Loch Fyne

After my recent post singing the praises of national chain restaurants; my most recent one has turned out to be rather disappointing. The restaurant in question was the Bath branch of Loch Fyne where we stopped for some lunch when we were on a day trip.

For the uninitiated, Loch Fyne is a chain of seafood restaurants that specialise in seafood from the eponymous Scottish loch. As such the food has a strongly Scottish theme running through it. Naturally I had high hopes and I was looking forward to a taste of home. Unfortunately, things didn't quite work out that way.

My first gripe comes from our introduction. Our waitress showed us to our table before introducing herself and reeling off a spiel more suited to a pre-flight briefing. While this may be considered charming in some parts of the world, we Brits want burgers not biographies. Everyone in this act realised this and it quickly created a slightly awkward atmosphere.

Next was the food. While lunchtime set menus are never going to be mind-bendingly brilliant, this was particularly disappointing. Our starters were very tasty and decently sized, unfortunately the main courses didn't follow suit. Both were bland and under-seasoned. In addition, my plaice was prepared in such a way that it was virtually impossible to get a decent mouthful of food. The seasonal vegetable side was much the same; under seasoned, over cooked and watery.

Such was the level of our disappointment that neither of us had the slightest desire to have dessert. We agreed that none looked particularly appetising and those that looked palatable would almost certainly be a let down. Now to put this into context; separating my girlfriend from sugar is like separating a Scotsman from a fiver... theoretically possible but in practise very difficult. Not having a dessert is a big deal!

The upshot of all this is that I can't in good conscience recommend going here. Perhaps the a la carte menu would be a better bet however, given the price of the dishes on there, it is a big risk to take.

TB