Alan In Belfast (alaninbelfast)

There’s finally a buzz in Belfast’s Cathedral Quarter, and new restaurants are opening, joining the more intrepid businesses who set up in the area before it developed a reason for people to walk through.

Salt Bistro recently opened in St Anne’s Square, tucked in beside The MAC and behind St Anne’s Cathedral.

Donal and Teresa Cooper are veterans of the trade, in their new venture have shifted from “fine dining” to “offer something of equal quality but with a more casual atmosphere and mid-range pricing”.

Calling in before a show at The MAC on Thursday evening, the service was friendly and fast. The menu was issued on a clipboard showing the main evening dishes and pre-show offerings tucked in underneath.

The bread, hummus and tapenade starter was generous with its portions of bread. The burger was home made and well cooked and served with mushrooms and cheese. The single slice of tomato and lettuce wasn’t really enough to moisten up the mouthfuls of meat and bap.

Overall, two main courses, two desserts, beer and a shared starter will set a couple back about £40. It’s not cheap ... But the food and the atmosphere was good.

With its proximity to The MAC, the Black Box and the University of Ulster, there should be plenty of passing trade for Salt Bistro, and lots of return visitors to its calm oasis in St Anne’s Square.

Tonight was yummy. Patient service. Food came quite quickly. Delicious mouthfuls. Child friendly. Being a Monday night at 6pm there was no queue - though there were only a few tables unoccupied. And the £5 off voucher from the previous visit (only valid Mon-Thu) made it less of a hit on the wallet. Recommended.

Called in for lunch before heading across the road to see a film in Lisburn Omniplex. Service was friendly, the Canadian (chicken) burger (£8.95 including chips) was delicious, and the scampi could only have been improved if they’d thrown in a portion of fries as part of the £9.99 price.

Not the cheapest of spots for lunch, but in Lisburn - where consistently good fare is rare - I’d go back to Blue Chicago.

Little Wing in Ballyhackamore has become a firm family favourite with us on Sunday lunchtimes. Glad to see that the two course deal has been extended, and the kids menu is a winner with Littl’un.  Current favourite is the Giardino with its olives artichoke and very sweet red peppers. Decent musak too.

It’s been a January of new experiences. First the new Boojum in Chichester Street, and then Wagamama in Victoria Square.

What’s all the fuss about Wagamama? I know Japanese food isn’t that easy to come by in Belfast, but for a lunchtime venue it was over-priced and under-whelming.

I can cope with the wooden tables and benches. I could cope with the scribbling of each dish’s menu number on the place mat if the staff then used them to set the plates down in front of the right person. But they didn’t!

The Chicken Tama Rice had relatively little chicken - four slivers sitting atop a mound of rice. Not really £8.95-worth.

Upsides - the staff were friendly, if not reliable.  A glass of milk is only 90p - and they’re one of the few companies to use a Nicaraguan domain for their NI website (http://www.wagamama.com.ni/).

I’ll be back to Boojum, but not Wagamama.

I’m not a fan of spicy food, so my expectations were low when the decision was made to go for a lunchtime snack in Boojum.  How wrong I was.

Grab a drink, choose your carbohydrate (what type of wrap), choose your filling, and finally the sauce and cheese etc.  Then pay and sit down on a stool and eat.

The paying bit is the hardest. It was £6.10 for the 3 tacos (two chicken, one pork) and a bottle of diet coke.  No cans - which are smaller and cheaper.

Clean environment, very friendly staff - willing to explain the process and didn’t assume everyone knew how to order and knew which options were more or less spicy - and handy for a city-centre lunch.  Just wish it was a pound cheaper.

I’d happily go back to Boojum as the non-spicy options had flavour and weren’t bland ... Which is more than I said for Nachos.

I was under-impressed on my first (and probably last) trip to Nando’s earlier this week.

I’m not a fan of spicy food, but lack of zing shouldn’t equate to lack of taste. The “plain” chicken burger served was bland and tasteless and the chips were undercooked (in the style of some of the city-centre KFC branches). The mayo had less taste than a jar of Hellman’s Light!  Even the chicken korma in an Indian restaurant/carry out has some kind of taste sensation. But not in Nando’s.

The chocolate cake dessert was brought out with an apology that they had run out of (clotted?) cream. When I asked if they had any other cream, the server (one of the more senior-looking staff) said that he’d thought about offering frozen yoghurt, but they’d also run out of that.  Later noticed that they had ice cream on the menu ... But he made no mention or offer of any of that. Chocolate cake was stodgy without the cream.

