Frankly, they can get Bent! (Frankie & Benny's)

Member Name: Emma1973

Product:	Frankie & Benny's
Date:	05/09/04 (5195 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Good range of dishes, Not overpriced

Disadvantages: Zzzzzzzzzz

The kids are back to school tomorrow! yay. lets indulge in some mutual cheering! Of course we'll miss the little darlings and not appreciate the calm between 8.45 am and 3.30pm.
Yeah right!, me too mate! Hence our last meal was not so much a sad goodbye to the holidays as a 'Thank God, here comes peace' to the new term.

Why Frankie and Benny's? Well. we had been here before, and in our dim and distant memories it was quite good. As well as that it served all purposes, the kids wanted pizza, and hence Pizza Hut, this however goes down like a lead balloon with my other half! He likes steak, chicken, etc, me I'm not fussy, so we know Frankie and Bennys do all these things, and we know its quite reasonable price wise. There is another American Type restaurant closer, but that's usually a disaster, naming no names but Thank God we're not going there!

This F&B's (too long to keep typing) is a stand alone unit, in one of those leisure centres in Bristol, and yes it has that garish American/Italian look to it. Lots of Red and Green awnings, and dark wood. This particular restaurant has tables and chairs outside, but the weather wasn't perfect so inside it was. Outside didn't appear to be very popular with the waitresses either as the same glasses were there when we left a couple of hours later!

At first we thought we'd stumbles into the Marie Celeste, but looking into the slightly gloomy depths we could see at least 2 other tables were occupied. Funnily enough we weren't asked if we had a reservation (actually F&B's don't take reservations unless its for a large party)
Smoking or non-smoking? The word 'Smmoookkk, was just about to jump out my mouth before Alan swiftly said Non and dragged me away. I only
wanted to sniff the air and the ash trays a few times, 4 days without fags were taking its toll. (still going mind!)

So we're sat in this booth type thing, very retro
, pity its so high my son cant reach the table! Very clean and nice, in fact the waitress thought she saw a bit of a smudge on one of the knives so took it away and replaced it! that's service for you! Looking around more of that American/Italian influence is doted around in old signs, pictures, and Frank Sinatra is playing on the sound system. Thankfully there were no Blues Brothers stuff as quite Frankly that stuff has been done to death.

I did notice that there was only two waitresses which I did wonder whether that was going to cause a problem, but then probably realised that it wouldn't as there wasn't enough people in the restaurant to serve. Strangely there was more chefs in the kitchen then waitresses, quite why they needed four I was unsure, perhaps they did a dish each. The kitchen is open so you can actually tell whether they are spitting in your food!

Whilst we were perusing the Appetisers, the little one was busy looking at the Rat Pack menu, cheesy yes indeed, I was also staggered by the fact that he didn't get a goody pack with colouring pencils and all that malarkey. Surely its obligatory in these restaurants? Bugger that means I'd have to entertain him whilst waiting for his food!
Alan's passed the idea of a starter so its down to me and Lucy to champion the cause. Lucy's up for the Garlic Pizza Bread (£2,65), and I've gone for Mammas Cheese Bake (£3.95) Everything else was your common fayre, Potato wedges, Soup, Chicken Wings, Chicken Strips, all ranging from £2.95 to £3.95. Nobody wanted to share the sampler Platter with me at £8.95), I'
;ll tell you I've been eating like a pig since giving up smoking and really I wanted one to myself, well there were potato skins, breaded vegetables, corn on the cob, baked mushrooms, bbq ribs, and spicy onion rings.

Never mind, I'll make do with the blend of fine cheeses bakes on Mamma;s Neapolitan sauce and served with sundried tomato ciabe
tta. Well its looked nice, the sea of red with a cheesy blob in the middle, and God knows it did take the skin of the end of my tongue as hot as it was, but it was fabulous when cool enough to eat, much much more ciabatta would have been appreciated though.
Lucys Garlic Bread, was lovely, golden, crisp, buttery and very very garlicky, it was near enough the size of a pizza and got happily shared about.

