Delighted to report that Mothering Sunday last month was our busiest ever with close on 450 people served - around 150 last minute callers had to be sadly turned away with a “sorry, full booked” response. 

In recent years we’ve found that Father’s Day is even busier than Mothering Sunday so best get your requests in for Sunday 15 June as soon as please- usual Sunday fayre of the roasts alongside our haute cuisine populaire range of fish, burgers, pizza and pasta.

We’ve reviewed and refreshed the à la carte menu with a number of additional items. Grilled sardines with a salsa verde, a smoked haddock Welsh rarebit plus a broccoli and watercress soup for starters.

New mains include a smoked salmon and courgette pizza, trofie pasta with walnuts and dolcelatte, the return of the lamb bhuna, a fillet of cod gratinée and sauce vierge with a warm new potato and spring onion salad.

Save room for dessert, as our popular Knickerbocker Glory is back plus a white chocolate and raspberry blondie with clotted cream ice cream.

Usual offer to paid up Club Bartellas members when dining from the a la carte menu of a complimentary bottle of wine up to the value of £50 - one bottle per member please per duration of the offer, valid until Sunday 11 May.

Only 36 more weeks now until Christmas and we already have over 250 people booked for Christmas Day. The Chris Till event, weather permitting, to be presented al fresco on Thursday 24 July, is nearly fully booked too.

Thank you for your understanding and consideration on the house rules we’ve introduced regarding us accommodating children and dogs along with cakes served at the table - still working on that particular restaurant etiquette with some seemingly entitled tuck-in types along with encouraging better and more civilised parking at particularly busy times!

Meanwhile the Hospitality Industry is still being hammered on so many financial fronts. Our trade bodies run by lacklustre and uninspiring people, much like our current crop of politicians, continue their gravy train journeys that are way too lucrative and enjoyable for them to bother rattling any cage when back in their Westminster Village.

I’m amazed that there still seems little appetite among the corporate giants and personalities at the likes of Wetherspoons, Whitbread and others to galvanize a fulsome response vis a vis our 20% v 0% VAT disparity with supermarkets on food sales, our 160% increase on Business Rates, the totally unnecessary yearly National Minimum Wage hikes and then there’s the nonsensical National Insurance malarkey.

Personally I find nearly every UK politician I meet, listen to or read about to be a total waste of space, generally devoid of any business acumen or chutzpah - let us run our businesses as we see fit and for fun - it helps generate “growth”. Which is why all politicians are banned from Bartellas (whatever their political persuasion) and should be from every restaurant, bar and hotel across the UK. As the largest commercial employer in the UK we need to unilaterally refuse to comply with their spiteful edicts of change and then what, they send us all to jail where there’s no room? At least the scran and service will be good.

Hope to welcome you back very soon to Bartellas, our safe sanctuary from all the nonsense currently going on out there.

As ever (but not in a Megan way)!

Ian

Ian@bartellas.com