I have to say The Bubble Room, in Woolton village, wasn’t what I was expecting, to me the name conjured up images of somewhere more informal, somewhere with a relaxed feel to it. I was intrigued to find that The Bubble Room is really quite smart, it has a more formal atmosphere and a feel of quality to it. I liked it, it was comfy and inviting and had a sense of professionalism.
Pleased to announce the latest Scousetro Club event will be June 12th at Caveau Restaurant in Woolton village. Dave and his team have put together a fantastic menu, for all the details please click the link below.
The Quarter, is one of the triumvirate of the 60 hope street group, and rumour has it the only really profitable of the three. I’m not sure what ‘really profitable’ means, but the Quarters success is hard to deny, always busy and very well thought of. This large cafe/restaurant also houses a modest deli, and serves all three meals of the day.
With the other two members of the 60 group, consistency has been a issue they haven’t been able to address. Through anecdotal evidence and my own experience, I find Host can vary from poor to excellent, and 60 hope street has a reputation I don’t feel it always lives up to. The Quarter, however, seems to easily attract very positive attention, its informal european influenced food served in relaxed surrounding, result in a consistently busy venue.
This morning, I took a long overdue trip to The Quarter, not to sample the full menu but for a substantial breakfast. The menu covers most of the breakfast bases, pastries, cured meats, muesli and various cooked breakfasts including eggs Benedict and Royal. For me, the full english (£7.95) was the only option to consider, what arrived was a large plate full of quality both in produce and cooking. Two eggs had soft and runny yolk and the bacon and sausage were both lovely, clearly well sourced meat, and not cheap watery and bland as so many breakfasts can be. My only real issues was the toast, which was of fairly poor quality bread and served dry. A single slice of quality bread served with plenty of butter would have far surpassed the two poor slices I had.
This was a good breakfast, I would happily go back again, and on the whole I was pleased with The Quarter. Its simple and informal approach is a lesson its biggest brother could certainly benefit from, it’s my favourite of the 60 group and I’ll try to get back there for a proper meal some time soon.
Last week I had my second chance to eat at Hanover Street Social, a modern european brasserie run by the team behind Salt House Tapas. My first meal was good, but my second visit failed to match the same standards. My latest review is now up at www.sevenstreets.com.
The Building that TriBeCa currently resides in, has a varied past, for several years it was Ziba, one of the first quality restaurants to begin the revival of the culinary scene in late 90’s Liverpool. After that restaurant’s closure and reincarnation as the Racquet Club, it was, for some time, Shere Khan indian restaurant, which never achieved anything better than mundane. So a year or so ago, the venue reopened as TriBeCa, named after the fashionable and upmarket district of New York City, it promises a cool friendly atmosphere and great pizza, a combination few can argue with. Pizza, this rustic Italian dish, is a tricky skill to master, influences from far beyond Apennine peninsula have shaped this ubiquitous meal into forms of varying quality. So the real questions here are, does TriBeCa do it justice? Is their pizza worth spending your money on? Continue reading
For seven years Spire has been going about its business, serving very good food and building an enviable reputation. The recent ‘best restaurant in the north-west’ award from The Good Food Guide, serves to highlight the great work put in by the restaurant team. Having eaten there several times before, but not recently, I decided their early evening menu was worth further scrutiny. Continue reading
Last week I went for a curry at EastZeast, the latest addition to the curry scene in Liverpool. I had a good meal and on the whole was impressed by a restaurant that wasn’t original or creative, but did serve well made tasty food. My review is now up on www.sevenstreets.com
Cafe Tabac, at the top of bold street, has been around for over 30 year, last Monday was my first visit. We popped into this relaxed and friendly bar, for a light bite before moving on to pudding club at Leaf. We needed something quick, tasty and not particularly huge, and that is exactly what we got. For £14 we shared four plates of tapas between two, which was enough for a light meal.
All four plates, sorry about picture quality
After a short twitter conversation with Paul, the owner manager of Schmooze, I visited for a light lunch yesterday afternoon. I’d been in Schmooze a couple of times before but that was several years ago, I can’t say I was overly impressed back then, the food was fine but it was no different and no better than many other places. Having been around for 8 years, Schmooze was one of the first bistro/wine bar establishments in the city, its now, however, a well trodden path. I was pleased to hear earlier this year that some redesigning work had gone beyond the physical, with a new menu and culinary direction adopted by the kitchen. The current menu is based on Cicchetti, a kind of Italian tapas, although Paul insists that isn’t a fair description. What is on offer is small plates of Italian food, some with a venetian theme and others more broadly italian.
I was pleased to see a braised calamari dish (£5.00), something that is a rarity on most menus, with cavolo nero cabbage. It was a rich stew of tomatoes, cabbage and tender calamari, I hadn’t had braised calamari before and was pleased with its texture and flavour. This was a really comforting dish, with a gentle chilli warmth permeating each mouthful, I could imagine eating a bucket load of this on a cold winters day. The cuttlefish and ink risotto (£5.80) had pleasingly large and chewy chunks of cuttle fish that carried good flavour, with the ink adding a deep salty rich flavour of the sea.
An accompanying dish of beetroot and rocket salad, had a pleasing sharp dressing, but could have benefited from more beetroot and less rocket. Large warm hunks of focaccia were soft and fragrant with rosemary, and were great at mopping up olive oil and balsamic. A final flourish of vanilla gelato floating in a glass of espresso was a real delight, Italian simplicity at its best.
Paul and his head chef Stuart, were very enthusiastic about what they do, and clearly have passion for a dinning concept that, at least within the confines of Liverpool, is original. Schmooze is more than just a restaurant, its also a wine bar with an extensive wine list. It is a venue that can take on several guises depending on what you’re looking for, be it a drink with a few mates, after work nibbles and drinks or a meal out with friends and family.
The Eureka is a very good greek restaurant on Myrtle Parade, you can now read my review of it at the most excellent sevenstreets website. Click here.
