back in half an hour – alright, perhaps they’re busy and want some time to sort themselves out – it looks like they need it – so we go for a walk around the bay, to check out the new bridge that’s being built over to the BBC production studios.

We come back at 8 o’clock, and to our surprise nothing has changed. The same half a dozen tables are still in the same state, and the manager who asked us to come back has completely forgotten who we are, staring at us blankly when we said we were back. We’re told to “take a seat over there”, with an extended arm point to the corner of the restaurant, a table set up for 6 people. Bewildered, we head over to this table and sit awkwardly as we’re unsure what exactly we’re doing. Are we being seated, or are we being told to wait while a table is prepared? Do we take our coats off and get settled in, or are we going to be on the move again soon? We peruse the menu with uncertainty, I resign myself to ask after a few minutes.

“We’re just preparing a table for you,” the waitress clarifies when I ask. The whole experience so far has been nothing short of a shambles; it’s as if the place opened a day ago with staff who have never worked a day in a restaurant in their lives. Perhaps they hadn’t? I wouldn’t be surprised.

So, eventually we get shown to a table – huzzah! I’m prepared to reset and start again with an open mind. The dining area is bright and open, and the windows have been replaced since Cote moved in with big French windows which can fold open completely in the summer – I imagine this would be a pretty good spot during an event in the Oval Basin.

We got a glass of house red wine each, but at £4.50 a glass, in hindsight we would have been better off getting the bottle (in fact, we rarely buy single glasses; I was “off alcohol” at the time, so I was only intending on having one glass – something I wouldn’t follow through with, but I digress).

So, we had a good look at the menu and Misia was very happy to see foie gras in the list of starters – she’s forever complaining that she doesn’t have enough foie gras in her life (sometimes I swear she’s the cast off of some aristocratic family, with her penchant for expensive delicacies). I kept it simple, opting for the soup of the day, which was something with celeriac – I didn’t actually catch exactly what it was. We also chose our mains, the lamb shank for me and a half a chicken for Misia.
The grills menu looked pretty good, with choices of steaks with a multitude of sauces, but alas, I just had to try the lamb, if only to find out what a “veal and rosemary sauce” was like.

Our starters came out quickly and were tasty; Misia, usually hard to please, says it’s one of the best examples of foie gras that she has eaten, and the soup was of good consistency. I’m sure the secret ingredient was cheese but I couldn’t pinpoint it and I didn’t ask so I guess we’ll never know. Maybe one day I’ll write a book following my quest to find out what the soup was that I had at Cote brasserie, embarking on a round-the-world trip following clues to locate the chef that was on that day, eventually finding him in a remote jungle in north-west Burma, and he’ll tell me that it was in fact cheese all along.

Starter plates cleared out, and my six week run of abstinence abruptly ended as we ordered our second glasses of wine. Mains were up pretty soon, might I take this opportunity to tell you that the initially ramshackle service we had received has by now picked up, the restaurant is mostly empty now though.

My lamb shank looked good, in a “veal and rosemary sauce”, it’s always good to have an assortment of baby animal products on one plate – give me a suckling pig too, please!
Lamb is very easily overcooked, I did it myself so often that I gave up and leave it to Misia or the professionals now. I’m pretty sure that at one point in my life I lived primarily on a diet of overcooked, dry lamb. That was a very low point. Luckily, this chef knows how to do it properly and it fell from the bone like it was dying to get away.
The sauce was full of flavour, and not of oily fat as can sometimes happen. The rosemary was particularly evident, although there was some kind of berry in there too which made for a sweet taste.

Misia’s chicken looked pretty damn good too, a “Breton” chicken, for what it’s worth; “Corn fed and reared in the heart of Brittany”, so, a snooty upper class chicken. But in all seriousness, it wasn’t anything special. Without the garlic butter, the chicken was lacking in flavour, and the meat was a hair’s breadth off overdone.

Creme caramel for me and creme brulee for Misia is what we chose to round off with. Misia is something of a creme brulee conneiseuer, so if this stands up to her test then it must be a testament to how good it is – but it wasn’t, “a bit gloopy” apparently. I’m not so hot on desserts – I don’t have too much of a sweet tooth, as I think I’ve mentioned before. It was typical of a bought-in dessert, so I suppose I won’t be offending any of the restaurant staff by saying that it wasn’t anything special. A decidedly average end to an average meal really.

