The Grand Hotel

Coast Restaurant at The Grand Hotel

For this post I'm starting at the end so as not to put you off before you get the full story.

We left the Coast Restaurant at the Grand Hotel in Swanage after a good evening and some very good food.  But it hadn't started quite so favourably....

This was our first visit to the Grand since a rather undistinguished "works outing" a couple of Christmases earlier.  Expectations were not high, and in fact the only reason we were going was so that we could offer a first-hand opinion to our guests - it helped that we had been offered a 50% discount on our bill for the evening in common with the owner of each B&B in Swanage.

We walked into the bar for a pre-dinner drink. Its a dark room not particularly welcoming and dominated by a huge television screen at one end which when we arrived was showing Harry Hill.  Classy!

Our order for two Mojitos was met by a pleasant but nevertheless blank look; a trip to the kitchen following our request for lime in the fallback Baccardi and lemonades also drew a blank.  Things were not looking good as we took our drinks to the conservatory.

But it started getting better. The conservatory was comfortable and even in the dark gave a worthwhile view of pretty much the whole of the bay and its light show.

And then worse - we were shown to a corner table arranged in a way which guaranteed that one of us would spend the evening with a close view of the wall.  A request for an alternative table was treated with reasonable if not quite good grace, and we settled down to await our starters.

I'd ordered Queen Scallops on pea puree with caramelized pancetta and it arrived looking fabulous - and with four whole scallops exceedingly generous for a starter.  Jude was looking forward to Chicken and Parma ham Rocket Caesar with Bocherone Anchovies and was a little disappointed when served with something with a florescent yellow picalilli (I know you're thinking "he's making it up" - but I'm not, and there is still one more to come). Five minutes later the ordered starter appeared, looking as much like a main course as mine and, so I'm told, well worth the wait.

Mains were equally impressive.  I know you can't go wrong with fillet steak, but mine was well over the right side of good; perfectly rare and served with a Porcini Mushroom Gratin and a fine Daupinoise potato.  Jude had slow cooked Belly of Pork which was rich and set off nicely by an apple rosti. Soggy crackling was a shame, but not the end of the world.

Jude's pud was OK but not special, Pear and Frangipane Tart with custard (they called it vanilla sauce).  I went with cheese; a disappointingly safe trio of cold Cheddar, Brie and Stilton.  It seemed to me the right amount of cheese to finish with, but nowhere near enough biscuits - why do restaurants find it so hard to get this balance right?

So to coffee and the bill - which was wrong!  Drinks and puds had not been added on. Normally I'd be inclined to let them live with their mistake, but despite everything wrong we'd had some rather good food and enjoyed ourselves  so we put them straight and the amended bill came to just over £90 including a bottle of Fleurie at an unexpectedly reasonable £16.95. We paid half, left a generous tip and went away happy.

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