Jess D, Natalie W, Oonagh C and I went here for a catch up and to take advantage of their 50% off January deal.
I hadn't actually been before and was pleasantly surprised at how spacious it was inside. There are also approximately eighteen thousand staircases, just a heads up.
Staff were really helpful and friendly from the start. After a half pint of nice beer, Jess and I were joined by Natalie and made our way to the table. When taking our drinks order the waitress convinced Jess and I to order a carafe of wine rather than separate glasses to save money. It was nice to see that kind of customer service rather than upselling, especially when we were dining on a discount.
We were a bit disappointed that the menu wasn't the same as on the website, although looking at it a second time I noticed the online menu is a sample. I assume this means they change the menu often which is a good thing I guess.
50% off all food is basically a challenge, and one we happily accepted. Between us we ordered salt cod fishcakes, crispy pork cheek, and three pizzas which were:
- Peppered beef, Lancashire blue, and gherkin
- Air dried ham, red onion and goats cheese (with the addition of rocket)
- Pancetta, red peppers and black olives (and probably something else? This was Natalie's own creation)
I didn't try the fishcakes but Nat and Jess made approving noises. The crispy pork cheek was not as I expected but then I couldn't really tell you what I did expect. It was like pulled pork, compressed into a cylinder. The piccalilli with it stopped it from being too heavy and it was really tasty, though I wouldn't rush to order it again.
The pizzas looked and tasted really good. I tried a bit of all three but enjoyed my choice - beef, blue cheese and gherkin - the most. Not too heavy on the blue cheese so not overpowering, and the gherkins really helped to cut through the richness. The crusts were especially delicious, and good for dipping. The other two pizzas were good. I'm not the biggest goat's cheese fan but the flavour was mild and pleasant, and went well with the other toppings. Natalie's pizza was very nice flavour wise but it seemed as though all the ingredients were just dumped on in a heap rather than arranged around the base which resulted in it being quite stodgy. It's odd that this was the case only with that one and neither of the menu choices?
The staff had no problem when Oonagh C joined us and her pizza arrived in no time at all, thanks to their huge pizza oven.
To finish, we shared a dark chocolate delice and a deconstructed tiramisu. The delice was so so so rich that it's a great option for sharing but I personally would have been defeated by it myself. The tiramisu was delicious although as Jess pointed out, not sure why it couldn't have been constructed?
With the 50% off deal this was astounding value, and even without it would have been very reasonable for what we ordered. I'll definitely be back to Tariff & Dale. read more