There’s nothing left to say really, our impression had been tainted from the moment we stepped foot into Cote Brasserie. It’s a chain and you can certainly tell. There’s just no passion, not even any fake passion like you get at other chains. Would I eat here again? Not likely, considering the other options available at similar prices in the same area.
My one line verdict; “If this was a pub, the food would have been good. As a restaurant, the experience went from harrowing to somewhat adequate and the food was lacking in ‘Je ne sais quoi’”

Rating: 3/10
Bill: £61.80

Le Gallois: The final review

April 19th, 2011

In a previous post I noted that Cardiff does not have a single Michelin starred restaurant, and this is still true – Le Gallois comes close, with three AA rosettes – and in my opinion it should have been handed the award; it certainly fits the criteria.

We have only eaten out together once since Tristan was born last year, and that was when a large group of us went to a tacky chain restaurant, so to make our first night out together since October special I proposed that we go to Le Gallois – long rated as one of Cardiff’s best restaurants, situated in leafy Pontcanna.

So we got dressed up and headed down there, I booked early in the week and I’m glad I did – it was fully booked and we wouldn’t have got a walk-in table. The same went for Saturday, I found out as I spoke to the maître d’ – who was actually Francis Dupuy, the restaurant owner.

As we were shown to our seats, walking through the dining area revealed how exposed the restaurant is, with an airy feeling that would be a pleasure to visit on a warm summers day – the frontage having large plate glass windows to let in all available sunlight, to be absorbed by the beech hardwood floors.

I immediately asked for the wine list – knowing it would not disappoint, being a fine French restaurant – and I was not wrong. The wine cellar is expansive, featuring bottles from around the world, and of course, a whole range from all regions of France.
Wine can make or break a restaurant experience, in my opinion – so choosing wisely essential. If you choose a wine that you are not used to, for example that is too dry, that can taint your palate and skew your taste of the food that you eat.

I settled on a Bordeaux, St Julien 2004 Les Chavaliers Des Templiers a medium sweet red wine that would compliment the red meat dishes that we both had pretty much settled on even before we arrived.

We would go on to order, but not before being presented with a glass, that can only be described as a shot glass, containing a hot spinach-based liquid that was bright green, but a marvellous way to start.

To start, I had chosen Hereford snails and Misia the foie gras. I am an advocate of the consumption of snails – in the shell being my favourite way of having them served, but in this case they were presented out of the shell in a sauce, cooked to perfection – tender, but not soft.

The atmosphere in the restaurant was very relaxed; I have been to many fine dining establishments and often uptight is not the word – you daren’t put your feet in the wrong position for feeling that you’re being judged, but in this case the clientele was a mix of young and older couples, totally non-threatening, and an air of chattiness kept up so that you wouldn’t be afraid to talk at your normal volume level.

After having our starters taken away, Misia made a point of telling me how good the Foie Gras was – all the while being kept topped up with wine, we had some time to continue to chat before being served our main courses – I had particularly wanted the woodland pork belly, and Misia chose venison.

The dish that I was served consisted of a strip of pork with a delectably hardened strip of crackling left along the top and glazed with sauce, also presented with it was a creamed potato (I don’t think I could really call it mash), swede fondant and a small plop of chutney.
The pork had been cooked to perfection, after making it through the suitably crispy cracking my knife slipped through like I was cutting butter – a very good sign of what was to come.
On first taste the flavours come dashing through – oak, berries, smokey charcoal all rushing to the tongue, following that comes the texture; smooth and not chewy in the slightest – all the signs of a very well cooked piece of premium pork.
I was surprised at my liking of the swede fondant, for I usually find swede very boring and not an vegetable that’s able to hold its own, but as it was I would say it was a perfect accompaniment to the pork.

We were having a good time thus far – we’d definitely made the right choice of venue for our special night out. We were enjoying the food and each others company, and we were also being looked after very well – never devoid of a glass of wine each, our glasses being watched by hawk-like restaurant staff for the perfect time to refill. Keeping me topped up is a wise thing; if I go dry for too long then I start to get tetchy.

I like a good dessert wine, it helps to bridge the gap between main and dessert – makes it less of a big jump from savoury to sweet. Le Gallois has a good selection of dessert wines, and I went with the
Maury Solera 1928; Misia chose Muscat Nuy Wynkelder 2006. This reminds me that I need to get some dessert wines for the house, the Maury Solera was delectable, very strong – a true palate cleanser.

