Restaurant & Pub Reviews

[JK]

Cafe Brunelli @ West Lakes

My first experience there, but the missus has been telling me how good the place is for the kids, thanks to the decent sized playground.

We had 6 Adults + 2 kids.

My old man ordered a small Meat Lovers Pizza which he said was solid, but for a bloke that can put his Pizza away I was surprised to see him hit the wall at the halfway mark.

His missus had the Puttanesca pasta, my missus had some Balsamic Salad thing, and the other two had Burgers. All agreed that their meals were really nice.

I ordered the Vitella Di Casa - Crumbed Beef backstrap with melted Cheese, Spinach and Rosemary Potato's in Mushroom sauce. I don't do Mushies, so had them replace that with a Peppercorn Sauce. The meal was good, but **** me it was bigger than Bernard Finnegan! Basically was equivalent to 2 crumbed Porthouse schnitties, probably a dozen spuds and a massive stack of Spinach.

Kids had a small pizza each with a communal bowl of chips on the table.

We doggy-bagged half of my meal, half a pizza, an entire kids pizza (biggest kids meal Ive ever seen) and the bowl of chips.

Was probably 4 or 5 glasses of wine consumed and the same quantity of soft drinks.

Bill came to $202, but Ent Book deducted $35.

Food I wouldn't rate as highly as a restaurant, or even the better pubs, but it was perfectly fine and did I mention the serving sizes?!?!?!

Across the board I'd rate it a solid 6.5/10 - If you're a big eater who's disappointed leaving a joint without being full, then this is probably right up your alley.

[Spargo]

Burger It - O'connell St, Nth Adelaide.

Choice of basic beef/chicken burger, chips & can of drink - $9.90
I ordered the chicken, comes with tomato, lettuce, onion, Mayo, tomato relish. I omitted the lettuce & paid via payWave. I then asked if the onion was cooked, I was informed it was raw WTF? I asked for it to be cooked and was told that was 50 cents extra, again WTF?? So after giving the bloke an incredulous look & shake of the head, I go back out to the ashtray in my van for the all important silver. I mean, the bloody grill is already on, it's not hard to put the onion next to the chook while it's cooking - serious case of taking the piss.
On to the feed itself. Very, very little chicken breast to report, mayo was bland, relish flavourless. Over half the filling was ridiculously thick slices of tomato, the onion was probably the highlight of this poor excuse for a burger.
Chips were ok.

3/10 - never again.

[Booney]

Burger It - O'connell St, Nth Adelaide.

Choice of basic beef/chicken burger, chips & can of drink - $9.90
I ordered the chicken, comes with tomato, lettuce, onion, Mayo, tomato relish. I omitted the lettuce & paid via payWave. I then asked if the onion was cooked, I was informed it was raw WTF? I asked for it to be cooked and was told that was 50 cents extra, again WTF?? So after giving the bloke an incredulous look & shake of the head, I go back out to the ashtray in my van for the all important silver. I mean, the bloody grill is already on, it's not hard to put the onion next to the chook while it's cooking - serious case of taking the piss.
On to the feed itself. Very, very little chicken breast to report, mayo was bland, relish flavourless. Over half the filling was ridiculously thick slices of tomato, the onion was probably the highlight of this poor excuse for a burger.
Chips were ok.

3/10 - never again.

I had a Scoopon for that place, completely forgot about it and it has expired. Not missing much, clearly.

[Footy Chick]

Has anyone been to that place with the comic book characters out front? There's one in O'Connell St and also on the Parade...

Any good?

[HH3]

Has anyone been to that place with the comic book characters out front? There's one in O'Connell St and also on the Parade...

Any good?

Chuck Wagon?

Nah I dont think there's over 10 reviews of those places on here....

[Footy Chick]

I didnt even know what it was called.

Right then....

[HH3]

You're welcome

[Magellan]

Burger It - O'connell St, Nth Adelaide.

Choice of basic beef/chicken burger, chips & can of drink - $9.90
I ordered the chicken, comes with tomato, lettuce, onion, Mayo, tomato relish. I omitted the lettuce & paid via payWave. I then asked if the onion was cooked, I was informed it was raw WTF? I asked for it to be cooked and was told that was 50 cents extra, again WTF?? So after giving the bloke an incredulous look & shake of the head, I go back out to the ashtray in my van for the all important silver. I mean, the bloody grill is already on, it's not hard to put the onion next to the chook while it's cooking - serious case of taking the piss.
On to the feed itself. Very, very little chicken breast to report, mayo was bland, relish flavourless. Over half the filling was ridiculously thick slices of tomato, the onion was probably the highlight of this poor excuse for a burger.
Chips were ok.

3/10 - never again.

