Review of Volare, Ashford Middx

We went here last week for a friends birthday for the 1st time

And so we begin...

This relatively new Italian Restaurant is located upstairs above some shops near Ashford Station, we were greeted politely and shown immediately to the table and asked if we wanted any drinks, advised we would look at list and could we have a few minutes. The place is cosy and brightly painted yet quite dark inside.

After perusing the menu for a few minutes the waiter returned and took our drink orders, 1 bottle of the cabernet sauvignon 2005 (ended up being 3 bottles...) and a bottle of still water. Wine was lovely and very drinkable

The menu was quite pricey considering the location and we decided orignally to skip the starters but then decided on the set menu. I had whitebait (ok, nothing special), 2 of our party had the tomato soup, which was lovely and fresh tasting, the other party just had garlic bread, which was pizza shaped and quite nice but lacking garlic I thought - but I am a garlic-o-holic!

For Mains, I had the white fish fillet with seafood, very disapointing when my plate came, had a one small coley fillet (slightly tough and boring), 2 mussels and 2 teeny clams in a slightly garlicy yet bland sauce. Also ordered was a spaghetti bolognese, quite authentic looking but not not to my taste, pasta with bacon and onions, which was nice but a bit plain, also my other half ordered the chicken with tomatoes, came out as a very small butterfly of chicken in a watery tomato sauce, not very attractive to say the least! On the side (and we are not sure which dish it was supposed to be with) was a dish of sliced carrots, fried sliced potatoes and hard cauliflower. The whole of the main courses screamed brown carpets and 1980's to me! and not in a funky kinda retro way either!

Desserts were the saving grace for me! I had the caffe semifreddo and enjoyed every mouthful, was like being attacked by an angry and cold espresso machine!! Also ordered was a strawberry cheesecake and some other ice creams. Judging by the pre-printed and laminated dessert menu, all of the desserts were bought in, like so many other places sadly nowadays.

We also had coffees, I had a lovely espresso and the boys had cappuchinos. (I was slightly buzzing by the end with all the caffeine!)

The next bit slightly narked me when the bill arrived, the waiter asked at the end of the meal if we would like a liqueur, to which we ordered baileys, now normally at every other place I frequent this tends to be on the house, imagine our shock when the bill had 4 x £3 'baileys' on!

Total bill was just over £100, which is fair enough for 4 people with wine but personally I would not go back, service was polite and efficient but found the food just too boring and very overpriced for what it was. Everyone else quite liked it but for me was very disapointing.