RESTAURANT REVIEW: Harvester at the O2 Arena *** (From News Shopper)

RESTAURANT REVIEW: Harvester at the O2 Arena ***

9:30am Friday 25th February 2011 in Freetime By Michael Purton

RESTAURANT REVIEW: Harvester at the O2 Arena ***

REVIEWING a Harvester restaurant is like reviewing a musical – you have to judge it on limited criteria.

Just as you wouldn’t mark down The Sound of Music for lacking gritty, hard hitting action, it’s unfair to criticise Harvester for lacking a broad, sophisticated menu.

The success of the restaurant chain is that it offers simple grilled meals served fast at low prices, with most customers eating there before going to a show or the cinema.

This makes Harvester ideal for the O2 Arena, where most people go to see live entertainment or a film, or dance the night away, so it’s a surprise it’s taken until now for one to open there.

So, did the O2 Harvester meet my expectations? Well, yes and no.

The food was as good as expected, with my mixed grill (rump steak, bacon steak, chicken breast and pork sausage, with a fried egg, grilled tomato and onion rings) cooked to succulent perfection, and my companion’s 10oz ribeye steak equally impressive.

This came with a side, sauce and salad of our choice for each of us, all for the price of £9.99 for the mixed grill and £13.29 for the ribeye steak, so we had no complaints on value for money.

However, where Harvester failed to impress was with the service and the number of dishes unavailable.

Although our waitress was friendly and we were served quickly, when I asked for an extra dip of garlic sauce, it never arrived, meaning I had to make do with getting myself a scoop of blue cheese dressing from the salad bar.

It’s a minor complaint, but when you ask for something at a restaurant and are told you can have it, you expect it to arrive.

The other letdown was discovering that, at 7.30pm on a Saturday evening, the restaurant had run out of two of its six sweet desserts – the rich chocolate tart and the profiteroles.

We both had the brownie and ice-cream, which was delicious and reasonably priced at £3.99, but it would have been nice to have our first choice.

Again, it was not a major problem, but for a restaurant to have run out of two of its most popular desserts at peak time on a Saturday is unacceptable.

As for the décor, it was what you’d expect from a chain restaurant – simple but pleasant – with a brown colour scheme, a few plain pictures on the walls, and background music quiet enough to have a conversation.

So, it’s cheers for the food and jeers for the service, but as it’s a newly opened restaurant (the official opening was February 22) I’m sure these flaws are just teething problems, so I’ll give the Harvester the benefit of the doubt and recommend it if you’re visiting the O2.

To book a table, call the restaurant on 0208 853 4574