Shears Yard

Atmosphere is #1 here. Beautiful looking restaurant and bar. Don’t know why the’ve received negative comments on the food. Had a three course meal and enjoyed every part of it. Only con was the grilled calamari we tried as a side… otherwise it’s a great restaurant worthy of your attention. Service was also top notch.

Big case of style over content.
Lovely setting, amazing service but unfortunately, disappointing food. Odd menu combinations. Struggled to find anything on the menu I wanted to eat. Food was beautifully presented but not particularly tasty.
Shame

I wish I’d enjoyed this place more than I did. I was fully prepared to adore it, being a fan of Arts Café and indie biz, but there was just something missing.
The building itself has been decked out rather beautifully, with simple romantic lighting inside and interesting features. It’s sort of separated into two areas: a bar style area of seating and then a restaurant area that’s sectioned by the bar area. When I went we were seated in the bar type area with our backs to the restaurant bit.
Given the bare walls noise travels easily, which meant we could easily hear the noise of a few parties present at the time — we had a few tables of patrons that were on the rowdy side, including one lady next to us who seemed to know everyone and wasn’t afraid to squeal over people’s tables to show it. Not Shears Yard’s fault, but not enjoyable!
The food is, undeniably, good quality and presented beautifully. You can tell that the chefs take pride in their work and use top notch ingredients, but each dish just seemed to miss the mark for me. I’m no connoisseur, so I’m fully willing to admit that it could be my lack of refined tastes, but it just seemed like more fuss than substance somehow.
I had the pressed ham hock starter, which was like a super posh version of corned beef (I think) and the duo of lamb for the main. Both certainly exploded with flavour and complexity, but it’s possible that I chose the wrong restaurant for the mood I was in – I was starving so perhaps didn’t get to appreciate the intricacies. I inhaled the first course and couldn’t finish the second as the flavours seemed to get a bit too rich half way through.
Basically, I love the concept, I think the food is of amazing quality, and I perhaps need to come back in the right mood to give it another try. To be updated!

My friend and I have eaten here three times at lunchtime. The building is a refurbished sail making yard which, given its proximity to the canal and river, makes sense. The walls have been stripped back to the original brick and some features left. It doesn’t exactly give a cosy ambience. The lunchtime menu on the first occasion was ok, and the prices reasonable. The second time the menu had changed and were mainly boards — meat, fish and veggie. Although the boeuf bourgignon was still available and this was tasty and plentiful with home-​made bread (I’m pretty sure it wasn’t, but it had been warmed). There were very few people in the first time, second time there was a raucous table of ‘suits’. (Anyone who has read my previous reviews will see I have an abhorrence of these noisy and loud individuals who seem oblivious to other diners). The noise they made echoed round the otherwise empty restaurants making it difficult to have a conversation. However, we gave it a third go. This time the menu had got even smaller, no boeuf bourgignon and mainly boards — yet again, what is this obsession with boards? I suspect it is because pre-​prepared food can simply be doled out and takes no effort. I had carrot and coriander soup, again with ‘home-​made’ bread (definitely not home– made this time) but it was hot and plentiful, though not what I would have chosen given more choice. My friend had a meat board which she said was ok but nothing on it was freshly made. I asked the waitress why the menu had been so reduced but she said ‘it was quiet’ — I could see that for myself. Perhaps this place is much busier in the evening but if they can’t be bothered to put on a reasonable effort at lunchtime they should not open. We shall definitely not be going again. Oh, one more thing — ladies, especially small ladies, should be careful when visiting the lavatories. For some reason the actual loo is VERY high — they are more like what you get in an orthopaedic ward in hospital (i speak from experience). I could have done with a small buffet — or a ‘leg up’ at least!

Thoroughly awesome food! That’s the first thing. Utterly beautiful interior. That’s the second. And then it gets worse.
The shiraz I had was totally flat and light, whilst sitting in their ‘heavy’ section of wine… so a little disappointed.
And then service was a combination of great and rubbish — in the right proportion I guess (generally great) — I ordered the two course lunch, my friend ordered off the standard menu, just one course … EVERYTHING came at once. The young ladies who served us seemed completely none fussed, and I’m not sure I even heard the word sorry.
Again though, the food was AMAZING.