Black Rooster Per-Peri
WE’VE only been in the place, say, three minutes and the boom, boom, shouty, shouty music is already doing my head in. It’s so bloody loud. My fingers, which should be in my ears, are actually hovering over the phone to text Garry and tell him: change of plan, mate: let’s bolt somewhere else.
Then I realise he hasn’t replied to the last text I sent and will no doubt be bimbling dreamily and unstoppably through the south side at this very moment. I can tell you by the time he arrives it will simply be too late to get up and move on as I’ll be trapped by the tractor beam of polite social life.
I will also have looked up the internet by then and discovered some curious things. One: the question someone posted on Google (possibly Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall) about whether the chicken in here is organic remains deafeningly unanswered. Be serious: it’s 11 quid for a whole chicken.
Two: is this something of a stealth Glesgow-esque phenomenon having branches in Duke Street, in Possil, here on Pollokshaws Road as well as in Paisley and Coatbridge. Pretty much the fast food equivalent of New York, Paris and Rome.
Three: someone has claimed this is a cut-price alternative to Nando’s (until that moment I thought it was a burger joint cum house party)
Four: they have a website and an app but neither seem to work. In the slightest.
Five: None of the other customers, and there are a surprising number on this mid-week evening, seem in the least bit bothered by eating in a disco (if they still call them that). And, yes, they are all younger.
Anyway, Garry arrives and we sit around in the racket until the penny drops that just like Nando’s we have to get up and order at the counter. D’uh.
Now, this is one of these places where it’s actually hard to tell the customers from the staff and I go through the whole ordering process with a cheery guy who nips out from one of the booths and slides behind the counter.
I know he does work here because during the actually very entertaining banter back and forward, and while I roll my eyes at being asked yet again what sauce with that, he says, there’s a sauce with everything in here, mate. And there is; Mango & lime, lemon & herb, BBQ, extra mild sauce, extra hot sauce, yadayada.
I can’t even remember which ones I chose because this place being brand new and having racked up £30.30 of goodies I’m then told it’s cash-only and sent off to the nearest corner shop with a cashline machine. Groan. To be fair when I return they take that 30p of smash off the bill for my sterling efforts.
The food comes to the table real fast. Now, normally at this point and even with the most gallus of places the first mouthful confirms that on the plate anyway dreariness is the order of the day. Hang on. Not so tonight. Crash, bang, wallop goes my palate as first super chilli heat, then salt, then moist chicken with a crispy skin is demolished. There is some sort of lemsippy side flavour too.
Joanna Blythman reviews Cannonball in Edinburgh
Being a namby pamby restaurant critic I should be completely horrified by this assault on the senses, swoon at the crude flavours, and storm off to snort some lavender water. And, actually, the sauce itself oozes and pools in a slightly alarming way, and is a weird colour, but somehow I really like the rude, crude flavours and its very, er, totally Glasgow bravado.
Not so impressed with the quesadilla or the toasted paneer wrap. Maybe because they seem to be pretty much exactly the same, being oozy, cheesy, toasty things at a nonetheless inexpensive £4 each.
The staff are relaxed and friendly, the bants are pretty good and by the time you leave you will definitely know you’ve eaten something.
Black Rooster Per-Peri
Pollokshaws Road
Glasgow
0141 423 7553
Menu: It’s a Glasgow or Lanarkshire chicken chain joint with Portugesuey flavours and quesadillas and chips and, well, you’ve know the script. 3/5
Service: Super casual but actually quite good fun and pleasant. Food came super fast too. 5/5
Price: It’s very cheap, with those quesadillas and wraps at a mere £4 and the menu topping out with a whole saucey chicken at £11. Don’t tell Hugh. 5/5
Atmosphere: I hated it’s non stop super-loud music but then fat old guys are probably not the target audience. 2/5
Food: Easy to sneer but the chicken was actually properly cooked, the flavours super-gallus and in your face and I liked them. You’ll know you’ve eaten. 6/10
21/30
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