Wetherspoons The Bell Hotel, Norwich

Due to being on a pretty tight budget at the minute, Wetherspoons is one of the first go to places when it comes to going out for lunch or dinner. The Bell Hotel in Norwich is a branch of Wetherspoons I hadn’t been to though until very recently. Although the boyfriend and I had spent the whole day shopping and spending quite a bit of money, we wanted to skimp on dinner and headed here.

The Bell Hotel is situated right in the middle of Norwich, close to all of the shops and shopping centres so it is easily accessible by foot or bus although as far as I could tell, there is nowhere to park. However, if you are coming into Norwich by train there is a different branch of Wetherspoons just around the corner from the station which would be a better and easier option.

Address

5 Orford Hill

Norwich

Norfolk

NR1 3QB

Contact

01603 630017

Staff and service

The staff at The Bell Hotel are by far the nicest I have come across in any Wetherspoons. Maybe this is Norfolk thing though as everyone here seems pretty damn friendly. When ordering our food and drinks at the bar, the staff member serving us was very friendly and helpful when it came to answering questions we had about our meal. I didn’t want any sauces on mine and as it doesn’t state anything about that on the menu, we were assured that there would be no sauces on the sausage but instead, there would be a pot of mustard on the side. We were also shown where the other sauces were should we want any.

Even though there were quite a few people in the pub at the time of our visit, our food only took 10 minutes to come out. The same guy who took our order brought our meals over to us, asked if we needed anything else and left us to enjoy our food. Something that I hate in restaurants is the waiting staff coming over within a couple of minutes of the food being brought over and asking if everything is ok. Here at The Bell Hotel, we were given a good amount of time before this happened and we were also asked in a wonderful, polite manner and then left to enjoy our food.

After finishing our meals, the table was cleared within a couple of minutes and again, we were asked if everything was ok with our food. Even though we were quite full at this point, we still wanted dessert. Again, we headed up to the bar, where there was no waiting time to be served and placed our order. Back at the table, I glanced over at the bar and could see the staff having good old chats with the customers placing their orders and those stood drinking at the bar. It was so nice to see bar staff having a genuinely good time at work and also making the customers feel so welcome.

I really think that the staff here are some of the best in any pub, let alone a Wetherspoons branch.

Food and Drink

As we were only here for dinner, we didn’t get to sample much from the drinks menu. However, like most Wetherspoons, The Bell Hotel offers a large range of drinks from soft drinks, Alco pops, cocktails and a whole load of spirits and beers. As pubs go, Wetherspoons is one of the best when it comes to value for money as they always have offers on and are very competitive with other chains.

When it comes to food, Wetherspoons pretty much offer everything you can think of. Open over breakfast, lunch and dinner, the menu is pretty extensive and there really is something for everyone. If we normally go to a Wetherspoons to eat, both John and I usually opt for the burger and drink offer but this time, we wanted something different. The Bell Hotel has a fantastic range of food to offer a hungry customer. As well as the burger and drink offer, you could have a curry, salad, jacket potato, sandwich or a steak along with much more. Something I had never seen on a Wetherspoons menu before though was hot dogs, which is something I am quite picky about. I hate those thin, watery hot dogs which don’t really taste of much. Still, both John and I decided to give Wetherspoons’ hot dogs a try seeing as neither of us had ever had one before.

Like the burger deal, you can get a hot dog with chips and a drink for roughly £4 which is what I had. John opted for the gourmet hot dog which had added chilli and cheese and came with both chips and onion rings. The gourmet hot dog cost just over £5. With this offer, you can have a soft drink or choose from a list of alcoholic drinks such as a pint of lager or vodka and coke for a slightly larger price. As our meals were at such a good price, we weren’t really expecting much. However, when our meals were brought over to the table, we were both quite shocked.

The hot dogs were double the size of what we were expecting and they came in lovely, fresh baguette buns with a side of chips and were served on long, rectangular plates. My plain hot dog did indeed come plain with no sauce or anything but there was a side pot of mustard on the plate as well. John’s hot dog was absolutely loaded with chilli that had a generous dollop of cheese on the top. Both meals looked amazing and we couldn’t wait to tuck into them.

