Want Pizza & Carvery? Well, You Can at
The Malt Shovel – Great Barr.
The Malt Shovel reopened last month after an extensive refurbishment, in which it was converted from a Crown Carvery into a Stonehouse Pizza & Carvery. It now serves freshly baked pizzas as well as the traditional carvery and a whole host of other treats and dishes.
Located on the Newton Road in Great Barr, Birmingham. The Malt Shovel is a pretty looking building with a great sized free car park big enough to accommodate everyone visiting. Our first impressions were, how bright and fresh the place looked. It’s a large building all painted nicely which looks very inviting. Once inside, it was very busy but it was 1pm on a Saturday afternoon so that’s normally the sign of a good pub. Filled with locals of all ages, elderly and young families alike. The place had a really nice atmosphere and everyone was friendly.
We were greeted at the entrance by a lovely member of staff and shown to our table which was situated in the corner next to a small children’s play area which was a lovely idea. It had a little table and chairs with some small toys on it and a machine which dispensed prize eggs for a £1. Even though my younger two aren’t that young now that they’re 7 and 10 but they still had fun playing in it whilst we were all waiting for our meals. It kept them happy.
If you love your Starters, you’ll love this place as they do a Pick & Mix Starters option where you can choose any 3 starters from a selection of 13 for £8.49, 4 for £10.99 or 5 for £12.99.
We went for the 5 starters of course as we love to try a little of everything. We opted for some BBQ Glazed Chicken Wings, Crispy Potato Skins with a Sour Cream Dip, Chicken Tikka served on Lettuce, drizzled with Mint Sauce, Onion Rings and a Garlic Bread Pizza.
Everything was delicious and very well cooked. I think we all had our own favourites out of the 5. I loved the Chicken Tikka the best as it was just so succulent whereas Daddy really enjoyed his Onion Rings, he loves Onion Rings! Chloe, my 15 year old loved the BBQ Glazed Chicken Wings and the younger two, Lily and Ryan gobbled down all of the Garlic Bread Pizza which they couldn’t get enough of. All of the Starters were well presented and looked really nice on the plates and everything was very tasty. There was nothing left when we’d finished which is always a good sign. No waste means No complaints from us.
For our Mains we went for a selection of the two main things on offer. Some of us had the Pizza and some had the Carvery so we could enjoy a bot of everything that was on offer.
One of the main things I loved about this place was no matter which one you opted for, you got unlimited salad and sides to go with it. The side included Chips, beans, mushy peas and so much more. I was really impressed, we’ve never been to a place where you could eat as many chips as you like for such a cheap price. The kids and I were really happy with this.
The salad bar was great, the pasta salad with a drizzle of Thousand Island Sauce was yum!
The Carvery cost £5.79 for adults and £3.99 for children. There was a choice of 3 meats which all looked delicious and then as many sides as you wanted. Chloe and Ryan both went for the Carvery and really enjoyed it. The Gammon was a huge hit with both of them.
The Pizzas were amazing, I had the BBQ Chicken Pizza whilst daddy had the Meat Feast with added Pineapple as you can do that for an extra 50p. You can add toppings or take off anything you don’t like to make your Pizza, perfect for you. The adult pizzas cost £7.79 upwards depending on which one you choose and the children’s Margarita costs £4.49.
Both were fantastic. I loved my BBQ Chicken Pizza, the sauce was rich and sweet and the best part was, when I didn’t finish it all, they gave me a box to take the rest home for later.
Last but not least was the Deserts. Again, there was plenty of choice. There was a Kids Sweet corner which made my little boy very happy as he doesn’t really like puddings but he does like sweets so this made his day. There’s a selection of sweet dispensers where you can pay 50p to get some sweets. Lily also loved this corner but she had the kids unlimited Ice Cream to go with hers. It was lots of fun for the kids to be able to serve them selves.
For the grown ups, we went for the Cherry Cheescake and the Syrup Sponge which were both very lovely. We decided to share two puddings between us as we were all a little full from all the food we’d already eaten but we couldn’t leave without trying some of them.
We had a lovely afternoon at The Malt Shovel and really enjoyed our time spent there. Everything was great, from the friendly staff to the relaxing decor. The delicious food and the sweet treat puddings. I think we’ll definatley be going back soon as we enjoyed it so much.
If you’re in the area, you should try it out and if you’re not, you can always check out the Stonehouse Restaurants website online to see if there’s one close to where you live.
Disclosure: We were invited to try the new menu for the purpose of this review. We received a discount off the total cost of our meal. All opinions expressed are 100% honest.
