On first impression the restaurant looks the part, very nice decor, clean and generally really well presented.
There is an offer which runs from Monday to Thursday, Two dine for £10.99 on a selected, but decent enough menu Alas, it was a Friday lunch time.
It did seem a little over confident to disclude today with so much choice elsewhere locally, and probably the reason it wasn't so busy.
I ordered Francesinha (curiosity often gets the better of me!). Described as Portuguese delicatessen ham, chorizo, and beef with a chilli and beer sauce. I was told it came as a sandwich, with chips. What I got, was not exactly as appetising as described, yes it appeared to be in a ciabatta.. yet the entire sandwich had the sauce ladled over it, making it impossible to pick up, and therefore pointless as a sandwich. Nevertheless I still anticipated something very flavoursome..
Inside was a thick, bland and fatty piece of pork with no flavour whatsoever (a completely different meat to the image of Portuguese delicatessen ham), two slices of chorizo and a wedge of well done beef, and nothing else. Very bland and chewy. I would say I could defend the rest of my meal but a reasonable chilli and tomato sauce and decent enough chips did not help it warrant the £10.99 price tag. I would likely have been just as disappointed on an offer day, but atleast with a little less impact on the wallet! My company had a fish pie. Also £10.99, but with the pie containing broccoli and carrots in decent size pieces and just peas as a side, I felt this was again a somewhat cheeky price tag (though on offer days this would have been much more forgiveable) The third main meal was a hot beef sandwich at £9.25 which looked genuinely appealing and much more tempting than the meat in my meal.
We had three deserts, sticky toffee pudding with ice cream with did make up for my meal, though somewhat slight for £5.25 , lemon tart with sorbet, and Eton mess. All deserts were certainly of good standard and everyone enjoyed. We also had two glasses of white wine (nicely chilled) and a lager. The bill came to just over £57 and yes would have stung a little less on any other week day. The service was very good and my input from my meal did seem to be of importance to my waiter which was refreshing actually. The quality of the food was overall good, I would just avoid the Francesinha. For me the biggest issue was the value of the food, which was a shame. The non offer menu did look noticeably higher prices too. I'm not saying don't go at all, if I was passing anyway on a Wednesday lunch time it might have been a different story, and rating. read more
