Cafe Zoot

We ate an early dinner there tonight and thoroughly enjoyed it. The interior isn’t very large and it has a rather romantic ambiance. We each got one of the (two-​course) specials, which included a choice of (certain) starters and entrées for 11.95 pounds. I had the soup of the day (cream of cauliflower) and the bouillabaisse. My husband had mushroom bruschetta and the chicken & mushroom stuffed pasta. The food was very tasty & flavorful and the service was pleasant. We had a delightful conversation with the couple sitting on one side of us, and then later we had a terrific & very lengthy conversation with the young guy sitting on the other side. We were there for two hours, which we’d normally never do out of consideration — but the restaurant didn’t begin filling up until that point, and we were enjoying the latter conversation too much to leave sooner. Also, the ambiance really lent itself to a leisurely meal.

Café Zoot is a very versatile place as it allows for relatively intimate and cozy seating in the downstairs part of the restaurant, whereas it also offers a large space upstairs in what seems to have been the former living area of a medieval merchant family.
In fact, I was part of a larger group and we all made use of the rather economic dinner-​offer: 2-​course for £9.95. I had the fried-​brie on chutney, which was really tasty. My main was a spinach-​ravioli, which was unfortunately rather uninspiring and dull… in fact, the ravioli were drowned in a rich & creamy tomato sauce, which left me feeling quite bloated.
Overall judgement: decent food and good service, but the menu could use a little more sparks of ingenuity…