First review - new Sun Dancer restaurant and bar in Nairn

(Please see UPDATE at end)

The new Sun Dancer restaurant and bar in Nairn finally opened a week ago yesterday (i.e. Sunday 14th August); I do not think it has yet been advertised in any way, certainly it was not in last week's Nairnshire on Tuesday 16th, so it seems to have undertaken what is usually known as a "soft opening". Rumours locally are that it was originally scheduled to open in May, presumably in order to catch the late-Spring and early-Summer trade, but local rumours are that its opening was delayed for various reasons; I will not repeat any of the reasons I heard about though, as this is mere hearsay and the important point, as I see it, is that it has now opened.

I visited with my partner yesterday Sunday 21st August around lunchtime and we had ice cream milkshakes in the ground floor cafe - very nice they were too and the interior is bright, cheerful and modern in feel and the young lady serving us was pleasant and friendly. We asked if we could visit upstairs to see the bar/restaurant and being told "yes" went up to take a look.

It was much more spacious than I imagined it would be (I live close by so have followed its progress over the months). It is well laid out and the tables are not too crowded together. There is a bar area in one corner, with comfortable and quite smart furniture in that part of the floor. The tables and chairs of the main restaurant part are also quite smart and the balcony at the front has some tables and chairs, pleasant for a drink on a nice day or evening. We asked to book a table for the same evening and returned for our meal later with time for pre-dinner drinks.

The staff are friendly and pleasant, although still obviously learning their jobs and getting comfortable with their work environment, drinks and menus, etc. We had a very nice meal indeed, broadly comparable with the two other what I consider decent eateries in Nairn (The Classroom and The Bandstand) and the cost was broadly similar too; the Sunny Brae is lovely too of course, but is rather more refined in many ways than those three (including the Sun Dancer), only being a bit more expensive.

There was a Sunday menu on offer, 2 courses for £15.95, with 3 courses being a few pounds more; there was a small but sufficient range of options for starters, mains and puddings/desserts, although we understand there may be a more extensive menu in due course, but that they are trialling a slighlty more restricted menu, at least at the beginning, not to over-complicate matters. The food as mentioned was pretty good, so this represents good value I think, specially for an evening meal, with drinks (campari/soda, guinness [2 pints in all], a large glass of white and a small glass of red, for the cheese we had for dessert), the total bill was about £66-, rounded up to £71- (for 2 persons) with tip, a bit less than we would normally have added, for the reasons mentioned later in this review.

The table settings are nice (white quality table cloths, decent cutlery and crockery, high quality cloth-like paper napkins) and the dining table seats are quite comfortable and smart. It is obvious considerable care has been taken with designing a very pleasant venue to take full advantage of the lovely views out over the Firth; we had a corner window table just inside the outdoor balcony so the views were excellent, but most tables (even those not directly adjacent to the large windows) will have good views of the Firth.

The only criticism I would have is that the service was very slow and somewhat disjointed, but always pleasant and friendly, although it did require us on several occasions to try and attract the staff's attention after we had been waiting for lengthy periods, both to place our orders and to receive each course, requiring us to query the delays throughout the evening. For example we had to wait 15 minutes after finishing our main course before managing to attract the attention of someone to take our dessert order (the cheese board for both of us, which was excellent when it came, but obviously required no "cooking"), then after 25 minutes of waiting for it to be delivered, we managed to attract the attention of a waitress returning to the kitchen with used crockery from another table, when it was delivered rapidly; probably it had been waiting for delivery to us in the kitchen for some time, I suspect.

Getting the bill took another while, a pattern throughout the whole evening. However, I think this will become a great place to eat in Nairn, assuming they maintain their initial food standards (which are quite high in local terms I'd say), once they become rather slicker in the service area. I put the delays down to the staff still becoming familiar with their roles, so expect and hope this is merely a "teething" problem. I think they have been quite busy during their first week of operation, from what the lady who appeared to be in charge indicated to us, and it was certainly pretty busy on Sunday evening when we were there, so everyone there was flung into the deep end whilst still learning their jobs. We shall certainly visit again in a month or so (rotating it in with the other places already mentioned, which we will undoubtedly visit again in the intervening period), and hope we will have an equally enjoyable meal, but experience somewhat slicker service, once the staff have become more comfortable in their jobs. However, first impressions are that it is a very welcome addition to Nairn's dining scene.

NB/ This review is a slightly more detailed version of one I have already placed in the restaurant's own recently-created Facebook page here.

My aim here, as with all reviews of restaurants and hotels which I add in various places (my own blog or 'social media' or specialised review sites), is to be honest and completely fair. I do not think the Sun Dancer yet has a listing in Tripadvisor, but perhaps that will come in due course.

