Thursday 13 June 2013

Goldbrick House Cafe Bar

I always find it so difficult to decide where to go out to eat in Bristol. There are so many amazing food havens spread across so many different places that when you decide to go on an impromptu night out, the choice is endless. Often we find ourselves in the car before deciding and hope that inspiration will strike us before we reach the end of the Portway.

Last night we debated between a few places but weary folk that we were settled on the less formal Cafe Bar at Goldbrick House.

There's no denying GH is a beautiful place from it's French bistro inspired Cafe Bar to the secretive Library rooms upstairs and it's sun trapped roof terrace. The restaurant upstairs is more of a fanciful affair but for a more casual occasion, the Cafe Bar offers small tapas type dishes amongst burgers, fish and chips and pasta dishes.



Si ordered a plate of linguine with meatballs and I plumped for the tuna nicoise salad with some chips on the side. I specified for the tuna to be served quite pink - the rarer the better for me. Pretty simple, right?

The dishes came and we were both somewhat underwhelmed. Si complained that his meatball linguine was more of a starter size than a main, you certainly didn't get a huge amount for your £9. I can't even give an opinion on how it tasted as it had disappeared within about three mouthfuls.

As for my salad...

When the waiter bought it over, he said that it didn't look too pink as the chef had flashed it under the grill to warm it. Um... no. Wrong. Why would you warm through a tuna steak after it had been seared? And as for the steak, I'm not sure why the chef chose to massacre what should have been a perfectly good piece of fish in such a way with something no sharper than a baseball bat leaving it strewn all over the salad like a piece of roadkill but he did.

Because of the ragged chunks, none of the pieces were cooked exactly the same and most were cooked through with none of that gloriously pink blushed centre a piece of tuna should have.

However, it was quite dark in the Cafe Bar (see the pic above) - perhaps it affected the chef's eyesight... But let me give you a quick lesson:

When we say pink we mean this:



If you cook tuna and serve it like this, it leads to a sad face:




If I was looking at the photo, I wouldn't think that was a piece of fish... and please note the rather small portion of linguine in the background.

The other components of the salad only added to the disappointment. The potatoes, were hard and had started to split down the middle which to my knowledge happens when boiled potatoes are kept in a fridge for a number of days. The boiled eggs didn't have the still slightly soft yolk which is what I expect when I order a Nicoise salad from an establishment such as Goldbrick House and the chef had appeared to empty an entire jar of capers into the dish. Mmmm... vinegary.

The waiter very kindly removed the chips from the bill but they weren't the issue. It's a shame that the same consideration isn't given to the food downstairs as upstairs. And for somewhere with such a lovely ambiance, it's a shame the food puts a dent in that experience and so when we next have our in-car debate about where to go for food, I think we'll know which side of the metaphorical road GH will fall on...

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