Good Restaurants in Portlaoise

irish atco

Some help required. Im organising a night out and am looking at Portlaoise, for 10 people. Can I get some recommendations from those in the locality about good restaurants/bistros please.
The places must be within a short walking distance of the town Centre.

All info gratefully received

Thanks

cpb

Best restaurants/bistro in Portlaoise is Seasons. It is in the Top Sq over Donoghues Pub. It is the best by far.

MickShamrock

The Lemon Tree is the best restaurant in Portlaoise, imo. It's small, so call ahead to book your group.

http://www.lemontreerestaurant.net/

ILA

Seasons is regarded as expensive, catering to the well-off in Portlaoise (which is entirely non-existant) and therefore should be pretty quiet and delighted to see a group of ten coming in.

Other good restuarants include The Square Meal on Main Street, and the Lemon Tree on Main Street. Spago's at the Heritage is based on an Italian theme, I've always found it to be good although others on here have doubts about it.

For an informal gathering, the New Oriental City restuarant on the Mountmellick Road is very quiet and the food (Chinese and Thai) is good value for money.

laois gael

Season is nice if a tad expensive,

The Lemon tree also nice.

The square meal is great value and nice food but doesnt open that late....

Don't like spagos not a great italian at all.

Kellys steakhouse decent if inconsistent

If you like indian then the kingfisher is beautiful.

Egans in nice but finish around 9.30 in the evenings.

Not much to go on after that plenty of chinese around town but that food ain't my cup of tea.

knifey_spoonie

ILA wrote: »

Seasons is regarded as expensive,.

Have you tried it lately,Kevin has turned it into a Bistro, so it quicker cheaper and just as nice. It's very reasonable and the food is Lovely, € 10 for lunch main course, that's cheaper than pretty much any where else in town.I don't know what the evening menu is like price wise, but you will get top class food.

laois gael

knifey_spoonie wrote: »

Have you tried it lately,Kevin has turned it into a Bistro, so it quicker cheaper and just as nice. It's very reasonable and the food is Lovely, € 10 for lunch main course, that's cheaper than pretty much any where else in town.I don't know what the evening menu is like price wise, but you will get top class food.

your actually right I seen the prices Advertised yesterday!!!!

MickShamrock

Seasons is way over-rated. Don't believe the hype.

laois gael

MickShamrock wrote: »

Seasons is way over-rated. Don't believe the hype.

not hype just saying its decent place to get a tasty bit of different grub and with prices lowered its a win win situation

MickShamrock

laois gael wrote: »

not hype just saying its decent place to get a tasty bit of different grub and with prices lowered its a win win situation

I didn't find anything different with the grub or the prices to make it stand out from anywhere else in town. Portlaoise is god awful when it comes to decent restaurants.

kizzyf

Have to disagree about Seasons, been a while since I was there but the food was delicious. Agree with all the other comments. Kelly's can be great but you can be unlucky.

irish atco

Thanks to all that replied, think that I have a lot of info to make a decision.
IA

MickShamrock

Food for thought! :pac:

adser53

MickShamrock wrote: »

Food for thought! :pac:

Boooo! Hissss!

dexter647

Very surpeised spago's hasn't got more of a mention... excellent food and very reasonable:)

adser53

I wasn't impressed at all with Spago's when I was there.
Kelly's foundry has some great offers on and the food is generally very good. The service can be pure muck tho! In fact the only time the missus and I EVER complained in a restaurant was in Kelly's because the service was so bad and even when we just walked in (with a booking) the woman at the door was a complete and utter bint!

MickShamrock

dexter647 wrote: »

Very surpeised spago's hasn't got more of a mention...

Maybe due to the fact it's dire.

**Vai**

adser53 wrote: »

the woman at the door was a complete and utter bint!

People dont use that word enough!

adser53

I'm striving to bring it to the forefront of the insult vocabulary

Bicky

Bint.. lol
I really like spagos and dislike the foundry. Guess its all down to personal taste or a bad experience.

dexter647

Ate out in kellys the other day and i have to agree with the comments already made about this restaurant...Food only ok but the main thing that really bugged me was the service. Absolutely terrible... we were left waiting for over 15 mins for the dessert menu so in the end we asked for the bill and left.. Will never set foot in this place again:mad:

ILA

MickShamrock wrote: »

Maybe due to the fact it's dire.

Are you for real? :rolleyes:

MirchMasala

u can try indianprince, if u like indian food...

Dempo1

MickShamrock wrote: »

Maybe due to the fact it's dire.

Or perhaps recievers running it into the ground, when it opened originally it was top class, staff are thin on the ground these days, i've seen quicker service at a funeral.

MickShamrock

Dempo1 wrote: »

Or perhaps recievers running it into the ground, when it opened originally it was top class, staff are thin on the ground these days, i've seen quicker service at a funeral.

In my opinion it was actually worst when it opened first.

Dempo1

It had its teething problems when it opened first, they had a fantastic Romanian chef who successfully opened an excellent place in Portarlington. Spago pretty much went down hill after that, most of the heritage staff moved to the kileshin (probably an unwise move as that too is in receivership)

The harsh reality in the hotel sector is there is a crisis, most newish hotels are be run under examiner ship by management companies with a simple brief, KEEP COSTS DOWN. As a result staffing levels reduce, cheap a cheerful approach to service and food, discounted meals, special offers which in turn force establish restaurants, hotels cut their standards, vicious circle really.

In the heritages case, the notion that two restaurants could compete albeit different styles of food was always a none starter in what is a very limited market, I suspect one will not survive beyond the new year.

MickShamrock

They can both close for all I care. Don't visit either anymore.

Hesh's Umpire

Hope I'm not out of order in reviving this thread but I felt I just had to after enjoying an excellent meal in The Lemon Tree last night.
All it was lacking was a crowd as it was very quiet but that was obviously out of the control of the proprietors.
Food, service and value for money were all excellent.
We had crab cakes and soup to start, both very good and seabass and pork for mains, both excellent with a gorgeous champ served on the side and very good home made chips too.
Highly recommend.

SlinkyKittin

And I would like to recommend The Kingfisher Indian Restaurant at the top of the main street. Was in there on Wednesday with my daughters for lunch €7 each for a starter, main course, pompodoms, rice and naan bread - definitely the best value in Portlaoise! Also do great early bird offers! yummy!!