As hot dogs go, these were pretty great. Now, the best hot dog I have ever had was from a street vendor in Toronto and nothing has ever come close to that but this does now come in second place. The hot dog is made from pork and was steaming hot on arrival. The bun was soft on the inside with a slight crunch to the edges. The chips were very lovely and fluffy on the inside with a crispy outer layer and the two items went really well together. These hot dogs are also a very filling meal and are well worth the money.

When it comes to desserts, I always have chocolate fudge cake from any Wetherspoons which comes with ice cream and costs just over £3. John had an ice cream sundae which came with warm brownie chunks, Belgian chocolate sauce and cream. This also cost just over £3. It only took a couple of minutes for our desserts to come out which is probably the quickest service I have ever had in any branch of Wetherspoons. I don’t know why, but desserts always seem to take ages. My chocolate fudge cake was the same as always but it always tastes great to me. John’s ice cream sundae again, was much bigger than he was expecting it to be. This came in a large sundae glass, filled to about three quarters high with brownie chunks and ice cream while the top had a lot of whipped cream. I can honestly say that he thoroughly enjoyed his dessert as much as I did.

Overall

As branches of Wetherspoons go, this is one of the best I have been in. With a great food and drinks menu (which I know are pretty much the same everywhere), the friendly and welcoming staff really helped to make our visit so pleasant and because of that, this branch is one I would go back to any time I am in Norwich.

The Yarborough Hotel, Grimsby

On a recent trip back to Grimsby, I went out to eat more than I usually would. On the Saturday, I headed into town for drinks and some food at The Yarborough Hotel, which is actually a Wetherspoons branch. The Yarborough Hotel can be found right near Grimsby Train Station so it is in the perfect location if you have had a long journey or need to go somewhere easily with cases. Having grown up in Grimsby, I have always thought of this branch of Wetherspoons as ‘the old man’s pub’. This is because the other Wetherspoons is much trendier and livelier whereas this one is actually full of old men. However, it has a more relaxed atmosphere and doesn’t play any music which is nice if you do just want to go and have a drink and a chat with friends.

As soon as you walk in the main entrance, you can see just how big this place is. The pub is split up into two floors although only so by a couple of steps. The lower part of the pub has quite a few tables although space is mostly taken up by seats around the edges of the room. As you go up the steps you see the first bar and just past this is another bar and another room full of tables. The Yarborough Hotel has so much seating in comparison to the other Wetherspoons which is probably why it is so popular.

Since I last came here, the menus have changed and for the better. Each table has a menu on it and you have to go up to the bar to order your food and drinks. The menu is so much better than it used to be although it is still very much a pub food menu. The Yarborough Hotel opens at 8am every day so it is open for breakfast. However, it is the main meals and sharing dishes which have been revamped. The Yarborough Hotel serves the basic burger as well as things like a full rack of ribs, salads and sandwiches. We decided to go for one of the new sharing platters (The Wetherspoon Sharer) as we didn’t want to eat too much. For £8.09, this included chicken wings, chicken strips, onion rings, battered shrimp and chips.

Service at the The Yarborough Hotel was fantastic. Even though the pub was extremely busy, after placing our order it only took 10 minutes for our food to arrive. Even though this is a sharing platter, we didn’t get given any plates so we had to ask for these. All of the food was nice and hot and looked very appetising on the plate. I don’t eat shrimp so cannot comment on what this tasted like but the rest was all lovely. For the price, I think we got really good value for money and there was enough food for the three of us without us fighting for more of anything.

As you would expect from a Wetherspoons, the drinks are also pretty cheap. We were having rounds of two VK’s and a pint of Fosters and this came to around £6 which isn’t bad for a round at all. As the drinks aren’t overly expensive, it is quite possible to sit here for hours if you’re paying for yourself only and barely spend £20. This Wetherspoons in particular serves a whole range of cask ales if you’re into that sort of thing too.

