I used to really enjoy this place before it became the craft and dough. The wig and pen was a cracking cocktail bar/gastro pub.
Unfortunately, the craft and dough has not been a successful takeover in my opinion. I have ordered food from them several times from both the wig and pen and the Kelham Island restaurant, as well as placed take away orders via deliveroo. I will keep my review focused on the Wig and Pen craft and dough, rather then the Kelham island one as they obviously have different managers.
To begin - - the atmosphere is nice. The layout of the restaurant is a little strange, but this adds nice personal nooks to talk with your partner, or with your group. They also back out onto the lovely paradise Square with a little seating area on the cobbles.
The menu has a nice variety, a few different pizzas and side dishes as well as puddings and most are unique enough to not be your standard Italian, although a little over priced in my opinion. You'll want a pizza each, or 1 pizza for two and a few sides to share. The drinks menu is roughly the same as what the wig and pen used to have, although less variety and higher prices. Our most recent visit was disappointing in this respect as they falsely advertised 2 for £10 cocktails and then refused to honour the deal, despite telling us that the deal hasn't been on for weeks.
The take away is easily the most disappointing aspect. The food is always cold, soggy and undercooked. What else is there to say? Take away pizza is not a new phenomenon and so it should be easy to master. The unique flavours they offer taste much better hot and the take away option leaves you a little dissapointed.
Conclusion : they could be a great restaurant. Unfortunately the problems here are quite similar to the problems found in the other craft and dough restaurants and I feel they are branching out too much. A step up from Pizza express and will keep most people happy with its palatable food, but the price puts it in the market that makes you wonder why you didn't...
Read moreVisited for bottomless brunch. The service was good, I personally had no qualms with it. Our waiter was nice and accomodating. The mimosas were nice and fresh drinks were delivered regularly.
At the start we were all offered a glass of prosecco. I managed to drink it (I'm not one for waste) but it was extremely cloying on the pallete. We were told that was the only prosecco in the house which was a shame. The other drink choices were fairly limited. My partner who was also there doesn't like mimosas or lager so they had to drink the prosecco.
The food was quite poor. I had the bacon baked eggs. The portion was tiny; served in a shallow cast iron skillet. It was two baked eggs and streaky bacon with spinach in a creamy sauce of some description. The spinach was burned brown, as if it had been under a grill for about 10 minutes.
The eggs were extremely overcooked and the yolks were chalky, possibly due to the aforementioned grilling. I know not everyone likes a runny yolk but for a £7 dish I expected better. I struggled through as I was starving.
I would struggle to pay the heavily discounted online voucher price for 90 minutes of syrupy prosecco and mediocre food, let alone the standard price of £40.
I like Craft and Dough for their pizza. However brunch is not their strong suit. I would be willing to try it again if the standard price was a bit more competitive and the food and drink selection...
Read moreOrdered two 'here comes the sun' vegan pizzas through deliveroo. They arrived and one of them was properly splattered with some yoghurt type stuff, it had been dressed afterwards with seeds... I called up the restaurant and was told it is indeed something made with yoghurt and it had been splatted "by accident". The man said they would send out a new pizza but that was before we noticed it had been dressed after the dairy had been added. We obviously could not trust this food after that. I phoned back and said we do not want this food and I want a full refund, he told me he would refund me from their end? I received no refund so I called again the next day and was then told I would receive a refund after the guy has called deliveroo, later that day I get a call from deliveroo saying they will only refund me for two pizzas (£15) as they were the defective items. The order was £22.50. It also takes 5-10 days to get the money back. The guy said he would "speak to his manager" the next day, which would be Wednesday, I've received no contact it's now Thursday. The pizzas also had no vegan cheese on them and were really badly arranged plus the chips were supposed to be herby but were totally plain. Everything went in the wheelie bin. Thanks...
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