In general, the staff were friendly and welcoming - asking if it was our first visit, handing out the loyalty card, and explaining how their ordering “system” worked.

But the blandness means, I don’t think you could pay me to go back.

Was in the Ballyhack branch for the first time on Sunday lunchtime. It was very relaxed (and quiet). The Little Wingers (Sunday morning pizza workshop for kids) had been and gone. Pizzas were nice. Our six year old enjoyed the kids menu - drawing over it and eating the food on it - particularly the ice cream cone and terribly cute wee cup (and saucer) of hot chocolate.

Warm, friendly, and they’ve a Dizzy the light-headed moose on the wall as you walk in.

It’s now one of regular lunchtime haunts each week. Consistently tasty, the £5 deal is great value (pasty, coleslaw, drink and a bun), the upstairs is warm, and the welcome is cheery.

Dinner on a very wet Friday night - Olio was busy.

Very child friendly with a bag of stuff to colour in, read and make. The children’s portion of sausage and chips was served on a cold plate - always a good idea to prevent burnt mouths.

Good to find that Chicken Maryland was still on the menu - the full thing - bacon, pineapple, banana, tomato, sweetcorn, and of course the chicken.

When the Sizzling Louisana Blackened Sirloin arrived, it was certainly sizzling.  And when the dessert was brought out for someone at a neighbouring who was celebrating their birthday, there was a fizzling sparkler on top!

It’s not a wildly trendy restaurant - in terms of menu, decor or prices - but the staff were friendly, professional, and looked after us well. No complaints.

At irregular intervals, we used to venture into a small Chinese restaurant on Church Lane for lunch. When we walked past last week, we noticed that it had gone, replaced with the Cornish Pasty Trading Company. Sticky floors and wobbly tables no more.

Picking up a menu from the holder outside, we called back the next day for lunch.  Freshly made cornish pasties of many different kinds, together with side orders (beans, coleslaw or salad), and a variety of glass-bottled juice drinks.

There were no complaints about the Pork and Apple, Traditional Steak and Stilton and Beef pasties that we ate upstairs. (They do have vegetarian pasties on the menu, as well as sausage rolls.) The apple cake was great afterwards (they offer clotted cream with it!).

With pasties selling between £2.60 and £2.90, it’s pretty good value for lunch. We’ll certainly be back before too long.

We called in for a quick dinner last Tuesday night. Walking in at a quarter to six, the restaurant was pretty empty. By the time we left an hour or so later, it was a lot busier.) The staff were welcoming, the menu was full of enticing dishes.

The scampi and chips arrived with a bucket of scampi on a bed of greens, and a cup of chips. The burger arrived with Made in Belfast’s trademark thick slices of bread for the bap. With black stripes along one side of the bread, it tasted burnt ... Which turned out to be that it had been char-grilled - something not mentioned on the menu. Staff quickly switched the toasted bread for fresh slices and we’re pretty sure that when the plate arrived back the chips had been swapped for a fresh (and very hot) set - a nice touch.

Dearer than Subway, but not too extravagant. Must go back before too long.

At lunchtime, it’s often the slowest KFC in town, with the queue of customers stretching towards the door and staff slowly fulfilling the orders.

Today’s one star is due to the swarm of flies circling around the self compacting bin on the first floor. Not a good sign. Won’t be back for a while.

The Streat operate at two levels in the “new” Lisburn Library.  There’s a small cafe upstairs inside the library facing the check out desks, and a bigger cafe downstairs facing onto Linenhall Street.

The cafe downstairs has a chest of books at the back and is child friendly.

The cafe upstairs is great to sit in and have a snack after you’ve chosen your library books. You can order sandwiches and paninis and the staff bring them up from the main shop down below.  In my visits, the staff have never made any fuss even though it’s extra work for them to go up and down the stairs.

The panini - particularly the one with bacon, brie and red onion marmalade - are lovely.

I’ve been to the Victoria Square Pizza Express a few times before and the service and food has been ok.

Sitting at a table of eight they managed to bring everyone else’s drink order except mine. And then after the starters had been cleared away, they delivered every other pizza and main course except mine. It hadn’t been made - and eventually only arrived after everyone else was half way through theirs.

As Four Seasons pizzas go, it was good. But the service badly let down the quality of the food. Let’s hope it’s a one off blip over a busy lunchtime and not a downward trend.