Went here with a voucher after we contributed £50 each to their indiegogo. Wait staff hadn't been briefed on what that entitled us too so we had to ask for wine (also we had to pay extra for bread which I thought was somewhat stingy given the set lunch was £25 but whatevs). Wine when it came was really nice - unfiltered so an interesting orangey colour (and a little cloudy) and great crisp applely flavour.
Service was incredibly slow and I have seen many other reviews on other platforms commenting on this. Basically lunch took 3 hours which is ok if you want to linger but as time went on and the atmosphere died as most people left we would really rather have been able to spend an extra hour in the park on a sunny day. It took 1 hour 20 minutes from arrival to the starter - fortunately we had some very good bread in between (I liked the two butters, skip the garlic oil) but even plating for a whole restaurant it made little sense when the starters are mostly pre-prepared/cold. Is only one chef doing all the courses? My oysters were very nice, there wasn't much to the mushroom starter but the focaccia looked ok and the cauliflower cheese soup was apparently not too heavy.
After another long wait the roast arrived. The goat meat was delicious although I think those with a big appetite would be disappointed by the little portion. Veg and potatoes were decent, the Yorkshires weren't very good. As with many places doing Sunday lunch they pour the gravy on for you - would be much better to have a jug so it's more like the home experience and you can add to your preference. Feeling your roast is a bit dry really makes the whole dish underwhelming. My friend asked for more and got a weird shallow dish of it with a tiny spoon!
After another 40 mins or so we got a good selection of cheese - a very interesting Somerset semi-hard cheese which combined elements of cheddar and brie. The blue was also nice. If you want all four cheeses you either need to share or pay £6 supplement - the latter I think is a little much given how small the portion is. Apparently the crumble was very nice, it def smelled good when I arrived initially!
I liked the decor and was surprised that didn't feel too uncomfortable after 2 hours on a backless bench (bf would never tolerate that!). Overall I think they have some way to go to make it a more generous and professional experience (and frankly I wouldn't make the trek back over to Chorlton unless I heard that had improved, as both Brassica Grill and Hispi are closer to me and far better experiences overall) but the food is tasty which ultimately is the most important thing, so that's a good start. read more