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With quality food, friendly staff, quick service and excellent value for money, Nando's is a great place to eat. Don't expect identikit, pre-fab restaurant interiors which are usually a staple of the larger chains; each restaurant is tailored to its local surroundings and customers, offering up a unique restaurant experience to go with the equally unique taste of legendary, Portuguese, Peri-Peri chicken.

Your peri-peri chicken, when the chips are down so to speak, is a fresh A grade chicken that has never seen the inside of a freezer, but having made the supreme sacrifice is butterfly-cut, marinated for 24 hours in a secret brew called - you've guessed - peri-peri, and is then cooked to your choice over an open flame.

There are, of course, many variations on this broad theme, numerous plays on words such as Nando's experi-perience, peri-peri good reasons why you should eat at a Nando's, and all one hopes is that for their sake chicken never goes out of fashion. New Nando's are opening all the time, peri-peri quickly in fact, the spicy bastes become hotter and more daring, and the full platter offers a whole chicken, large chips or spicy rice and Nando's salad or coleslaw.

Since chickens are vegetarian it seems logical you can order veggie or bean burgers and patties, and still feel the heat from the peppers. All in all, Nando's is hotly recommended for those occasions when you have a large following of permanently hungry children, or adults even, to keep happy - the only thing taken really seriously is the quality of those peri-peri good chickens.

Nando's is a place for bright people who love to laugh and love to eat, and is guaranteed to spice up your taste buds. Their fun approach to life means that when you visit Nando's you can fully relax without the airs and graces associated with more starchy dining out.

For the location of your nearest Nando's restaurant and a host of details about menus, parties and drinks, a click on their Website will reveal a Pandora's box of information.

The charming Tudor style exterior and time-honoured interior is what marks Corus Hotel in Elstree, which, standing majestically amidst landscaped gardens and ten acres of lush greenery, is still a great favourite with the film making industry.

The abundance of timber and panelling works well to add a period feel at the Cavendish Restaurant. The English menu has embraced influences well beyond its shores with pleasing results. You might start with pan-seared scallop in Thai broth and pesto risotto. Progress to roast breast of duck with pot-roast beetroot, shitake mushrooms, fondant potatoes and tagliatelle of wild mushrooms.

The Laura Ashley designed bedrooms are trendy in an understated way and are equipped with amenities required by the modern day traveller.

Noodlewood is not just your straightforward oriental restaurant. Once inside you'll find an almost bewildering choice of cuisine starting with Japanese, Vietnamese, Singaporean, Chinese and Thai dishes and a good many hybrids in between. Needless to say this makes for adventurous eating as a careful and often prolonged study of the extensive menu will show.

Try chilli teriyaki gyu pho from the Vietnamese fusion stable. Pho noodles are made from rice flour and originate from Mongolia and in this dish they come with grilled beef marinated in teriyaki sauce, red onion, menma and wakame in a meat broth, served with coriander, beansprouts, fresh chillies, Japanese pickled ginger and a wedge of lime.

Since this is but one dish you will understand why we are stopping there, on our assurance that there are many more such wondrous surprises. Vegetarians are admirably catered for.

Brace yourself for many a journey of adventure.

A traditional pub building with Asian inspired interiors offers guests a unique environment in which to enjoy a modern menu influenced by the cuisines of China, Japan, Thailand and Malaysia. A delightful sun terrace and garden make ideal venues for al fresco dining in fine weather at The East in Elstree.

Patrons can get off to a good start with chicken teriyaki, mussels in black bean sauce, beef satay, spicy Thai fish cakes, crispy seaweed, smoked chicken flavoured with five spices or grilled meat dumplings. House signature dishes include salmon teriyaki, steamed sea bass with ginger and spring onions, medley of seafood in a crispy potato nest and king prawns Szechuan style. Diners can also choose from citrus duck salad, garlic prawns, beef with seasonal greens, lemon chicken, double cooked pork, Singapore vermicelli with egg, chicken and shrimp, beef crispy fried noodles and steamed jasmine rice. Traditional Sunday lunch offers roast beef, chicken and lamb with seasonal vegetables, mashed potatoes and Yorkshire pudding. Choice of white or red wine rounds off the meal nicely.

Pizza Express remains a hugely popular bedrock of casual eating. Its popularity is testimony to the fact that across the country, they have restaurants where you will always be guaranteed a good nosh, with children's tastes being well catered for.

Pizza Express has gone even more Roman, and following the success of that particular example of listening to their public have introduced Romana pizzas, including the scorching Etna and the hearty Siciliana.

These pizzas are now thinner, bigger and crispier, and if that sounds like a marketing line, it is. However, unlike many such lines, this one is true, and their quality is always consistent, though cleverly they have still managed to retain a homemade feel to their pizzas.

As an alternative to pizza, try their pollo pesto - cavatappi pasta with torn chicken breast, mushrooms, red onions and mozzarella in a creamy gruyere, parmesan and pesto sauce and finished with grana padano - or the niçoise salad with mixed leaves, yellowfin tuna, free range egg, green beans, potatoes and tomatoes with olives, anchovies, capers and house dressing.

Many of the big chains have come a long way, and Pizza Express is certainly amongst them. One of the first to be quoted on the Stock Exchange - in 1993 - Pizza Express is not a franchise operation and retains tight control through its own staff.

Their wine list - though short - contains some surprisingly good offerings, especially their intense Australian Chardonnay, and a big, full-bodied Merlot from Cusumano, Sicilia.