After so many glowing recommendations from friends, I can't believe it took me so long to visit The Cheerful Chilli! Was it worth the wait? You bet.
Situated near the Chevin in some beautiful countryside, the Cheerful Chilli is a relaxed and cosy place. The food isn't gourmet but the quality definitely doesn't suffer for that. Rather, it seems as if they've decided to do fairly simple meals and do them really well. The atmosphere is casual and friendly, a bit like walking into a huge old stone-flagged kitchen, brightened up by lovely flowers on all the tables. It's the best of casual dining: unpretentious but attractive, service relaxed but not slow, and staff in T-shirts with friendly smiles and good knowledge of the food.
Oh yes, the food. Hoo boy. I'm still so full it's actually hard to think about it. Since we were in a group of six, we decided to go for the 'Banquet' - a selection of starters, mains and desserts from the menu. It was £18.50 and wow... it was definitely value for money. We had a 'pre-starter' meze of two giant plates of couscous, halloumi, falafel, houmous, bread, olives and salad, which really could have been a generous starter on its own. But oh no, there were starters too: potato wedges with cheese, corn cakes with sweet chilli, nachos, and goat's cheese tart. All delicious.
To be honest, at this point we could have left satisfied - it felt like we'd had a full meal already! But then the mains arrived: vegetable fajitas, kerala curry, enchiladas, roasted veg and pizza. Again everything was delicious - possibly the only weak point was the pizza which I think was homemade but had been a bit overdone which left it tasting a little like an oven pizza. But everything else was great. Nothing fancy: it was all stuff I could make at home, but just.... better. Hugely flavoursome in a way I can never quite get my dishes to be, and presented beautifully.
So on to the desserts! We got wedges of the chocolate truffle cake (rich and divine), the cheesecake (maybe a little creamy for my taste but lovely fruit) and the chocolate nemesis (dark, fudgy, amazing). And what was maybe even better: a huge bowl of vanilla ice cream which was hands down the best ice cream I've ever had. I asked them where they got it and they said they make it themselves. I wonder if they'd consider delivering in bulk...?
I couldn't quite believe that we were only paying £18.50 for a lovely meal that could keep you full for days, but yes, it was true. You can bring your own booze too, and they didn't charge corkage - champion! The reasonable-ness just continued with my friend being charged just 70p for the 7-up she ordered: smallest restaurant markup ever?
And so we rolled home, vowing to return. I'm already planning a walk up to Otley for this very purpose - I can't think of a better place to welcome tired and hungry walkers! read more