Every once in a while, I feel the need to do a check-in visit with one of our bigger global chain restaurants, just to make sure that the local equivalents are offering something of vastly better quality. I’m meaning places like Burger King, KFC etc, rather than the horrors of TGI Fridays – places with one main thing they do that is consumed at scale across multiple continents.

On a very blustery and rainy day, it seemed a good moment to give my local Pizza Hut a visit. I hadn’t “Hit the Hut” since the days when my sister used to work there; that was not yesterday. I therefore had no particular recent frame of reference, but upon crossing the threshold things did feel immediately familiar.

At lunchtime they have an unlimited buffet for £6.99. This seemed like the way to go to get a broad sample of their offering.

I started at the salad bar, where most things looked pretty decent except the lettuce, which looked rather sad. I chose a plateful of crunchy things, including carrots, apples, cherry tomatoes, beetroot and what I’ll call bacon debris. I had room on my plate for a little scoop from both of their hot pasta dishes, so added pennes of the bolognese and creamy broccoli variety.

The pasta was hideously overcooked, but both sauces were decent and packed good flavour. The salad was all pretty fresh and did its job rather admirably.

I then turned to the core pizza dishes. On offer today was a ham and mushroom, a pepperoni, a barbecue beef and a margarita.

The pizza base was pillowy and rather greasy, not unlike fried bread. As such it was unusual rather than off-putting or bad. Toppings were a little lacking in character, but it was all fairly decent.

The place felt slightly trapped in a bygone era, but I suppose that feeling could easily be mistaken for “classic” from an optimistic standpoint. I have a certain sympathy for places that get caught in this situation: their formula is still winning although it’s tired and really needs dragged into the present, but why mess with success? Well, perhaps a refreshed commitment to being as good as they possibly could be wouldn’t go amiss.

So overall, it was good to check-in with Pizza Hut. Their pizza was a little too bready for my tastes, but it was a solidly decent lunch. The next time I’m labouring under a hangover, a return visit would likely represent a very quick way of addressing munchy hunger.

Scores
Blythe scores Pizza Hut
2.5/5 for food
2.5/5 for presentation
3.5/5 for service
3/5 for setting
giving an overall 11.5/20

I ate: salad (beetroot, apple, carrot, cucumber, bacon aggregrate, tomatoes, chilli garlic dressing); pasta (bolognese and creamy broccoli); pizza (ham and mushroom, pepperoni, beef, sweetcorn, and margarita)

I drank: sparkly water

I wore: pinstripes

Total bill: £9.09