Main Courses. This is where you may have a slight problem, because they are lots and lots of them. even Brandon had trouble, but his was a meal consisting of main course, kids drink and kids ice cream all for £3.95. So unsurprisingly he went for the pizza, instead of the usual bolognaise, chicken nuggets, sausage, etc, blimey these places are so original! For the rest of us it was worse. Have an idea of how many dishes there were:
Pasta: 10 dishes
Pizza: 9 types
House Specialities: 9 dishes.
Steaks: 4 (including a Mixed Grill) and 5 different sauces.
Burgers: 4 types
Sandwiches: 4 types
Salads: 5 types.
See, difficulty arising here! In the end Lucy had a Ham and Pineapple Pizza, I had the Calzone Sicilian which was a folded over pizza filled with mushrooms, ham, pepperoni, red onions, mozzarella, cheese and ragu bolognaise, topped with Neapolitan sauce, setting me back £7.85. Alan went more expensive and spent £8.95 on a Pepperoni and Mozzarella Stuffed Chicken, which is basically what it says on
the tin but came with creamy cheese sauce and red onion and mustard mash.

We didn't wait too long for it, maybe 30 mins, certainly enough to get another round of drinks in. It came, it was all hot and nice, but not outstanding, certainly there were no gasps of delight or Mm's going around the table. the Calzone was fine but a lot less filling then I've had in other places and certainly not enough cheese. Although Alans chicken was fine his mash was just stodgy and dry, could have done with an extra dollop of bu
tter in it. And as for Ham and Pineapple pizza, just where can you go wrong?
Perhaps I should have gone for the Bacon Cheese Burger, or the Steak Ciabatta Sandwich, the Tagliatelle with cream and garlic topped with Salmon or even Chicken and Roasted Peppers Ravioli.

But sadly I will probably never know as things slowly began to go down hill and we'll probably never go back! We got desserts, Brandons came straight away, the most pitiful one scoop of chocolate ice cream in the most pitiful small dish and the most pitifully small bag of buttons I'd ever seen. Bearing in mind that Brandons drinks also came in a small tumbler, other restaurants definitely give more value. Lucy had brownie and cream ice cream, Alan Vanilla Cheesecake and myself the Heavenly Chocolate Rocky Road. Mine must indeed have been heavenly, so good in fact that a couple of days later I've forgotten what it tasted like! I've had the cheesecake before and I will admit its good.

What was so bad at this point though? Well, we waited over half an hour before our desserts arrived. I had actually been waiting in anticipation because I had seen a glass of ice cream placed on the counter ready to go out about 10 minutes before we received ours. I s
aid to my partner that I hoped to God that that wasn't Lucys ice cream on its way as I knew how long it had been sat there! But, it was! Only the top was ice cream though, the bottom was just kind of cream, I was all for sending it back but nope Lucy decided that was the way she liked it and scoffed it all! Personally I thought it was a disgrace, that they got the timing so wrong and that the waitress had the audacity to bring it to our table looking at the state it was in. Still we finished up and waited for the bill.

And waited...............
And waited.......................
And waited..........
In fact they didn't come near our side of the room for ages. Finally the waitress came towards us to
bring us the bill, the little one was getting a bit wriggly by then so I took him outside to play.
And waited...................
And waited..............
And waited..............
I went back inside to find Alan still sat there waiting for the waitress to come and get his card so she could swipe it and leave.
And waited............
And waited.............
And waited..........
In the end I stood up with the most disgusted frown on my face and caught the eye of the waitress who quickly came running over. Not a word mind, her ignorance was beginning to rankle by then. Strangely enough Alan left her no tip. It actually took over 30 mins to pay the bill alone, longer than we had waited for our first two courses, This is really not acceptable, especially as although there were more people in the restaurant there was still not enough to have the waitresses rushing around.

Funnily enough, before I wrote this I read another op that had been written back in 2001, with a most amusing anecdote (sorry if I hijack it, you know who you are!). The person in question had a
lso been waiting ages to pay as had another couple next to them, when the waitress finally came over there was a business card left on the table stating 'To the slowest restaurant in the world, please send the bill to this address, I will try and find time to pay it!) And it just hasn't changed in 3 years!

The best part was yet to come, I checked the bill outside, which I always do just in case, to find that the little ones second drink, another kids one, remember I said how small it was, well I had been charged an adults price of £1.80. Blimey did I nearly storm back inside and demand a refund! Until I perused further and found they had missed off his meal altogether! So I figure that, to be honest his meal was only worth £1.80, if that, so everything was fair and square. Yes, its probably thieving, but quite frankly I don't care, with all the inconven
ience we shouldn't have had to pay at all!

Going back, not at the moment, knowing us though we'll give it a try just in cause, but seeing as it hasn't happened in 3 years I cant imagine it changing any time soon!

Capital letters courtesy of: http://www.chuckleweb.co.uk/fixit.php

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