Nandos

Chicken nearly ready to go

17 Apr 08, 10:54 Above expectations

Fast, efficient and often, just what you're looking for.

Not a place for a romantic sit down meal, but for a quick bite to eat with friends then it's just the place.

Grilled chicken that is a mix between fast food and grill service, where everything is pretty much ready to go, aiding with the speed of table turnover.

Giving mass catering a bad name

10 Oct 07, 12:32 Well below expectations

OK, so mass catering hasn't exactly got a great name to begin with. But set against the likes of McDonalds and Burger King - who it must be said do this sort of thing rather well - The Portuguese chain Nandos have a few lessons to learn.

One, wine. Now white wine is supposed to be chilled, no? Mine was presented at approximately warm cellar temperature. Don't you have a colder one, I asked? No they did not. And yet the bottles of ketchup were glistening with condensation. I couldn't figure it out either.

I'm getting ahead of myself. This was my first visit to Nandos so the method of service is to me quite unusual. You're shown to a table, handed the menu and then asked to join a queue of other diners to order and pay for your meal. In retrospect it sort of makes sense, dispensing with all that bill-paying palaver at the end of your meal. So I studied the menu, noting with approval that its attempts at wit were, for once, not entirely witless, then ordered my meal.

Returning to my seat I reflected upon the elephant tusks adornin....hold up, here's my meal! Bloody hell, that was quick. It must have been waiting there just for me, a suspicion given weight by the fact that the chicken burger was tepid at best. A dollop of their ketchup would see it develop a layer of frost. The waiter who put it in front of me had long gone and, being both hungry and English, I abandoned the idea of complaining and instead tucked in (it being the sort of place where one does that). The chips were warmer but otherwise so-so, the chicken as mentioned was cold but otherwise unremarkable, there was a generous helping of coleslaw and the wine - a Portuguese number of indeterminate grape variety (code for I can't remember) - was quaffable. Which was lucky, given its initial temperature.

And the elephant tusks? Portugal is not strongly associated with Pachyderms, and I was still pondering their significance later when someone revealed to me that far from being a Portuguese chain, Nandos was South African in origin.

So that's one thing I learnt on my first visit to Nandos. The other being that it would also be my last visit to Nandos.