St. Albans’ Newest Restaurant – Kashu
Submitted by Robin Hamman on August 11, 2008 – 19:0714 Comments
Just opened in the refurbished former home of the Liberal Club on Hatfield Road, Kashu is locally owned (by Tony’s brother – yeah, of Italian deli fame) and offers a contemporary menu with Italian pastas and pizzas for the less adventurous.
I haven’t been yet so your reviews and photos welcome.
Update: We gave Kashu a glowing review in January 2010
Visit them online at http://www.kashu.co.uk
Popularity: 7% [?]
I have dined at Kashu on at least 4 occasions, with various friends and family,all who have returned and recommended the restaurant.
The 5th time was last night, there were 7 of us. We were delighted with the experience, and I have recomended the restaurant for a company evening out later in the month, which I am looking forward to.
Thank you Kashu! I am here visiting from the USA. Last night my friends and I had an excellent meal at Kashu. The waiting staff were very atttentive,efficient and respectful. The food was delicious – the portion sizes were ample.
We really enjoyed our visit. It’s a shame that the first two reviews for this restaurant are so negative. We had no problems with the service or the food, we liked the decor and the generous and tasty portions of garlic bread, and we would definitely go again. Another plus – our meal for four including drinks came to only £15 per head.
Really noisy. We were put by the bar and the chef and his crowd shout out when food is ready and that obviously happens very frequently, fortunately, and I found it ruined my meal. It would have been fine if we’d come out to be entertained, but we simply wanted an enjoyable meal in ambient surroundings. The room is too open, the bare floors and the lack of incidental buffers like plants, pillars etc make it very difficult to relax. More like Grand Central Station on Christmas Eve. The lamb though was absolutely fabulous. Won’t be going there again, sadly.
Not a good first experience. head waitress was downright rude and got easily flustered. Decieded it would be a good idea to cover me in Red wine.Food only okay, not great.If this place is to survive it needs to sharpen up it’s act and re write the menu, the novelty will soon wear off , people will vote with their feet.
not the greatest meal i have ever eaten. The gnocci was bland, tasteless and the consistency was perculiar to say the least.I did not appreciate the head chefs ’small talk’ when my wife and I were trying to enjoy our evening, the overall experience mean we wont be dining at kashu again. Nice try though
WOW I had a fab time at Kashu.
I was a little apprehensive after reading a couple of the comments on this site. But I am so glad I went.
I really enjoyed everything I ate. The staff are very friendly and welcoming and from what they told me, Kashu source a lot of their produce locally, so not only did I eat well but I felt smug about the whole carbon footprint thing as well.
My only problem was I ate too much. I will be going again very soon to try more of the menu.
I would recommend you try it for yourself, I was pleasantly surprised.
Four of us ate at Kashu a couple of weeks ago. The service was friendly but not obtrusive, the portions were large, and all in all we thoroughly enjoyed our meal. I would definitely recommend this restaurant!
We only ate one course (on a very tight budget) but it was pleasant. Large portions and reasonably tasty. I quite liked the decor. I would say that in my experience they were similar to many st albans restaurants as far as quality and value for money (I’d give most of them such as wagamamas, carluccios, verdis a 6 and cafe rouge a 3 out fo 10)
Gosh this restaurant has created debate! I think I’ll have to check it out to see for myself!
Emily @ http://www.foodsnappers.com
We have been to Kashu 4 or 5 times now, mostly in the evening and once at lunch time with the family, and have thoroughly enjoyed it every time. Excellent service and the food is always good with a regularly changing menu. There is always a great ‘buzzy’ atmosphere. Everyone I have recommended it to has thoroughly enjoyed it too.
I’ve eaten at Kashu a couple of times with my husband, and on both occasions staff have been very accommodating, squeezing us in without a booking on Saturday night.
We like the atmosphere, and find the owner charming and keen to make it work. The food is really very nice, and I absolutly don’t know why people so much have it in for this place.
I never normally comment but felt moved to by such unfairness!
I think some people must be going to a different restaurant, or they have been very unfortunate. I have eaten both lunch and dinner, on more than 5 occasions. Every time the service has been more than adequate and food excellent. I would recommend this restaurant above any other in St Albans, and I’ve have had the pleasure at eating at most of what St Albans has to offer.
Very unimpressed. It would seem to me that a key to a successful restaurant is to develop a clientele who come frequently, and who reccommend it to their friends. So, when my tuna steak arrived completely undercooked (literally fridge-cold in the middle), when I had asked for it medium rare, you would have thought that they would go out of their way to apologise, and would probably take it off the bill (which came to £200 between 6 people, including 6 beers and a bottle of wine). They didn’t, and again, I didn’t mind too much – I just pointed out to the waiter that I would hope for a merest sign of compromise, not particularly enjoying eating after the others. After offering some drinks that no-one wanted, the manger came over to me and actually argued his case. Why you would argue with a customer when a fiver discount would have at least indicated that you cared is beyond me, particularly since they were automatically adding £18 to the bill for service (10%). Eventually he agreed to knock £5 off, before leaving me with a sarcastic coment about how he hoped the £5 would make a difference to me.
Foolish, foolish little man. He’s lost 6 potential repeat customers, and has encouraged me to write a poor review.