Compared to the other times I have been here, nothing much has changed in regards to how the pub actually looks but the food menu is a hell of a lot better than I can ever remember it being.

Address

29 Bethlehem Street

Grimsby

Lincolnshire

DN31 1JN

Telephone

01472 268283

Opening Times

Mon - Thu: 8am to 12am

Fri - Sat: 8am to 1am

Sun: 8am to 12am

Vapiano Great Portland Street, London

While in Finland, my sister and I had found this amazing restaurant called Vapiano and ever since I found out there were two branches in London, I was desperate to go back. Unfortunately though, it took me a year and a half to make the trip to London and to find the restaurant. 

Finding the restaurant

The branch I visited is located at 19-21 Great Portland Street which is just behind Top Shop on Oxford Street. Due to the location, it can easily be found after getting off the tube at Oxford Circus. I say easily but this wasn’t so true for me. I had read the map wrong on the website and not even looked at the actual printed address and I thought the restaurant was on the street next to where it actually is. Needless to say, I was disappointed when I went to find it and it wasn’t there. My flatmate and I (who I was in London with) decided to eat at Strada instead, only to finish our meal there, turn the corner and see Vapiano looking right at us. At least we had another day in London so we could go back. 

How the restaurant works

As you enter the restaurant, someone at the front desk will greet you and then hand you a credit card style card and explain that this is what you use to order your food with. The restaurant is set into different sections and as you go up to the station you wish to order from, you hand over your card and someone behind that counter will scan in whatever it is you have ordered. This is a really good thing for people who like to order separately or order different kinds of food. At each station, when you order, the food is then cooked there and then right in front of you. However, if you order pizza, you will be given a buzzer so you can go back and collect the food when it’s ready.

At the end of your meal, you take the card back to the front desk where they scan it and give you your final meal price. Everything apart from how much a drink will cost is clearly priced on the menus so you pretty much know what you are going to spend anyway. There are paper take-away style menus at the front desk in the restaurant or there are menus are each different cooking station. 

My experience

As my friend had not been to a Vapiano restaurant before, I explained to her how it worked. I already knew what I wanted to eat and we decided to split two dishes so we could have the best of both worlds – pizza as well as pasta. Kate went off to order our piz-za while I went to the pasta station.

At the pasta station, first you must decide which kind of pasta you would like. The choices were Pappardelle, Spaghetti, Penne, Linguine, Conchiglie, Campanelle, Fusilli, Tagliatelle, Ravioli, Spelt Spaghetti and Spelt Fusilli. Both Kate and I always have penne pasta so this was an easy choice for me. Once you have decided this, then you choose what kind of sauce etc. you would like. The menu is split into four different price categories with everything in A costing £6.75, B £7.75, C £8.75 and D cost £9.75. As you can see, the prices vary depending on what is in the pasta and D costs more because there are dishes with seafood items and expensive meat. Carbonara (menu B) was our choice so this cost us £7.75,

After telling the chef what you want and scanning your card, he took a little bag of pasta out from behind him which had obviously been weighed out earlier in the day. In this branch, you can actually see people making the pasta fresh and then bagging it up which was something I didn’t get to see in Helsinki. Next, he added oil into a wok and threw in a lot of chopped up ham for a few minutes, letting it cook. While this was cooking, he added the pasta into the cooker beside him so it would be ready when the sauce was. Next, I was asked if I wanted garlic which I did but at this point, I also said I didn’t want onions in my meal so he left them out. The garlic smell mixed with the ham was amazing and I couldn’t wait for my pasta to be ready. Next he added in some white wine and the carbonara sauce along with an egg yolk and began to mix it all together. This only took a couple of minutes and then the pasta was added, letting it mix together. Once the pasta was placed in a dish, basil and ground black pepper, along with cheese was added to the top. The basil was pulled directly from a plant in front of the chef which I thought was a great thing to do, instead of it being from a tub.