Suitably happy, dessert time had arrived – I’m not one for too much sweetness, unfortunately – I have more of a taste for savoury treats, so I had chosen the cheese board to finish with; not an uncommon choice, you’ll know if you’ve been in my company before. Mr Dupuy reeled off a list of cheeses to me, of which I could choose five – though my preference is to have only a few, for too many distinct tastes can distract me and I end up not enjoying the individual cheeses as much, so I just chose two – a Cornish cheese that resembled Roquefort in look and texture, which I was informed is made on a tiny farm, and that only a small amount is made each year – and the other was a soft cheese, a brie of which I unfortunately cannot remember the name. The green veined Roquefort-imposter was delightfully strong, and crumbled like chalk on the slightest touch just how I like it to, the taste of the age hitting the back of my throat, letting me know in no uncertain terms – “I’m a good cheese, and I’m here to cap off your night”. The brie helped to calm down my sensory system, complimenting the green cheese and taking away some of the residual strength left on my breath.

My board and Misia’s plate were taken away after we had signalled we had finished, which wasn’t hard to notice really – since I had devoured almost all of what was probably near a quarter kilo of cheese, along with crackers and biscuits.
We were offered tea or coffee, but declined – it was getting late, we had arrived at 8pm, and in a whirlwind of culinary delight, laid-back humourful conversation and being in such relaxed surroundings we had managed to while away three hours, and it was just after 11pm, surely one of the longer dinners that we have had, and without even noticing it – we were both surprised when we found out the time, a true sign of a good date.

Our coats were fetched, polite conversation was exchanged with Mr Dupuy about how we had enjoyed our evening – he asked what we were going on to do now, and I told him that since we were in such good spirits that we would take a walk to Chapter for a nightcap, seeing as it was a Friday night and they would be open for a while longer.

This evening was less of a meal and more an experience, how food should be done – Mr Dupuy clearly understands how to create this mix and how important it is to treat customers like royalty, and that no detail should be overlooked in the quest to make every patron feel special. Everything about Le Gallois had been well thought out, from the art on the walls to the knives and forks, lighting and especially the service – which was unlike anywhere else in Cardiff, the standards have been brought from Paris and high-society establishments in London and to lose Le Gallois is a real blow to the city. If nobody influential in the city tried to talk him out of it, then they don’t understand how to build a reputation of a good city.

Will Le Gallois be bettered? Not soon. Will other try? Yes, they already have – with The Crown Social at the Parc Hotel having opened just a few weeks after the closing of Le Gallois. Will they get the recognition that Le Gallois did? Not quickly, and not without a fight.

Bill: £152 inc. tip.
Rating: 10/10.

Le Gallois closed its doors for the final time seven days after our visit – on February 5th 2011.

Review: Boof rotisserie & grill

April 18th, 2011

I can sometimes be hypocritical in my musings, but I think that’s only human – as long as it doesn’t happen too often.
I advocate local business over chains, especially when it comes to eating out. The food at chains is usually daudry, plain and shipped in frozen – but on this blog I have still reviewed places like Ruby Tuesday.
Don’t get me wrong, I like Ruby Tuesday – and I think it may even be an exception to the rule because it’s Cardiff branch is the only one in the UK and is run by a pair of Welsh businessmen who bought into the franchise – so technically it’s independent, right? Or at least that’s what I’ll tell myself to make me feel less like a sell-out. Their food is good though, and definitely not shipped in.

Anyway, I talk about chains but this review is not of one – but Boof is situated in the domain of the chain, inside a shopping centre. Adjoined by a chain baked potato place and a chain chocolatier, directly across from a chain coffee shop and a chain sushi restaurant, it’s firmly in the land of big business.

Boof opened at the same time as St David’s 2 – in October 2009 – and is owned by the team who ran the stylish and classy Le Gallois in Pontcanna until their decision to close down a few weeks back. Boof remained open and has appeared to be doing quite well since; the majority of tables are taken whenever I walk past - granted there are probably only about 12 tables – but still, that’s not bad for an unknown. When people go to eat at a shopping centre they stick to what they know – this is why the mall concept does well; familiarity and well known brands all under one roof.

Boof intrudes on this party and seems to be doing quite well for it. They have the mall concepts figured out too, a simple menu with familiar favourites – burgers, steaks, salads – and the service is quick too, with our food delivered to the table within a couple of minutes.

We all chose the Boof burger, with varying degrees of cheese and bacon – not being a fan of bacon I opted just to have cheese.

