Description: While shopping in the Merry Hill Centre we decided to have a look for somewhere to eat lunch, ending up at Pizza Hut where we found ourselves just in time for the regular lunchtime pizza buffet. There were four of us dining plus a two year old toddler so the buffet option seemed best as it meant we didn't have to purchase all different pizzas to suit our individual tastes.
We were seated immediately upon entering, there was a short wait for a highchair for my son but once the staff member realised she was extremely apologetic and explained that it was her first day so she'd gotten herself a little mixed up. This wasn't a problem at all and I found all members of staff efficient, helpful and extremely friendly during our visit - this isn't always true of Pizza Hut I've found but I really can't fault the staff in this branch at all.
The full pizza and pasta menu is available and there looked to be several special offers to cut costs if ordering off the main menu. As I said, we were eating from the buffet selection and I was pleased to see that although they were pretty busy the two buffet areas were well stocked and pizza was being replenished on a regular basis - again, not always the case when eating a lunchtime buffet in Pizza Hut. We ordered a drink and waited for the queue at the hot pizza table to go down a little before heading over there ourselves to choose our food.
As you can go up for more food as many times as you like, I've found the key thing is not to overload your plate on the first visit - pizza is notoriously stodgy and if you try to eat too much too quickly then you'll simply end up too full to make the most of the buffet, for me a smaller plate makes much more sense and allows me to ensure I receive value for money as far as the food goes. There's an excellent selection at this Pizza Hut restaurant, it's quite a small branch so I was slightly surprised to see the full compliment of pizza and pasta available plus a well stocked salad bar - it was explained as we were seated that my two year old was welcome to eat from our plates and there would be no charge for him, this was great as I was planning to order him a meal from the kids menu so it saved me some cash.
The pizza is cut into reasonably small slices, presumably to ensure there's enough to go around everyone at such a busy period. It's not an issue as if you're in the mood for lots of pizza then you can simply put more slices on your plate, and the smaller slices make it ideal for someone like me who enjoys pizza but doesn't like too much. The selection at the time of our visit was excellent with Margarita, Ham and Pineapple, BBQ Chicken, Meat Feast and other pizza (which I can't remember!) available in large quantities. Every slice I ate was deliciously fresh, hot and of absolutely superb quality - my absolute favourite being the BBQ Chicken which featured BBQ sauce instead of tomato and lots of fresh chicken with slices of onion, delicious! My daughters both particularly enjoyed the Meat Feast pizza which had a deep filling of various meats and a wonderfully tangy sauce, this is an incredibly tasty pizza and one I was glad to see on the buffet as many Pizza Hut branches do not serve this at lunchtime apart from on the main menu. At any one time there were three or four different pizzas available to choose from and also fingers of garlic bread, which again were replenished regularly as it was very popular amongst the diners.
There were two pasta dishes to choose from; a macaroni cheese type dish and a pasta in Bolognese sauce. Neither of them were particularly to my liking as I'm not a fan of pasta from Pizza Hut anyway but I sampled a small amount of the Bolognese pasta which was very tasty, if a little tomatoey for my taste. My son loved it however and ate two bowlfuls, the pasta was cooked to be soft yet slightly al dente - perfect for his young palate and the large pieces of pasta meant even at his age he was able to poke it onto his fork and feed himself with a minimum of mess. The macaroni cheese looked to be a little sticky, I didn't try this myself but my daughter mentioned that she wasn't too impressed as the dish had very little flavour and the cheese sauce was greasy tasting. Neither of the pastas were particularly hot and they didn't seem very popular on the day of our visit, so much so that I only saw the containers being filled back up again once which would mean cool and stale pasta for those who did what to eat it.
My favourite section of any Pizza Hut buffet is the salad bar, and this branch was no exception. I particularly love their tangy potato salad and filled my plate with this on my first visit, it's freshly prepared in the restaurant and tastes absolutely delicious with small pieces of well cooked tender potato and a rich cool mayo based sauce. There's also hummus which my daughter ate and declared delicious, she dunked crunchy breadsticks into the thick paste and said she couldn't fault it at all. Everything on the salad bar is extremely fresh, with crunchiness where needed and foods being arranged well so that diners can see at a glance what they're putting on the plate - the actual salad foods (cucumber, cherry tomatoes, celery, lettuce etc...) are plentiful and obviously fresh, other items such as sweetcorn, beetroot, croutons, pickled onions and olives are also available for you to tailor your salad to your exact requirements. I adore their blue cheese sauce and had a dollop on every single plate, liberally covered with crunchy bacon bits - perfect for dipping pizza crusts and breadsticks in, and oh-so tasty! There are several other sauces and flavoured mayonnaises to choose from, my mum had a wonderfully pink 1000-Isle dressing which looked lovely but in my opinion was a little lost considering there is no fish of any description on the menu. You're invited to take a clean plate each time you go up for food and dirty plates were removed very quickly, although not so quickly that you feel you're being rushed - this is great as a previous experience in Pizza Hut really put me off as we were expected to use the same plate forcrge duration of our visit! Not good, and not really hygienic either!
Overall I was extremely impressed with this branch of Pizza Hut. It's spotlessly clean throughout and I observed staff clearing up and cleaning all the time we were there, tables and chairs are all in excellent condition with no stains or rips on the surfaces and despite it being busy the floor was free of food and regularly swept. I visited the ladies toilet and in all honesty found it to be a little run down; it was clean but there was a 'puddle' next to the toilet and the area just looked a bit shabby, this puddle remained for the whole time we were there which surprised me as the rest of the restaurant was so clean and well maintained.
Our bill was around £40, which included four buffet meals, four soft drinks and two desserts. I think this is reasonable value for money, although I did note that the buffet meals themselves have shot up in price compared to my last visit which was around thirteen months ago - still representing good value for money, but not making for a cheap meal when you are dining with children.
Close