Chicken Club at The Lord Wilson in the Kingsgate Centre in Huddersfield

The Lord Wilson, Unit 27, Kingsgate Centre, King Street, Huddersfield, West Yorkshire, HD1 2PZ.

The Lord Wilson is a Lloyds No. 1 venue - which are part of the same group as J.D. Wetherspoon's and are almost identical - in the Kingsgate Centre in Huddersfield. Although the address is in the Kingsgate Centre, there is no inside access to the pub, and it is outside the centre itself, just next to the doors to the House of Fraser department store. There is a paid car park inside the Kingsgate Centre and some limited on street pay and display parking. There are a few tables available outside of the pub itself.

The pub was Wednesday lunchtime and many of the tables were occupied, although most were not close to being full. The Lord Wilson lacks table service, so you have to find a table, make a note of its number, and then go to the bar to order your food and pay for it. The food is then brought to the table when it is ready. Any additional food or drink requires visiting the bar again.

Cutlery and paper napkins are brought with the food, and there are bottled condiments available in several places in the pub. The table chosen was a bit on the sticky side, and the pub itself was a bit on the cool side.

There are a number of meals on the menu that come with an included drink. There are a wide selection of drinks available, including alcoholic ones of various types, hot, cold and soft drinks. In some cases the alcoholic drinks have an additional charge. On a number of days during the week there are various special offers available; on Wednesday it is the Chicken Club, where there are a variety of chicken dishes available with included drinks and reduced price side orders, supplementary items and desserts.

Both dishes were ordered from the Chicken Club menu, and both came with an included drink. On this menu there wasn't a surcharge for the alcoholic drinks available. The drinks chosen were a Pepsi, and for 20p extra this was upgraded from half a pint to a pint, and a bottle of Strathmore sparkling mineral water. Both were served with glasses and were suitably chilled; the mineral water, being in a bottle, was better than the Pepsi, which was draught.

Main Courses

The two main courses ordered were identical; both were the Peri-peri Boneless Chicken Breast from the Chicken Club menu. As well as the chicken, these were served with a small container of coleslaw and a small container of the peri-peri sauce. These also came with either chips, side salad and dressing or rice; both were ordered with chips.

The chicken breast was tender and moist and was just right, but the chips were ever-so-slightly overdone and the portion was a little bit on the mean side. A few more chips that had been cooked for slightly less time would have been appreciated. The peri-peri sauce was actually quite spicy, and these types of dishes are frequently rather milder than the menu makes out, and because it came in a separate dish it could be added to taste, which is useful as not everyone may have appreciated the spiciness. The chicken breast did not appear to have been marinated in any of it though. The coleslaw was fine, quite creamy but nothing special.

Desserts

With the Chicken Club, the dessert were available for £2.25, rather than the main menu price, which naturally did not apply to those items priced under that normally.

The first dessert was American-style Pancakes with Ice Cream & Maple-Flavour Syrup, although it could have been had with blueberry compote instead of the syrup.

This dish had three pancakes, which were thicker than normal ones being American-style and were warm, a jug of maple syrup and two scoops of vanilla ice cream.

The other dessert was Warm Chocolate Fudge Cake with Ice Cream. This was a fairly thick wedge of cake with a lot of chocolate sauce and two scoops of vanilla ice cream.

Neither dessert had genuine vanilla ice cream, and the syrup was, as stated, maple flavour rather than maple; the genuine options for both would have been more expensive.

The total cost of the meal came to £18.20, Both courses were brought out quickly, with the hot dishes actually being ready faster than the desserts. Having the drinks being included with the meals reduced the cost, as did the Chicken Club offers themselves.

The lack of table service can be inconvenient when dining alone, especially if the location is busy, as ordering food or drinks requires leaving the table unoccupied when the bar is visited, but this is not a problem when there are two or more people.

The food is decent quality, if not top of the range, and is available at a decent price, making The Lord Wilson a good place to visit for decent food at a decent price.