Eating out and restaurant reviews and recommendations

Restaurant reviews and recommendations – good places to eat out in Leeds, Bradford, West Yorkshire in general and sometimes further afield.

Creative Breads’ Pop-up Restaurant, Shipley

May 15, 2013
Creative Bread's pop-up restaurant, Shipley

I first discovered Creative Breads, located at the back of Shipley Health Store on Westgate, last September. I remember the day well. It was the first weekend of the Saltaire festival. We had returned from our holiday in France to find their flyer in our postbox and, keen to try something new, along with showing [...]

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Red’s True Barbecue, Leeds

April 4, 2013
Red's True Barbecue - slow cooked meat in the heart of Leeds.

When did slow-cooked barbecued ribs become the unofficial signature dish for the whole of Leeds? I don’t know, but I’m not complaining, and even though I exaggerate slightly, there do seem to be loads of rib joints springing up all over the city. This one, Red’s True Barbecue, is the current, undisputed leader of the [...]

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Prashad Indian vegetarian restaurant, Bradford-Leeds

January 30, 2013
Prashad vegetarian Indian restaurant, Bradford and Leeds, Yorkshire

Prashad has had a lot of hype. I approach hype with a healthy amount of scepticism. I’m good at scepticism – it’s a speciality – and the world of food is littered with things that don’t quite live up to the mark, that aren’t quite as good as they claim to be. For every stellar [...]

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Mrs Atha’s coffee shop, Leeds

November 10, 2012
Mrs Atha's independent coffee shop, Leeds

From absolutely nothing a few years ago, Leeds is now littered with top-rate independent coffee shops. The latest one is Mrs Atha’s a quirky little place on that odd, desolate feeling pedestrianised road behind House of Fraser. They’re springing up all over the place, these indies, to such an extent that it’s possible to say [...]

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The Shipley Slouch

September 30, 2012
The Shipley Slouch, Kirkgate Community Centre, Shipley

Sundays are meant to be slow. They’re supposed to be lazy, a small chance to rest after the trials and triumphs of the week gone and to prepare for those to come. I start Sunday with a lot of coffee, a pile of maple syrup covered pancakes on the kids’ plates and a newspaper, sat [...]

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The Wetherby Whaler, Guiseley

July 31, 2012
The Wetherby Whaler, Guiseley, Leeds

The food game is a vicious business, littered with spectacular failures and well-intentioned enterprises that don’t quite last the distance. Restaurants come and go, sometimes suddenly, sometimes after a period of stagnation, slipping into an unstoppable downward spiral of cut corners, tatty interiors, tired service and crappy food. Harry Ramsden’s at Guiseley typified this type [...]

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Pinche Pinche, Chapel Allerton, Leeds

July 12, 2012
Pinche Pinche Mexican Restaurant, Chapel Allerton, leeds

You know those times when a restaurant creates a bit of a buzz about it?  How it gets mentioned often on twitter and facebook and blogged about endlessly? That makes me nervous. There are plenty of places that don’t live up to their hype, plenty of places that just have good PR people cooking up [...]

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Pizzeria da Remo, Rome

June 23, 2012
Pizzeria da Remo, Testaccio, Rome, Italy

Remember the other week I wrote about trekking all over Rome to find a pizzeria late at night? The same thing happened the next evening, too, when we yomped across the city to a closed-down restaurant, complete with tumbleweed rolling past the door. Luckily, I’d idly canvassed some twitter opinion on decent restaurants when I [...]

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