The first thing you notice is the cheese, in fact – you can’t even see the beef for the dairy – all melted over the patty, whitish in colour, proving that it is indeed cheese and not a single wrap slice made in a factory out of pencil sharpenings.
Once you do get to the burger however, it is different. Good different. It’s very hard to describe, I haven’t had another burger like it on my burger conquest (post coming soon!) - it has to have been ground in a very different way, a method that I have not come across before. Here, look at it:

It’s too tightly packed, too well formed – it’s as though the beef has never been minced. Answers on a postcard please, if you think you know the method to making this type of burger.

Anyhow, once I got past the make-up of the patty I could really enjoy the food. The cheese, beef, moist lettuce and seeded bun all seemed to work together very well. The burger wasn’t too moist, but also not too dry – although I’d probably say it was closer to the dry side than not, but that’s generally fine, a little longer and it would have been overdone.
In my burger conquest post you will hear me rant about burgers that are gratuitously large, bigger than they need to be in order to satisfy the “bigger is always better” mentality that has seeped into consumers expectations – that if the burger is not massive and popping out at the sides, and holding the bottom and top parts of the bun 10 inches apart then it isn’t a good burger. The Boof burger doesn’t suffer from this, but it fills you up and you will leave happy.

Fries, fries, fries. Fries are a real wildcard, is something I have learned on my burger conquest (post coming soon!). No two establishments have the same method around making, cooking and storing and presenting their fries (or chips), and this makes for some very interesting analysis. With Boof’s fries, the little holder is a nice touch, I think – especially with the little ketchup receptacle on the side, it saves wastage as I’m a real “big splodge, use hardly any” kind-of guy. The fries themselves were hot, straight from the fryer and crispy – just how you would expect them to be. All too many times I have been presented with soggy, nearly cold fries – and this is a real turn-off. So, Boof fries = 8/10.

Service at Boof is odd – semi-table service is the name of the game here, a waiter seats you – but refuses to take your order, you order and pay at the counter, and then the waiter who seated you brings you your food. I can kind-of see how this works to cut staffing costs, because then patrons do not have to wait to get the attention of the one waiter who is on shift to order food or drinks or to get or pay the bill – it’s all done at the counter. In fairness, the more I think about it now the less uncommon I am realising it to be – it’s just the same as at a pub, except with somebody seating you first.
Food arrived relatively quickly, i.e. not in a second like at a Wetherspoons – which usually denotes microwaved produce, but still quickly enough for us not to think “where is our food” and the service was pleasant.
We took Tristan with us and there was a choice of highchairs – in fact, this was the first time he had ever been in a highchair so we tried two of them, the server was good enough to bring each of them to us to try.

Rating: 7/10
Bill: £21.90

Bristol for beginners

September 13th, 2010

“You must hate the commute” they say to me, my friends. “I walk 5 minutes to the train station, sit on my arse in a semi-comfortable seat for an hour, I get off and walk 10 minutes to the office” I reply, “It’s not exactly strenuous”.

I left the company that I started in May 2009 to experience more new things, that and the working relationship between me and my business partner had become strained through all the late night working and creative differences. I took the choice to start working a regular job again, doing what I do best, being a developer. A perfect opportunity at a perfect company came up, but with just one drawback – the company is based in Bristol.

They offered to pay for my season ticket on the train, I accepted with the notion that I would give it a try. I like trains, I find the time “in transit” to be serene and in a way quite gainful. I can write, I can read or I can just watch the countryside go by – I find it less stressful that being sat at a desk where my only prerogative is to write.

So I’ve been travelling to Bristol every day for about 12 weeks up ‘til now and the city has really grown on me. It has some of the best eateries I have ever been to, the people are generally friendly and it is certainly more established than my home city of Cardiff.

Cardiff is a city in transition, a city that is finding its identity, building its repertoire – it’s a young city and it’s still finding its place in the world, and in my view it’s being taken on the wrong course by city planners who are too eager to maximise profit. They have this freaky idea that “big chains means big reputation”, but it doesn’t, there needs to be a good balance of the two – this is the biggest failing in Cardiff’s much fought-over development plan.

Bristol for food

As I just mentioned, Bristol has some of the best food outlets that I have come across anywhere in the world. I would never have guessed it, it’s certainly not something that people say to me when I ask them their views of Bristol.

