Side Door Bistro, The

Nut Allergy (1 March 2009)

The Side Door must be aware that there is a credit crunch and that 503 restaurants went bankrupt last year. It shows, a bit, on the menu. They are using cheaper cuts of meat like liver and pork belly, but there are also luxuries like scallops and sea bass. At first this seems like a great idea giving customers a lot of choice. However, there is a problem; the more expensive products are being messed around with too much. For instance as a starter I had scallops, they were beautifully presented and the coral had been left on. There were two problems. There were only two scallops and even for a starter that is small. The other was it was served with a ‘pineapple salsa’ that tasted like mango chutney. It didn't look nice, taste nice or in any way complement the scallops. Someone had thought that if they served just two scallops on their own, people would object to paying nearly six quid for them, if they served more scallops that would reduce the profit. So they served them with something that you shouldn't and hope people don't notice. The starter of pork belly with chorizo and parsnip cream looked fantastic but was Lilliputian in size. For some reason it was served with a steak knife, I do not know if this was intentional. Again, the parsnip cream was not necessary, although it did look nice on the plate, and was there to try and make you forget that it was a tiny lump of pork belly and two bits of chorizo. The calamari, from the pre-theatre menu, was very good. The squid had been cut quite thickly and was well seasoned. The presentation wasn't up to much but there is only so much you can do with deep fried squid. The batter was not as thick or crispy as I would like, but I am fussy about calamari. There was also a sign of lowering costs with both the scallops and the calamari; they both came with wedges of lime instead of lemon.

I had a duck breast as a main course that was very pink as I had asked for and it was delicious and not too ‘farm yard’ tasting as some duck. It was served with roasted shallots and dauphinois potatoes. I would never have thought of putting shallots with duck breast but it worked really well. It was the potatoes that annoyed me. Duck is a very rich meat so serving it with cheese and cream soaked spuds was a bad idea. Mashed potatoes would have balanced the meal. Why serve something more complicated? Is it to justify the price of $15.95 or to show off? If a restaurant makes a bad plate of food in order to do either of these things it is making a monumental mistake. The liver with bacon was good, I was told. The liver was not leathery as it can be and there was some nice extra spicing. It didn't look pretty but I don't think liver and bacon can be made to look good. The last course was heaven and hell. The sticky toffee pudding with vanilla ice cream looked superb and was light. I would have wanted more ice cream but I always do. The cheese was abysmal. On the menu it did not say what cheese was on offer, really not fair. You would never just put cake on a menu and then serve whatever you have lying around the kitchen so why do it with cheese? God knows what it was, the waitress didn't. There was something that may have been brie that had been cut into a heart shape, this was 3 days after Valentine’s, I don't mind kitchens using up supplies but at least try to be subtle. There was something on the plate that looked like and may have been smoked salmon. Expensive, totally pointless and it seemed to be off. There are excellent cheese producers near Liverpool, all they had to do was take the time to buy it, put it on a plate with some celery and spring onions and serve. It is obvious that there is someone in the kitchen that is very skilled but dishes are being over complicated for no good reason and simple things are being over looked. This may be due to having too many things on too many menus. There is a pre-theatre menu available all evening mid week, an a la carte and a long list of specials. The service was, well they were very nice. We had to order the food and the wine from separate waitresses, which would have been fine if either of them seemed to know about the food or wine. We had to ask twice for an ice bucket and the wine waitress didn't know what they had and what they had run out of. They were very smiley and were fine about taking a starter from the pre-theatre menu then a main from the a la carte. The wine list is brief but impressive with a good range of old world wines and a shorter separate list from Australia and New Zealand; why not put them on the same list? It is a bit expensive. There needs to be more information on the menus. I don't want a full CV for every animal that is on my plate but tell me where the meat is from. There was veal on the menu and it did not say if it was rose and if you don't say people assume it isn't. It is the same with the scallops, were they dredged or diver caught? They have this information and customers like me want them to divulge it. There is a lot that is very good about this restaurant. It is friendly and even though it was full when we went it did not feel crowded. I really enjoyed most of what I ate and what was bad could be corrected so easily. They can make excellent food even from economic ingredients. They just seemed scared that if they serve something simple people will stay at home and make it themselves but if they make overpriced, over complicated food people will go somewhere else.

Susie Sue (8 December 2008)

I ate there on Friday; fantastic food, great wine, and great ambience. It is a lovely, cosy restaurant, and I have already booked to go back. I cannot wait as it was fabulous stuff.

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