My lovely wife and baby G popped up to my office on Friday afternoon which was lovely. After baby G had done the rounds and been carried, kissed and cooed over by everyone we decided to head out for an early family dinner. We decided to take him out in his car seat on the pram wheels as he was unlikely to lie down in his pram whilst we ate. We wandered around the West End before ending up in our old stamping ground Marylebone. Obviously our old favourites like "Odin's" and "Langan's Bistro" weren't an option and I really didn't fancy pizza Express so we decided to give "family" friendly "Giraffe" a go. We thought that is was bright and noisy which should keep our young man distracted so that we could eat.
It was early when we arrived but we were nicely greeted and given our choice of table. We opted for the end of one of the shared benches so that we could keep the pram in between us. We ordered a couple of drinks, a nice cider for me and a fancy spritzer for my lovely wife. The waitress also bought us some hot water to heat baby G's bottle. Though the restaurant was quiet, the upbeat world music mix gave it a nice atmosphere. We ordered some nachos to share which were pretty good not the usual half-*rsed ntotilla chips and tomato salsa but a nice mixed bean salsa, lots of guacamole and green chillies. Baby G had been fed during nacho time and seemed pretty chilled out so we chanced some mains.
I went for the special quesidellas whilst my lovely wife had a duck burrito. My quesidillas were OK, not amazing but pretty tasty and my wife found her burrito pretty good. The food in Giraffe is nothing amazing but it's reasonable and there is a bit of variety to it. We followed the mains with a shared sundae which was good but perhaps needed to be a bit bigger for two. Throughout the meal we were looked after by a team of young friendly staff who took a real shine to baby G who was enjoying the attention. The Marlebone branch isn't big but they make good use of the space. Though we were inside the glass doors were open so we got the benefit of the summers evening.
All in all a pretty nice meal and at about £50 not too expensive. It certainly is a place to take the little ones though by the time we left it had filled up with families, couples and one american tourist family who looked thouroughly hacked off with each other after a day doing the sights. We would go back with baby G but then again if it was lunchtime and we were up that way we would automatically go to the Royal China for Dim Sum.
Tuesday, July 27, 2010
Overall rating
Food 6 | Service 8 | Atmosphere 8 | Value for money 8