St Nicholas Market in the Old City is a haven for independent small restaurants, a model that could so easily be brought to Cardiff. In their indoor market there is space set aside for an avenue of small cafes and in it you can find food from Morocco, Jamaica, south-east Asia as well as pies and sausages from a range of different themed open-fronted stalls, each with a small area to sit and eat.
My absolute favourite is the Moo Pie from Pieminister, but the tajine from Al Bab Mansour is to die for and some of the vegetarian curries from Spice Up Your Life are definitely not to be missed. It’s a real treat to work so close to such a place and if I haven’t gained a few pounds since June I would be very surprised.

As well as St Nicholas Market the harbourside also has a large cache of eateries, a few of which I’ve tried and would wholly recommend including the Olive Shed (awesome burgers) and Bordeaux Quay for which you cannot beat for early morning coffee and toast with the summer sun beating down on you.

Bristol for nightlife

Having friends who live in Bristol, formerly from Cardiff is something that I’m lucky enough to have and we’ve had a few nights out – both raucous and civilised.

I am totally, absolutely in live with The Apple on Welsh Back. I love cider, I love cheese – who doesn’t? The Apple is a boat, it primarily serves cider and they won Strictly Come Ploughman’s last year, which means a bloody good range of cheese, crackers and pickles are available too, we’ve spent many nights outside on the terrace sampling some of the dozens of different ciders and cheeses – always go home happy.

Bristol for entertainment

The Bristol harbour festival was held over 30th July – 1st August, I went up on the Saturday to sample some of the things that were going on and was surprised at the turnout, there thousands upon thousands of people spread over the entire site – which appeared to be the entire city. In each corner of the city there were different things going on, two stages, street theatre, food stalls, boat trips, you name it, they had it – think of Cardiff’s harbour festival, plus the International Food Festival and the Big Weekend all rolled into one three day event and you will have some idea of what the Bristol Harbour Festival is like, all put to bed with 30 minutes of continuous, very impressive fireworks. Put it in your diary for 2011.

It’s safe to say that I’m smitten with our west-country counterpart, but I won’t be leaving Cardiff just yet.

Review: West Coast Grill & Bar

August 20th, 2010

Old Orleans in Cardiff Bay has never been a place I would have said to go to if someone asked me for restaurant suggestions. The last time I went there I still had long hair and my parents paid for my meal. From what I remember, the food was not up to much and I hadn’t felt an urge to go back since. This was 7 years ago.

The company that own the Old Orleans brand, Punch Taverns, selected 6 of their outlets and have rebrand them under a new moniker, West Coast Grill & Bar, changing the fayre on offer from deep South fiery cajun dishes to Californian style ribs and burgers.

Firstly, I’m pretty sure, and correct me if I’m wrong, that ribs and burgers aren’t especially Californian. I’d say they were more mid-Western, Indiana, Iowa, Michigan, South Dakota, Ohio – that kind-of area; but, I suppose how do you decorate a restaurant to look like Sioux Falls, South Dakota? So I guess we’ll agree to disagree on this one.

The refurbishment has been done adequately, the smouldering red colours replaced with sea blue and the New Orleans style Bourbon Street signs and decorations have surfboards in their place.

We were invited to the re-launch night, a “soft launch”, so no fireworks, prowling CEOs or any of that malarchy – just a night for invited guests and the occasional walk-in, so the staff could get used to the new menu. @MisiaKuczys, @DanielGrosvenor and @CardiffBites came along with me.
The good thing about this being a re-launch is that the staff are all the same, so we wouldn’t have to deal with a whole bunch of waitstaff on their first day tripping over each other and bringing us potatoes instead of pork and margheritas instead of martinis.

The new menu is a big one and I can see why the kitchen staff would need a while to get to grips with it, with no less than 34 items available as a main course it took us a while to decide and had to ask our server to come back, twice.

Once we finally had a handle on the menu, starters were ordered in the form of two of the biggest sharers – there were 6 of us after-all. This platter, the simply named “West Coast Platter” had pretty much every starter on it – so this helped for me to sample everything so I could be fair in my review.

In true American style the prawns were dubbed “shrimp”, but surely they must be prawns since it would take a lot of effort and a hell of a lot of food miles to source and import shrimp to the United Kingdom, especially since we have an abundance of their larger brothers.
The two huge oblong plates also had on them small ribs, chicken wings, tortilla chips, corn, onion rings and sweet potato fries.

