Review of Pasqualino’s, Newcastle

It’s always canny to find a decent independent restaurant in Newcastle as, to be honest, anything that isn’t Zizzi, Bella Italia, or Strada is a bit of a bonus on the high street. You might not know it, but trendy Pasqualinos (NE1 6BR) is actually part of a small chain run by the Geordie Italians responsible for every decent Italian in town that isn’t Caffe Vivo Paradiso, Popolo, Intermezzo, Alvinos, Secco, Don Vito’s and 9Bar. 

Much like the “Enzo” Ferrari, Pasqualinos is named after Papa, and is really the flagship restaurant, which, considering a £100k investment in a new kitchen, is no surprise. To our delight, the kitchen now boasts our old favourites, a proper wood stone oven, and a Josper grill. These are good things.

We’re big fans of lazy afternoons with a carafe of wine, cheese toasties and arancini outside at neighbour 9Bar, as well as some of the other venues in this GeordieItaliano dynasty, so Pasqualinos, also loaded with being the Theatre Royal’s resident restaurant, has some big boots to fill.

We’ve been many times since its launch only a year ago, and things have changed quite a bit - traditional Italian fare is out, and pizza/pasta is in…

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Afternoon Tea at Marco Pierre White Newcastle

Did you get the idea that we quite like a bit of afternoon tea?

Honestly, what’s not to love? Taking some time out from the 9-5 on a glorious spring Monday, after a few beverages on the Quayside, a pair of comfy wingbacks and cakes awaited us at the new love it/hate it Marco Pierre White Steakhouse Newcastle (NE1 5XN).

Speaking to the restaurant manager, we’re assured the afternoon tea is of the “traditional” sort - no Heston stuff, just finger sandwiches, cakes, and scones, and apparently it’s proving very popular. A safe choice maybe, but achieving perfection through simplicity is hard. It’s priced sans champagne at £15.95 each, so about average for high-end of Newcastle.

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Hotel du Vin Sunday Brunch, Newcastle

Everyone’s seemingly talking Ouseburn at the moment. The trendy capital of Newcastle has loads of things to keep the hipsters busy, what with it’s digital startups, trendy bars, pop-up restaurants, and all round cool “vibe’. Having parked itself in an impressive Grade II listed building for nearly a decade now, Hotel du Vin (NE1 2BE) fits in quite nicely, despite being part of a national chain. 

Having covered Malmaison quite a bit recently - it was impossible to turn down an invitation from its sister venue to try out their new Sunday brunch menu. But… we are usually quite parky when it comes to Sunday dinners, typically preferring a home-cooked one over the many hot-lamp versions served in pubs up and down the country. Could the HdV change that?

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In case you couldn’t get enough on here, or over on Twitter - we now have a Facebook page. It’s more of the same, only a bit different…

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(image via webdonuts)

Review of The Lambton Worm, Chester le Street

It’s unusual that many times we’re asked “where’s good to eat in Newcastle”, and one of the first answers always tends to be in a pub. Sadly, if you go a little further afield than the Quayside, “proper” good pub food is much harder to find - something which the newly refurbished Lambton Worm (DH3 4AJ) hopes to change.

Following a new owner and £500k makeover, the legend of the Worm hopes to live on as “The Lambton Worm - A Sonnet 43 Brew Pub & Restaurant”. Certainly the makeover has paid off - entering the pub through its Union Jack coloured door, it’s all very agreeable, with just enough personality showing through - but you can’t get away from the fact it’s owned by Sunderland leisure giants, Tavistock Leisure - make of that what you will.

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Review of The Red House, Newcastle Quayside

When you have charming little places like Cafe Bistro Buee closing on The Side and being replaced with nasty dirge like “Tasty QFC” - it’s encouraging to see someone making a go of it on the Quayside. A flagship street for Newcastle should be filled with brilliant places to eat, and not just  a stag/hen party thoroughfare.

Luckily, bucking the trend is the recently opened Redhouse (NE1 3JF), billing itself as a “meat pie and ale only” sort of establishment, sitting amusingly in the previous home of vegetarian food on the Quayside, Bob Trollops, which was looking very tired before it closed. Celebrating British Pie week this week (is there anything that doesn’t have a “week” these days?), we had a stroll along the river, with pies on our mind all the way from the Ouseburn…

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Street Spice, Newcastle

Watching this week’s Food & Drink, which had a segment on the rise of street food, made us realise it is now only 7 days until what could be the biggest street food event the region has ever seen.

Heavily publicised, but in case anyone hasn’t heard of it - Street Spice at Life (in Times Square), is a massive three day food festival celebrating all that is spicy, with loads of street food, chef demos, music, and more. Right up our street!

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Review of Café 21, Newcastle

If you’ve been following this blog for any period of time now, you probably know what this is going to say, so maybe just look at the pretty pictures then have another trip down to the Quayside and enjoy the food, because Café 21 is still easily one of the best places to eat in Newcastle.

The flagship of five restaurants owned by local food hero Terry Laybourne (MBE no less), Café 21 has always flown the flag for the North East food scene, winning a multitude of awards, and even having a Michelin star at one point in it’s now twenty-fifth year.

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The Teashed

Dodgy tax avoidance issues aside, coffee continues to take over the UK where Costa alone has over 15,000 units. We remain staunchly British and will rarely cheat on tea with the brown stuff unless it’s for something very nice. Being proper Northern, we’ll leave the coffee to them softies down South…

Luckily we have a bit of a tea heritage in the toon - the famous Ringtons is over 110 years old now, and we have a handful of smaller tea companies, like the great Victory Tea (actually a spin-off of Ringtons), Storm Tea, and now “design-led tea and homeware company, born and brewed in Britain”, TeaShed. 

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Newcastle Restaurant Week January 2013 (Extended!)

Updated Fri. 25/1/2013 - With the terrible weather we’ve had the past week, most of the restaurants are extending their offers by another week until up to 3rd February - hooray!

It seems like only two minutes ago it was the last Newcastle Restaurant Week! We criminally underused it in August, as everywhere was fully booked by the time we decided - a mistake we will not make again in two weeks time.

This time round it seems it’s the best ever 25+ restaurants, and there’s always more added later to the date, and this time, the bar has been raised for the standard of the restaurants on offer.

As usual, founder of the idea, Terry Laybourne’s Cafè 21 offers exceptional value, as do nearby Caffe Vivo and The Broad Chare, but there’s plenty of newcomers this year, with the likes of Mannaza Korean Grill House (grill your own Korean BBQ?), The Stand comedy club - highly regarded for it’s food, Pasqualinos with their new wood fired pizzas, and of course the newly opened Fat Buddha. Hmm…

above: foie gras at Blackfriars

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