 Look at the barrels! 
Not Really A Cafe, But A Fab Pub!
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Recommendation added: 11/04/2007 08:11
By: dewberry (YSUK rating +817)dewberry has been thanked 4 times for this contribution
"During a recent stay in Gloucester Mark was working and I was bored out of my head sitting in our small hotel room, so I decided to pop out and find somewhere to grab a bit of lunch. After a few false starts (ie. asking for directions from the locals then having to explain that no, it's not something like McDonalds I'm looking for) Café Rene was pointed out to me as an excellent place for lunch as well as being a bit 'more interesting than the other dives in the area', to quote the bored looking girl serving at the nearby newsagents.
Intrigued I made my way towards Café Rene and it's such a lovely place that I returned the same night with Mark (after a quick explanation about what I was doing visiting pubs on my own while he's working!) and it quickly became a firm favourite throughout the 2 – 3 weeks we spent in Gloucester.
Located in a smallish side street, Café Rene looks great even from the outside. It's one of those kinds of places which you'd probably pass by without a second glance if you didn't know it was there, with only really the small arrangement of benches and an up-in-the-air pub sign to herald your arrival. It looks very old fashioned and industrialised from the outside, but in a good way as many of Gloucester's pubs and bars seem to have been hit with the monotone glass and chrome stick – Café Rene is definitely a change from the norm.
Inside its gorgeously unusual. The first thing I noticed was the fact that the bar is propped up on old beer barrels, the effect is amazing and I immediately warmed to the place. After ordering a drink and asking for a menu I went and found myself a seat and spent a while just looking around at the various items of interest inside the pub. The first is definitely the old well which is (oddly) located directly in the middle of the building, it would have been lovely to be able to toss a few coins into the well and make a wish but the top is completely covered over with not even a gap small enough to squeeze a 5p piece into – probably for the best as a steep well and drunken customers probably wouldn't mix too well!
Anyway, by now I was starving and the single shot of Malibu I'd ordered at the bar was making me feel even hungrier so I started browsing the menu. Here at Café Rene there are three entirely separate menus; one for lunchtime, one for evening meals and the other for desserts. During this visit I ate from the lunchtime menu, which was so extensive and packed full of delicious sounding possibilities that I actually checked the front of the menu that I'd been given the correct one! I had, so in super fast time I ordered a hot Roast Pork Sandwich with Stuffing and Crackling and settled back in my seat to wait for my food.
My sandwich arrived within a few minutes and it was huge. Let me tell you now, portion sizes in Café Rene are phenomenal. Most pub sandwiches are usually an inch or so thick unless you're unlucky enough to be eating in one of those establishments where a floppy ham sarnie on thin bread is the best you're going to get, but here the sandwich rose up from the plate like a skyscraper dwarfing everything else on the table! OK, OK, slight exaggeration there but it really was the biggest sandwich I've ever been served in a pub.
Served with an excellent side salad, the Roast Pork sandwich was absolutely delicious. Chunks of beautifully cooked fresh pork were topped with a herby home made stuffing and this was, in turn, topped with crunchy pieces of salty crackling from the pork joint – my mouth's watering just writing this! I was asked when I ordered if I'd like butter on my sandwich or any apple sauce to compliment the meatiness of the meal; I declined the butter and asked for a small dollop of apple sauce to be served in a dish so I could add it myself. As it was, only a small scraping of sauce was needed to moisten the sandwich slightly as although pork is a notoriously dry meat the chef at Café Rene had cooked it to perfection and it retained much of its natural moisture. I could honestly have eaten my fingers after finishing my sandwich – and in a greedy mood I think I could possibly have gone straight back to the bar and ordered another! Absolutely wonderful.
Subsequent visits assured me that the evening meals are also without fault; Mark loved the Caribbean Lamb Curry which he commented was one of the most authentic and tasty he's ever eaten. My personal favourite was a roasted duck breast which was cooked and served in a delicious fruity sauce, with fried rosemary potatoes and fresh veggies. This truly is a meal to be savoured; the duck is perfectly cooked (a miracle in itself!), while the thin pan fried potatoes are divine with a crunchy yet melt in the mouth texture. The fruit sauce compliments the duck beautifully and lends a bit of sophistication to the meal.
The dessert menu looked to be equally good, although I didn't order from this menu during any of our visits as at seven months pregnant I'm frantically trying to watch my weight. However, I spotted a few diners eating various sorbets and sticky looking cakes and pastries and everything looked delicious – everyone else certainly seemed to be enjoying their pudding anyway!
The food prices at Café Rene are very reasonable; a light meal from the lunchtime menu will set you back around £5, while to eat from the evening menu is more expensive at £8 - £13 per meal. The thing is the portion sizes are so large and the food so good that even though this isn't the cheapest place in the world to eat you're still getting fantastic value for money. The staff seemed to be happy to swap and change menu items so if you fancy a certain dish but can't stand one of it's accompaniments then don't be embarrassed to ask for a substitution, I definitely got the impression that the staff I dealt with genuinely wanted me to enjoy my meal and return to this pub over the umpteen others I'd walked past to get here.
The bar is well stocked with your usual lagers, beers, top branded spirits and the ever present alcopops but what really makes this place stand out is its fab range of real ales and ciders. I stuck to Malibu and Coke during all our visits, but Mark drank the unusually named Cheddar Valley Orange Cider which he said was tangy and refreshing after a hard day at work. Prices at the bar are on a par with other pubs in the local area, although I did find the brilliant quality house wines are slightly cheaper than elsewhere.
The atmosphere in Café Rene wildly differs depending on whether you're visiting during the day or at night. In the daytime it's fairly quiet with an older clientele who are obviously visiting to enjoy a good meal, while in the evening the pub gradually gets busier and louder with a wide variety of customers from your groups of blokes who are popping in for a couple of pints on their way home to organised hen parties and family dinners. Personally I preferred visiting this pub in the evening as there's definitely more life to the place after around 7pm. Although they have a 24 hour licence standard opening hours seem to be 12 noon until around midnight, with later closing on a Friday and Saturday night. I didn't see any trouble or aggressive behaviour at any time on our numerous visits (apart from one argument which I won't count as it was me and Mark!) and this made it a nice pub in which to sit and relax without having to look over your shoulder at every raised voice you hear.
Disabled access is superb. The wide doorways and aisles make for easy manoeuvrability if you're using a wheelchair, and anyone with any degree of mobility problems will be able to make their way around Café Rene with little or no trouble. Likewise the seating arrangements in both the bar area and also in the non-smoking restaurant make life easy for those of you using a wheelchair as all you need to do is get one of the ultra helpful members of staff to remove a chair for you and you can get as close to the table as you need to be.
To find Café Rene is easy peasy once you know it's there. Once you're in Gloucester proper, simply get onto the main A4301 and follow this until you see Southgate Street which is pretty much opposite a large hotel called the New County. Café Rene is located directly opposite the hotel, through a large ornate archway.
Café Rene
31 Southgate Street
Gloucester
Gloucestershire
GL1 1TP
Tel: 01452 309340"
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