Harvester Restaurants Review

I don't go very often. The one closest to me is Wilford, next to a bus stop and a busy road (It's convenient when I go into Nottingham, because I just get a bus, get off, walk a hundred meters, go to Harvester, walk a hundred meters and get a bus). It's never majorly busy, so you get seated within minutes. You get a great selections of cold drinks and beers. Service is great nine times out of 10, the only one out of 10 is when it's busy. You order off the HUUUUGE menu, covering fillet of beef to burgers, sea bass to a full rack of ribs. Then you hop off to the salad cart...



I love the salad cart, the vegetables are always fresh, the lettuce and onions always crispy, I didn't like beetroot until I went here, but the best by far is the pasta and potato salads. The rolls are brilliant, a choice of granary or white, warm with butter they are to die for. The salad cart is so good it makes ordering starters almost useless, except for large groups.



However, I have tried the Harvester Feastival, the chicken wings were huge, crispy and succulent, the breaded mushrooms were crispy with the unmistakable taste of button mushrooms, a mushroom I don't like. But the breading makes it enjoyable, the onion rings are crisp and clearly homemade, but the batter breaks off usually, leaving you with a whole ring of translucent onion. I also hated sweetcorn before the Harvester, but it's amazing with the Kickin' Garlic Sauce (More on that later). The crackerjack prawns are more like tiny shrimps, but the crisp breading is oily and spicy, and goes very well with sour cream.



Main Courses:



I have been once or twice a month for a couple of years now, and in that time have tried an array of the main courses. The chicken, spitroasted, is wonderfully juicy and flavored with the slight singes of burned flesh, but not overpowering. Chicken breast is very hard to do, but Harvester manages to cook it to perfection, the gammon is terrific, the sausages are very low fat and full of pork flavor. I'd avoid the burger though, they do end up a bit like hockey pucks, but go through the chicken, gammon, steaks, pretty much everything else.



The fries are amazing, putting chains fries which are almost always the same to complete shame! A deep shade of golden, seasoned with salt. The garlic bread and the onion rings are great too.



Admittedly, I haven't tried any other of the sauces, but that's because the Kickin' Garlic sauce is so terrific. It's rich and buttery, with a mild garlic flavor and a strong hit of chili. It's addictive and is amazing on eggs and chicken. Now where is that recipe?

You get sauces on the tables, the ketchup is exclusive to Harvester, not as sweet as Heinz. I think so is the mustard, a very mild variety, halfway between Dijon and English mustard. There's a brand new chili sauce that is spicy with whole chili flakes, and then there's the barbecue sauce, don't buy it as part of the 'Salad and Grill menu', it becomes much thinner and a bit too sweet. But the stuff in the bottle is heavy on molasses, giving it an earthy sweetness.



Desserts:



The highlight of the meal. Harvester make their own soft serve, something I was amazed by at first and I do not understand why other chains follow suit. The ice cream comes out a yellower colour, is heavy on vanilla and sugar, and has no ice crystals whatsoever. Of course, you could have the profiteroles which I have been meaning to try, and a bittersweet, fudgy chocolate brownie. But the sundaes are to DIE FOR...



I tend to have the Sundae Best, which is more than enough after the generous portions for the main course and the unlimited salad cart. I always have it with the toffee sauce. But when I feel greedy, or have friends with me, I go for the specials. There's a month of sundaes, which vary, I'm not a fan of lemon curd, so I've never tried the blizzard. The toffee waffle is terrific, the waffles stay crispy when submerged in cream, toffee and ice cream. The honeycomb explosion is the best to date, the honeycomb gives a unique and intriguing texture change against the soft serve and cream, with the toffee and chocolate too. My next turn is to go for the raspberry sundae. As I love raspberries and meringue. Or the rocky horror, or the profiteroles. I could go on...



I would have to give Harvester a 9.5 out of 10, the food is simply top class, it is more expensive than places like Sizzler, Fayre and Square and Wetherspoons, I really like all three, but compare the three to Harvester, they are simply outclasses, the service is young and very friendly, by people pleased to be working there, I've never had any problems their, or gone and thought 'I had a bad meal', so to all the people flaming, go to Wilford, and...



God bless Harvester, you have a bad reputation, but that has firmly gone now...