Taybarns/Pub Food/Newcastle

Taybarns was recommended to me as it had "loads of Vegetarian options", so while in Newcastle we decided to track down the closest one which was in Swallwell, Newcastle-Upon-Tyne. 

The website boasts an impressive list of different foods, Indian, Chinese, Chip Shop, Carvery along with Soups & Salads for a set price.  The set price changes according to which day and time you go, as we went on a Saturday evening we payed the highest price of around £8.25 each.  The sign outside had a huge white price of £6.20 with a tiny tiny black "from" above the pound sign which you could only make out if standing right beside the sign.

 I wonder why the price changes though as you seem to be offered the same food, there isn't anything extra offered for the extra money which I think is a bit cheeky.

Busy car park, but it is shared with the Premier Inn which is next door.

The restaurant itself is vast, loads of tables.  As you go in you queue at the till to pay, you also order your drink, you are handed an glass with ice if you order a soft drink (they are refillable) and whatever other drink you have ordered, then you trot off to find yourself a table.  Staff are great, really friendly, and they explain how it all works if you have not been before.

So, we got our table and headed off to check out the food. Imagine a motorway service station canteen and you wouldn't be far wrong, only you can have a bit of everything.  A lot of the dishes were empty though, pr just had half a portion left.
I started with a slice of pizza, cauliflower cheese, vegetable korma with rice, chips and corn on the cob.

Although the place boasts a "chip shop" section, they were just frozen (school dinner type) chips, although sadly, the nicest thing on the plate !
The pizza was ok, cheap 'tinny' tomato sauce and barely cooked base, but they had an impressive pizza oven.  The cauliflower cheese was watery and tasteless, I usually love cauli-cheese, but this was awful. The vegetable korma wasn't any better, in fact worse !  The vegetables in it were new potatoes (with skin) peas and cauli, and again, tasteless. Corn on the cob was shrivelled and cold.

I ate the pizza and chips and decided to try again !

This time I went for cheesy pasta bake, potato wedges (just two as that was all that was left) and another slice of pizza with chips as I knew I would eat those.

The pasta bake, like the cauliflower cheese, was watery and tastless - so dissapointing.

In the end I decided that the best food in Taybarns for a Vegetarian was this......

A chip & bean butty  :)


Hubby fared a little better, he went for the Carvery and got some good chunks of turkey, hand carved.  Veg was un-seasoned and luke-warm.  He liked the yorkshire puds though.

His second plate said a lot !  Yorkshire puddings, naan bread and nachos.  :)

A good range of deserts, again help yourself.  There was three jugs of cream, all with crusty tide marks inside the jugs, two were empty.

I couldn't decide between bakewell tart and victoria sponge, so I chose the smallest slices of each and had both  :)

The bakewell tart was delicious, the best thing I had tasted in there. The victoria sponge was not so nice with an incredibly sweet sickly butter cream inside, to sweet to stomach to be honest.  So you will impressed to hear I only ate one pud after all :)

Hubby had chocolate fudge cake with ice cream, which he said was "alright".

We went to a lot of buffet restaurants when we were in the USA and if this place could get it right they could be right up there with the best.  The UK is crying out for a place like this BUT the food needs to be HOT and the quality much better.

Definately a case of quantity over quality.  Would we be back?  Probably not, although £5.00 for a bottle of wine (yes really)

...... and refillable soft drinks, plus £8.25 for as much as you can physically stuff in is a tempting offer.

Here is their website.

http://www.taybarns.com/

Let us know if you go.