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Must try harder
Based on various positive reviews, we chose this venue for a dinner to celebrate our anniversary, and the fact that we'd escaped from the children for an evening. All began well with immediate attention from the waitress, who throughout was good - but sadly not our only staff!
We ordered, including wine, which came immediately and sat back to wait for food. And waited. And waited. Given that there were only two other parties in the restaurant, and one of those finished soon after we arrived at 8.20, it was a long wait indeed until our starters arrived. In fact, over 30 mins. When they did arrive, things improved. The French onion soup was declared delicious; the salad nicoise adequate, but fresh as opposed to (some)tinned ingredients would have improved the overall effect. The fun began as we finished our starters. With no exaggeration, as soon as the empty starter plates were out of sight our main courses were placed in front of us - not even a chance to have a sip of water! I must say; this was NOT delivered by our initial waitress, but I presume 2 off duty taxi drivers; at least that's what the looked like, with ballpens in their top pockets, and glasses hanging from their shirt button. This was rather offputting, but we got stuck in to the racks of lamb we had ordered. Whether I was just unlucky or not I don't know, but I only had 3 mouthfuls of lamb in my portion; the rest (at least the same amount) was fat. What I had was good, but there was more edible food in the starter than the main course. VERY disappointing. As soon as we had finished the main courses, they were whisked away, and we were given the dessert menu - again no chance to breathe. At this point we did ask if we were under time pressure to finish the meal since we were being hurried along.
After we had had desert and coffee, the restaurant manager came over to ask us whether we had had a wonderful meal. When we said no, it had been 'OK', and explained why (especially the lamb) we were told, 'Well, we get that cut because most of our customers like fatty meat' - a dismissal which summed up the attitide of the restaurant - this is the way we do it and you can take or leave it. (For the record, the OTHER portion of lamb was almost all meat, so the explanation didn't hold water any more than it was satisfying as a customer).
So, we ate, and we had a meal we'll remember - since this is the first review I've ever written I hope it can be shared - to be honest, with L'angelus just up the road, anyone who wants decent French-style cooking should NOT head to The Brasserie... just as we won't again.    [01 Apr 2007 04:15:01]
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