Pizza Express High Street Northallerton (from Darlington and Stockton Times)

I'M a big fan of Pizza Express, the nationwide chain of restaurants which has perfected the art of chic and cheerful.

Seven pounds is a lot to pay for a lump of dough, some mozzarella cheese, tomato and assorted other bits and pieces of your choice, but I've never begrudged it because the restaurants have always been the sort of places you want to hang around in. The firm has few peers in creating a cool and contemporary ambience in ordinary buildings.

Despite it being a chain of restaurants, with identical menus, every one has an individuality which makes even the snobbiest, styleconscious foodie happy to patronise them.

The Pizza Express train has now arrived in Northallerton, taking over the ill-fated and shortlived McCoy's, which took over from the ill-fated and short-lived Y'Thai which took over from some other restaurant whose name I've now forgotten but was also not a tremendous success.

It appears as though the Pizza Express formula may work where others have failed. Last Thursday, a couple of weeks after its opening, the place was nearly packed, which is not the sort of thing that goes on midweek in Northallerton.

Mind, this may be just the novelty factor, because as we arrived at the door, a group of people were leaving and advised us against entering, one saying: "The service is b****** c***." Again, it's not the sort of thing one expects to come across in Northallerton.

That may have been a bit of an exaggeration, but from the moment we sat down there was a strong sense of imminent chaos abroad.

The waiting staff were all young, highly personable and a pleasure to talk to, but they didn't seem to know what they were doing, at least not all the time.

They had an uncanny knack of bringing a menu and then seemingly forgetting that the diner might want to order something from it.

At one point every table seemed have people holding menus looking round expectantly while the entire waiting staff huddled round the till. What were they doing? Deciding who to ignore or spill coffee over next?

I started on my salsiccia al forno (£4.35), a relatively new item on the menu. It was a tapas-style stew of sausage, cannellini beans, mushrooms in tomato, garlic and chilli sauce. It was hot and spicy, the sausage was meaty and the sauce could be soaked up with the little pieces of ciabatta which accompanied it.

The explanation offered, with profuse apologies, was that the order of garlic bread and mozzarella had not been rung through the till and it would arrive very shortly, without charge. It duly did and was very good.

So were our main course choices of a La Reine pizza (ham, olives and mushrooms - £7.35) and a mixed salad (£2.95) for Sylvia and a Salad Nicoise (£7.95) for me.

We were then offered the dessert menu which, perhaps because we accepted it rather half-heartedly having eaten our fill, prompt the waiting staff to ignore us for the best part of ten minutes. By this time I was ready for a little something which was exactly what a strangely-titled Cafe Reale (£2.95) offered, namely a little bowl of baby figs in a beautifully-unctuous syrup topped with a teaspoon of mascarpone and accompanied by a coffee of my choice, an espresso.

Sylvia had good latte, spoilt by the cup being over-filled, and by the time the waitress reached our table a good proportion of it was in the saucer. She was sweet thing and apologised profusely but by this time our patience was beginning to wear a little thin.

Our meal had been accompanied by an excellent bottle of Prosecco (£16.99), chosen from an exclusively Italian list and that brought our bill, minus Sylvia's starter, to £44.

Food, ambience excellent, price reasonable, staff very keen and friendly but no-one seems to be managing/training them. We went there with six friends. one had chocolate sauce tipped over his head by a passing waitress, she then spilt the rest at the entrance to the ktchen and collapsed with laughter. she did tho return and apologise profusely. teas arrived but no coffees. when we pointed this out we were told the machine had been switched off. We asked the girl, politely, to tell the manager to turn it back on. She then returned clearly embarrassed to tell us there were now chemicals going through the machine to wash it and there would be no more coffee that night. We felt like suggesting a kettle and nescafe but lost the will. Not her fault, bad leadership.

What are these links for?

If you liked this article and would like to share it with others on the web who might be searching for good content we've made it easy for you to do it.

At the bottom of all articles, you'll see links to six sites. These sites - commonly called 'social bookmark' or 'social news' sites - have large communities of web users who share and rate interesting, useful and fun things on the web.

Clicking the links will automatically add the address of the story you are reading to one of these sites, letting you share it with others. Each site will ask you to register to share stories. Registration is free and once a member, you can store, recommend and search for stories that interest you.

Newsquest
Terms & Conditions Privacy Policy © Copyright 2001-2008 Newsquest Media Group A Gannett Company
This site is part of Newsquest's audited local newspaper network

Hot Jobs