UPDATE (Sunday 19FEB17 16.50 RST [GMT+1]) A rather tardy comment, but my partner and I, together with a friend, visited the Sun Dancer for a second time on Tuesday 10th January 2017, this time for lunch. The lunch menu offered a reasonable range of choices and all three of us had enjoyable meals, nicely presented. The cost was again pretty reasonable too. Happily, the service on this second visit was much slicker than on our earlier visit, whilst still retaining a friendly atmosphere, without being "over familiar" in any way. The restaurant was fairly busy too, for a Tuesday in the middle of winter, with roughly two thirds of the tables being occupied in the main part of the restaurant (the smaller end part was screened off that day). We again occupied a very nice table by the windows at the front of the restaurant so had excellent views out over the Firth. In summary, I'd say we all three were quite happy with our meal and will certainly return in due course, rotating this newish restaurant with the two or three other pretty good eating places in Nairn.

Restaurants and coffee places in Nairn & Elgin - places visited very recently

Reviews of a few places I ate in or had coffee this past weekend:

The Classroom, Nairn: (for dinner on Saturday evening)
I've eaten in this restaurant many times before, as has my partner on a few occasions. We booked late in the afternoon for a dinner booking that evening (Saturday 26th March), half expecting to be told it was fully booked as it was during the Easter weekend, but they were able to take a late-ish booking for 8.45pm; we turned up at about 8.30pm and as predicted it was "hoaching", but they were able to seat us at our table for two immediately, which was a relief as the bar area was really busy and almost every other table was fully occupied. Our orders for food and wine were taken reasonably quickly. We both ended up ordering starters and mains from the 'daily specials'. We both had the crab croquettes with a small salad and a sweet-and-sour dip, which was excellent - the croquettes had nice crunchy outer layers but very tasty creamy potato and crab-filled interiors, nicely set-off with the dips and the salads. For the mains, we both had the venison haunch steaks with black puddings, etc; I've had this particular dish here before so remembered it being pretty good. Vension steaks can sometimes be a bit dry, but previously and on Satturday both our steaks were delicious - cooked quite rare as we both like them, juicy and tender and with a lovely sauce. The accompanying black pudding slices atop disks of very smooth creamy mashed potato and the accompanying veggies were all excellent. We had a very nice bottle of Rioja (red) from the 3rd wine on their list of reds, which was pretty good value I'd say. For pudding one of us wished to have one of the 'daily menu' specials - a variety of panna cotta - which sounded delicious (but was already sold out unfortunately), so we both had the triple Belgian chocolate dessert - it was nicely served and in fact included about 6 separate elements, all delicious and of course quite rich and sinful. In local terms this is one of the more expensive places to eat, but not outrageously so for the quality offered. Despite it being very busy on Saturday, the service was efficient and reasonably prompt whilst remaining friendly and professional. Undoubtedly we shall be back in due course.

The Links TeaRoom, Nairn (for Sunday morning refreshments)
I live very close to this place so very occasionally pop in for a bite to eat, or a coffee if I'm too lazy to do it at home. On Sunday (27th March) we popped in for coffee and hot chocolate after a walk along the beach. The service was very slow, but reasonably friendly and both the decaffeinated latte (for me) and the hot chocolate (for my partner) were excellent. The Tea Room only re-opened a few days ago, just before Easter, after having been closed as usual over the winter, but I expect it will do a roaring trade over coming months. I/we will probably pop in a few times in coming months and recommend it, provided you are not in a rushing hurry.

Brewers Fayre, Linkwood Lodge, Elgin (for Sunday lunch)
This is not one of the best meals I have ever had (by a long way), but it did represent extremely good value, with pretty slick service from friendly, attentive personnel. The food was modest in cost, but perfectly nice and acceptable. I've eaten in a few Brewers Fayre outlets before and this was similar. My partner had seen them, but never eaten in one before, so we decided to visit yesterday (Sunday 27th March) for lunch. The restaurant was quite busy, but we found a table easily enough, the ordering system is straightforward and the person who took our order was friendly and efficient, as was the person who delivered our food and drinks. Our orders took a little while to arrive, but on the other hand that indicated that the food was likely freshly prepared, which it was. A 14oz rib-eye for my partner, which given the very modest cost was quite good and cooked 'rare' as requested; it represents amazing value in my view (I had a few small mouthfuls of it). My Thai chicken curry was not brilliant, but still very nice and the spicy crackers and sweet/sour dip were nice too. You don't go to a Brewers Fayre for gourmet food, but they do serve decent food, fairly quickly, and the staff are generally friendly and attentive. I can certainly see a return visit in due course. NB/ Brewers Fayre restaurants are often close to Premier Inn hotels, as both are owned by the same company; this one is located in a small commercial area just off the main A96 road on the eastern edge of Elgin.

So there we have it, quite a lot of food over a very enjoyable couple of days. In fact I eat out fairly frequently, usually at least once a week, so I may start including brief reviews here in future. I hope others visiting or living in this part of Scotland may find this useful.