One of the first things I noticed were that the onion rings were clearly bagged and frozen, quickly deep-fried on site. TGI Friday’s have absolutely awesome onion rings – I don’t know their method, but however they do it they make them taste as though they have been prepared from scratch. The rings here were disappointing, even for the frozen kind.
On the plus side, I love sweet potatoes, who doesn’t? So having them cut into gourmet style fries, thick and crispy, was an absolute delight. They were cooked well and could have been sliced freshly? I have no reason to doubt that they were.

After our epic menu reading session, where I could have mistaken our group for a book club, we had all ordered main courses and now they started making their way to the table. I had made a joke with our server that since we were eating for gratis that I should order the most expensive thing on the menu, and she duly pointed out the “The bigger rib gig”. It’s description “Share the stickiness for even better value; an extra large portion of the big rib gig, it’s a real belt strainer ideal for sharing”. I’m not a big eater, I like to eat “nouveau” – small portions of awesome flavourful food; but this is what the West Coast Grill & Bar is supposed to be modelled on – good ribs and wings – so what better way to get a taste of it all than to have them all on one big plate?

Out of shot: The rest of the pig.

It was a monstrosity, 3 different cuts – pulled pork, a rack of ribs, and pork hammers with corn, fries and coleslaw. Not knowing where to start, I went for my favourite piece of the pig, the ribs. The meat fell from the bone easily, as good rib meat should. The texture of the meat was smooth and succulent – no problems here, this is good quality meat. The barbecue sauce that almost all of the pork on the plate was covered in however wasn’t the greatest. Quite salty to taste and a way too sticky, as if it had congealed. Covering 2 out of 3 types of meat, this really put the good cuts of pork in a bad light; like making parsley sauce with old milk and pouring it all over nice, fresh turbot.

The pulled pork had an entirely different barbecue sauce applied to it; darker in colour and thicker in texture, but thicker as if it had been aged or a bourbon had been used to thicken it, not like the other stuff which seemed it had become thicker through being left in a bottle with no cap in a fridge for days.
Yes, this was an entirely different specimen of marinade – fruity and smooth, topping off some of the best pulled pork I have had in a long while. It literally fell apart with my fork lightly jabbing at it. Moist and succulent, it had all the flavours of the flame grill ingrained in it and the sauce covering it just topped everything off – this single piece of meat, in my opinion, saved the whole dish.

The fries that we all had on the side became a topic of conversation between the members of the group, both over the table and after the visit – yes, this is how bad they were. The West Coast Grill & Bar need to source new fries immediately. They might as well have not been there, and quite how you suck all flavour out of potatoes like they have managed to do, I have no idea. You put them in your mouth and you could have been eating anything, it was a blank canvas, they tasted of absolutely nothing. I can’t even say anything more than that; they weren’t greasy or oily, they weren’t too thick, thin or potatoey, they weren’t dry, they weren’t cold, they weren’t hot, they weren’t salty, they were actually nothing. I have never tasted anything like this before, and this was resounded around the table. Making fries is both an art and a science, one that many companies invest thousands of hours to get right – if you’re going to be putting them on the side of every dish, they need to stand up to the challenge; these do not.

After managing to finish almost everything on my plate, despite the drawbacks of the one kind of marinade (I hasten to add that while it wasn’t the greatest, it was certainly edible, and the meat was worth salvaging), it was time for the third course, dessert.
Even though I have a relatively small frame and only weigh about 10st, sometimes I can manage to put away quite a lot – not often, but I have my moments, so I went with the apple pie – a dessert you cannot get wrong, and I was right, it was great, heated to the right temperature and not overdone – it went down a treat.

The other thing that this restaurant seems to be focusing on is their cocktail menu – there was an array of good looking “fun & fruity” cocktails like “jelly baby” and “tutti frutti”, Unfortunately I’m not a “fun” cocktail drinker – I’m completely buttoned down, my favourite being a whiskey cocktail, the Old Fashioned. @DanielGrosvenor did try a milkshake, the “chocolate banoffee” – he finished it all and didn’t complain, so I assume it was good – I’m sure you’ll hear about it in his review.

Service all night was great, our server was very attentive, friendly and welcoming – giving us as much time as needed to decide; but not overbearing – making sure that we were always with drinks.

Rating 4/10

The food was mostly phoned in, better than pub food, but you’d think that as a restaurant they would do more cooking – rather than using so much ready prepared, “3663 style” delivered dishes.