I went there about 10 years ago when it opened and it was pretty average then. I'm surprised it's hung around for so long, particularly with two bona-fide burger/fast food joints further along on O'Connell Street.

[Brodlach]

I didnt even know what it was called.

Right then....

Don't over order as the meals are quite big

[MatteeG]

I'm quickly losing faith in these scores, pub bistros getting 9/10 doesn't leave much room for an exceptional dining experience, Benny's hot dog joint 10/10, pfft. I'll reserve judgement on Macca's create your own but 8/10...

Yep- confirming Beefy, Cove a 9/10 for a Pub/Bistro meal. Hauling 2 kids along wont get us to any silver spoon establishments any time soon!

[Mr Beefy]

I'm quickly losing faith in these scores, pub bistros getting 9/10 doesn't leave much room for an exceptional dining experience, Benny's hot dog joint 10/10, pfft. I'll reserve judgement on Macca's create your own but 8/10...

Yep- confirming Beefy, Cove a 9/10 for a Pub/Bistro meal. Hauling 2 kids along wont get us to any silver spoon establishments any time soon!

i hear ya

[wristwatcher]

I'm quickly losing faith in these scores, pub bistros getting 9/10 doesn't leave much room for an exceptional dining experience, Benny's hot dog joint 10/10, pfft. I'll reserve judgement on Macca's create your own but 8/10...

Yep- confirming Beefy, Cove a 9/10 for a Pub/Bistro meal. Hauling 2 kids along wont get us to any silver spoon establishments any time soon!

My AFL 9s team "The game for everyone" were all given $15 vouchers to build your own burger as our game was cancelled due to the lightning storm on Tuesday a couple of weeks ago. This Tuesday we have the early game which will be followed by the mandatory cuttla froths at Gaza and then the 10-15 of us heading down to Maccas to use our vouchers.

Will have up to a dozen ratings and will average them out just to maintain my restaurant review integrity

[Mythical Creature]

The little lad had a dentist appointment in Greenhill Road yesterday arvo, so on the way back we stopped at The Parade and went for a walk to find somewhere to have some tea. We settled on Café Bongiorno which looked familiar so I may have eaten there several years ago.

I ordered a large BBQ chicken pizza, Mrs a Parmi and we got 1 kids bolognaise to share between both kids (3 & 1) plus 4 pieces of garlic bread. Also ordered 1 Super Dry, 1 Pear Cider and 2 Apple Juices. Total came to around $86, and with my Citibank Signature credit card I paid $86.

The Parmi was huge and the wife loved it. Generous serve of chips (under the snitty) and a bowl of salad, she didn't eat it all but was pretty happy.
The kids spag bog was mostly over the floor, however what they did eat filled them up. I had a mouthful and thought the sauce tasted a little like tinned tomato soup so its little wonder more didn't end up on the floor.
My pizza was massive, full of big chunks of chicken and crispy bacon, right amount of BBQ sauce. Was quite tasty although due to the amount of topping (not a bad thing) the squares in the middle were a bit soggy. I only ate half of it, so I took it home and ate the other half at lunch today. (always a plus)

As for a score, obviously its above a fasta past and café primo despite having similar menus so I would mark it a comfortable 7 out of 10. Maybe 7.5 if I include the fact it doubled for lunch today.

[Q.]

Went to European Cafe for a small work dinner. Shared some anti-pasto platters, which were pretty standard with the thin prosciutto slices being the highlight.

I'm a sucker for a good handmade gnocchi, so went the gnocchi dish with ragu. A generous serving arrived, which is always a bonus, the sauce was delicious and the meat was tender. The gnocchi itself was good, lightish, but I've had better. Not quite the silky, melt in your mouth parcels I've had elsewhere, but very good nonetheless.

8/10

[Magellan]

I haven't been to European for a few years now. I've always found the food to be great, but the service IMHO was average. Slow, an attitude of not giving a rat's, and I reckon they tried to charge for tap water once as well.

I remember seeing a framed review up on the wall inside the restaurant from (presumably) The Advertiser which proved my point. The headline said something along the lines of "great food worth the wait".

Not sure if it's picked up its act since, but on the basis of Q's review it must've and therefore definitely worth a look. One of the few decent places on The Parade (which is littered with a lot of average eateries).

[Q.]

It was a weeknight, so not too busy and service was fine.

[Stumps]

It was a weeknight, so not too busy and service was fine.

do they still give out complimentary garlic pita/pizza triangles?

[Q.]

It was a weeknight, so not too busy and service was fine.

do they still give out complimentary garlic pita/pizza triangles?

They didn't last night

[MatteeG]

Generous serve of chips (under the snitty)

-2 right there. Sacrilege.

[Spargo]

Generous serve of chips (under the snitty)

-2 right there. Sacrilege.

This ^