Carbonara is my favourite of pasta and my flatmate’s too so we were both excited to eat this amazing dish. Kate was extremely impressed and now understands why I wanted to go back to Vapiano so mucj. The sauce was rich and creamy but mixed with the parmesan and black pepper, it had a bit of a kick to it at times too. The pasta was soft and the portion was very reasonable for the price. Each of us had a bottle of coke with our meal, which came in a glass bottle instead of plastic and cost us £2.25 each which I don’t think is bad, especially in London.

We had nearly finished eating our pasta when the buzzer went off and the pizza Kate had ordered was ready. This was perfect timing and such a good idea if you are sharing meals. Again, the pizza menu is set up into four sections with the same prices as pasta. We only had a margherita so this cost us £6.75. The pizza comes on a thin and crispy base with the normal tomato based sauce and then loaded with cheese. The pizza was lovely but nowhere near as nice as the pasta but it was nice to be able to eat two different meals without being bored of just one thing. I know I would have struggled to eat either a whole pizza or a whole pasta dish to myself.

The restaurant has a very contemporary feel and look to it with the tables being high and surrounded by stools. There are fresh herb plants in the middle of each table and in this branch, a massive tree at the front of the restaurant. The herbs are mostly grown in the restaurants themselves so you know how fresh they are. I like that you can see the chefs working and watch them make your meal for you and with the pasta section, a dish only takes a maximum of 5 minutes to cook. The chefs were also extremely friendly and didn’t mind if you wanted certain items not cooked in your meal. The front desk staff were also very friendly and had big smiles on their faces. I thoroughly enjoyed my visit to this restau-rant and I couldn’t have asked for better service. Vapiano on Great Portland Street is just as good as the branch in Helsinki and I would happily go again!

Find out more at www.vapiano.com

Strada Marketplace, London

Strada is a restaurant chain that I had never even heard of before until recently. There isn’t one in Nottingham as far as I know and there definitely isn’t one in Grimsby. However, while in London recently and not being able to find the restaurant we were supposed to go to, Strada seemed like the next best option and it was right where we were anyway. The Strada I will be reviewing is Strada Marketplace, London. 

Restaurant Information

9-10 Market Place, 
London 
W1W 8AQ

My Experience

This particular restaurant is really easy to find. The best tube station to get off at is Oxford Circus and you just need to head behind Top Shop in order to find Marketplace. Here there is a range of restaurants. Strada is on the left hand side and right in the middle of the street.

All I knew about Strada before actually eating there was that it served Italian food. The restaurant had an outside eating area although I definitely didn’t want to sit there as it was freezing and had been raining all day. Upon entering the restaurant, we were asked if we had reservations (which we didn’t) then shown to a tiny table shoved in the corner. The space around the table was tiny and although the table next to us was empty when we arrived, it was soon filled and there was a struggle for the other people to get in and for us to get out after we were done.

The restaurant was dimly lit, which did give it a lovely romantic and intimate feel to it although this made me wish I was there with my fiancé instead of my flatmate! The closeness of the tables added to the intimacy although for me this was not a good thing. It seems as though they just wanted to pack in as many tables as possible especially as the restaurant is quite small. However, I did like the setting of the restaurant and it also made going out for a meal feel more special than it actually was. This would be a lovely place to go with your other half.

After only being sat down for a couple of minutes, we were asked if we were ready to order and if we wanted any drinks. Having barely looked at the menu at this point, we ordered 2 cokes which cost £2.35 each. A glass bottle of coke was brought over along with a small glass with ice and lemon in. The waitress then left us alone for a good 5 minutes in order for us to decide what we wanted to order.

My flatmate opted for the Rigatoni Speck pasta which consisted of a creamy sauce of Gorgonzola cheese, smoked speck ham and rocket with rigatoni pasta and this cost £10.95. I went for a basic margherita pizza which cost £7.95. We always tend to share dishes when we go out to eat so I figured I didn’t want to get pasta as well so that way we would both get something different. We also has Algio which is a basket of hand stretched flat bread topped with garlic & rosemary to share between us and this cost £4.95.

