Salutation Inn, Tynemouth

Apr 20 2008 by Eddy Eats, Sunday Sun

SOMETIMES, it seems as if Mrs Eats and myself must walk around with a big neon sign over our heads telling waiting staff to do their best to mess us about.

It seems that for every fantastic meal we enjoy, we end up being hit with something of a disaster shortly afterwards.

Which is exactly what happened to us last weekend.

In a bid to experience more eateries in the North Tyneside area, we have been popping into North Shields and Tynemouth every six weeks or so to start carving our way through the various Sunday Lunches on offer.

So last Sunday we decided to give the Salutation Inn on Front Street a shot.

Big windows looking onto the high street revealed tables full of scranners tucking into big, tasty looking plates of food as we made our beeline.

Finding the last remaining table, we sat down to peruse the menu. Like most big pubs, it offers its full menu on Sundays alongside the Sunday Lunch specials, and tempted as we were by the fantastic looking dishes, we were both adamant we were going for a roast.

As we peered closer at the Sunday lunches, we discovered it was a choice of either beef or chicken with all of the trimmings, at an incredibly reasonable price of £7.95 for two.

At prices like that, we really thought we couldn’t go wrong, so decided to treat ourselves to a nice starter each and then push the boat out with a lovely big dessert.

My head was instantly turned by the promise of homemade broth as the soup of the day, priced at just £2.75, while the missus was temped by the sweet chilli chicken sticks.

Within around five minutes of ordering, our starters were delivered to our table by a waitress wearing a flashy headset, who announced her arrival with “So who’s having the chilli thingies?”

She Who Must Be Fed put her hand up as said waitress then apologised, saying she couldn’t remember what they were called, and we laughed it off while she went to find us some cutlery.

About three minutes later she wandered back with the cutlery, and eager to sample the food, which had been sat in front of us getting cold, we tucked in.

The broth was lovely, definitely homemade, and came with a nice chunk of fresh baguette, while Mrs Eat’s “thingies” - which resembled long thin spring rolls - were pretty tasty too by all accounts.

As we finished up, we figured our mains would not be far away. People had arrived in the tables beside us and had been served within minutes.

However it was 20 minutes later before anyone came to clear our plates . . . and then the waitress asked if we were ready for our main course. “God, yes!” we exclaimed.

Another 20 minutes . . . still no food. By now She Who Must Be Fed was growing more and more irate, and went off in search of staff.

Eventually, three complaints later the food arrived. Mrs Eats had asked for hers to come without much gravy and we’d been told it wouldn’t be a problem … but guess what? It came with plenty of gravy.

The waitress was apologetic and explained that no extra gravy had been put on but that the meat was cooked in it … then she gave perhaps a little too much information away.

“The meat comes in little individual packets you see, and they’ve got gravy in, so you can’t get away from it.”

Our hearts sank. It wasn’t fresh meat, it was out of a bag. As we dug in, it seemed the Yorkshire Pud and roast potatoes were also pre-packed but the cabbage, carrots and new potatoes were clearly fresh.

Ironically, it was quite a tasty meal, but by then we just wanted to get it over and done with. And neither of us were in any hurry to hang about and try a pudding.

So it was with heavy hearts we left the Salutation Inn. We’d been there nearly two hours, had tasty starters, a 40-minute wait and then boil in the bag meat.

Perhaps we were just the unlucky customers . . . everyone else seemed to get served quickly, and we wondered if perhaps getting starters had caused some confusion, and admittedly had we not known it was pre-packed meat, we’d have been none the wiser.

But sadly for us, it seems disappointment was the dish of the day.

::  The Salutation Inn is located on Front Street, Tynemouth, North Tyneside. Head into the main high street and the pub is about halfway along the main strip.