Reviews

Bristol food review - Za Za Bazaar on Bristol Harbourside

Posted on: 2015-04-07

The combination of excellent food and pocket-friendly prices - from £8.99 during the week to £16.99 on weekends - ultimately make Za Za Bazaar one of the best value restaurants in the city.

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When it comes to Za Za Bazaar on the Harbourside in Bristol, size really does matter. This world food banquet and bar is so gigantic - such an emporium of eye-popping, gut-busting proportions - on first visit it's a little bit overwhelming.  

The sheer scale of the place is pretty epic. At 30,000sq ft that cost £3m to build, it can cater for 1,000 enthusiastic diners . That's a gargantuan amount of food. It is actually Britain's largest restaurant and there are plans to turn it into a national chain. 

After you've managed to get your head around the enormity of the venue, you can start taking in its sights and smells. The point of Za Za Bazaar is that it's supposed to replicate the atmosphere of a bustling street market, with different kitchens cooking up various dishes from all around the globe.

Its buffet style, all-you-can-eat concept is certainly a lively, vibrant affair, covered with neon signs, the air crashing and banging with the sound of pans and woks and filling your nostrils with the heady aromas of delicious world cuisine. There is literally something for everyone. Whether your food of choice is Indian, European, Chinese, Tex Mex or Italian, your culinary predilections are well catered for. And if you don't fancy being too adventurous or if your taste buds lay a little closer to home, there's even a section of food from Great Britain. 

While some diners' appetites get the better of them and they return to their seats with a plate piled so high with so many different dishes it can only conceivably taste of one mountainous, homogeneous mash, the best way to approach Za Za Bazaar is several small plates of lots of different dishes.  

Always partial to an Indian, I first went for pilau rice, lamb rogan josh, chicken tikka, sag aloo and naan bread. It was faultless, the lamb melt-in-the-mouth and infused with rich, dense flavours and the plate as a whole representative of some of the best Indian food I've ever eaten. 

After leaving it a few minutes to savour the flavours and digest the first lot of food, I enthusiastically marched up to the market for round two, thrilled at how buzzy, lively and exciting the place is with its feasts for the eyes and senses and genuine feel for the way it creates food as theatrical spectacle. A culinary carnival, so to speak. I made a beeline for the Chinese food station, selecting noodles, mushrooms and peppers which the chef hurled into his wok and gave a thorough tossing and cooking before plopping it on my plate, steaming, mouthwatering, and ultimately absolutely delicious. 

In fact, the Indian and Chinese dishes were so good I went back for a third and fourth plate of pretty much the same thing. 

There was room for dessert - come on, there's ALWAYS room for dessert - and I pulled myself a dish full of ice cream from the Mr Whippy-style dispenser, but this was much thicker, creamier and more heavenly that your average Mr Whippy offering. I added a few sponge puddings and Smarties and mixed them which, on the plate, ended up looking like some kind of pudding-based pandemonium, but it was so sweet and tasty I didn't care.

Za Za Bazaar is always busy whenever you pass and when we went on a Friday evening it was no exception. The combination of excellent food and pocket-friendly prices - from £8.99 during the week to £16.99 on weekends - ultimately make it one of the best value restaurants in the city.

Za Za Bazaar is an imposing monolith to mouthwatering global tastiness. 

4.5/5

Reviewed by Jamie Caddick for 365Bristol – the leading events and entertainment website for Bristol

 

Contact Za Za Bazaar at:

Harbourside, Canon's Road, Bristol, BS1 5UH

Tel. 01179 220330

Web. www.zazabazaar.com

Email. enquiries@zazabazaar.com

Or connect via Facebook and Twitter.

 

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