Considering that the restaurant was nearly full, it only took 10 minutes for our meals to arrive. My pizza was absolutely massive and it made me wish we didn’t order the side of garlic bread as well. The base of the pizza was lovely and thin, making it crispy on the edges but softer in the middle. The top was loaded with cheese on top of a wonderful tomato base. Although this is a basic pizza, and with not much to it, it tasted great. My flatemate’s pasta was even nicer though. The cheese sauce was rich and creamy and mixed with the ham and rocket, there was a good mixture of flavours and textures. The pasta itself was soft and extremely hot and that made it an all-round very nicely tasting dish. The garlic bread was soft and crispy at the same time in different places and the garlic not too overpowering.

We were not pressured to hurry up during our meal and someone only came over once to make sure everything was ok. I liked this about Strada because sometimes, a waiter or waitress can come over too much and it makes it feel like you should have been gone a while ago. The atmosphere at this restaurant was nice and relaxed although the service was spot on. After our meals we were asked if we wanted dessert but we were far too full so we asked for the bill, paid (with a tip) and left. 

Overall

Although I had never been to a Strada restaurant before, I thoroughly enjoyed my visit here and would now happily go again.

Le Pain Quotidien Covent Garden

When in London with my flatmate a little while back now, we had had more than enough of shopping and were wandering around Covent Garden, waiting to go to the theatre. Not wanting to walk around for another couple of hours, we saw the delicious looking cakes in the window of Le Pain Quotidien. They were far too tempting to pass up so we headed in to see what we could have.

ADDRESS

48 & 49 The Market

Covent Garden Piazza

London

WC2E 8RF

I had never heard of Le Pain Quotidien before but they are a company who pride themselves on baking fresh breads and pastries every single day and they also do large orders of full size cakes. On the lower floor of Le Pain Quotidien are a few tables where you can sit in and eat although this part is mainly for take away orders. You can have a quick browse of the cakes available here before heading off upstairs to the bigger restaurant area. Well, I say bigger but the upstairs of the restaurant is absolutely tiny and there are as many tables as physically possible squashed into the space. This means that people cannot walk around easily and the waitresses had to wait for people to pass before being able to either take people their food or get people seated.

We had about a 10 minute wait before we did get a seat but this gave us a chance to have a look at the menu, which is more extensive than what you can order to take away. Le Pain Quotidien serves hot dishes such as Pot Pie, a range of salads, soup of the day as well as a good range of international platters. While we didn’t want a meal here, I was impressed with the size of the menu for such a small place.

After being seated at a tiny table squished into a corner, I ordered a slice of chocolate tart along with a fresh squeezed glass of orange juice while Kate had homemade lemonade and a strawberry tart. There isn’t much space upstairs so if you have shopping/ bags with you, be prepared for a struggle. The table next to us was extremely close so we had to put our bags behind our table near the window. Anyway, for just 2 pieces of cake and 2 drinks, this cost us just under £10 each. Drinks were roughly £2.50 while the cakes were more at around £5 a slice. A service charge is added onto your bill which is why this small snack ended up costing so much.

While the cakes were absolutely wonderful, I’m not sure it was worth the money. They were well presented on white slabs – mine decorated with chocolate powder, and did look extremely nice upon arrival. However, I have had cakes just as nice from places such as Patisserie Valerie at much better prices. The drinks were just the same – very nice but not worth the money. Orange juice is orange juice in my eyes and although I did get a large glass, it wasn’t anything special.

The size of the restaurant also didn’t help me to have a good experience here. Being tucked away in a corner very close to another table meant we spent our whole time here listening to two really loud women talking about their boyfriends and burlesque in great detail. Kate and I could barely talk between ourselves without being spoken over by the table next to us. If this restaurant had a little bit more space, I think it would be a lovely place to go but considering how high the prices are, I would have rather gone somewhere else.