Perla

I had never heard of this place, just passed it and we decided to give it a try. A very varied menu of western and eastern style tapas, completely unique to the local scene. We had 6 main tapas including the stornoway black pudding & scallops (which was amazing!!!), Chilli & peppercorn chicken and the gambas pil pil, all were fantastic! it has obviously had a makeover recently and it looks good, very welcoming. Staff were all very pleasant and keen to provide best service possible. I would defo recommend this place especially as they are running a 20% discount on food and drink when dining there!

We were actually heading to Giraffe when we noticed this had opened, and it serves international tapas so that made our decision for us. It feels more like a restaurant now than when I was last in two incarnations ago. It’s darker, more subdued and yet somehow better. The service was a bit slow and slightly confused, but I’m guessing that it must have been very, very recently opened. Firstly they didn’t serve us at all for a few minutes, then after we had ordered they told us our wine wasn’t in stock, then a bottle of it was found, and then the food came and it wasn’t quite what I ordered.
It’s certainly a global menu, with Vietnamese dishes, Chinese, Spanish, Thai, Scottish, Malaysian, Greek, Russian and others. I went for the Sambal Beef, the Minced Beef Balls with Ginger Sauce, and the Chicken with Lemongrass, and my partner went with the Gambas Pil Pil (prawns in chilli sauce) and the Hummus and Tzatziki with bread. We also asked for a side of olives and bread, which we had to remind them about.
First thing to say and the ultimate point is that all the food was good. However there was a few little niggles. My partner really liked her Gambas Pil Pil and thought the Hummus and Tzatziki was not bad. Her only issue was the paucity of bread supplied with it, but presumably that would have been supplied gratis if asked for, I would hope!
My dishes were a wee bit more hit and miss, firstly my chicken wasn’t chicken, it was pork, and I couldn’t even figure out what dish it was meant to be, it certainly wasn’t in a spring roll which was the only pork dish I could find on the menu! My sambal beef was nice, with decent soft meat, it was specified as being a dry curry, I would say too dry though, it almost literally was just flavoured meat and it could have been spicier for me. My beef balls were confusing too, because of my masquerading pork dish I wasn’t confident that this was what I had ordered either, but on reflection my concern was actually because the balls were in fried dumplings that weren’t even remotely spherical. They were definitely Chinese-​style and pretty tasty though I didn’t detect enough ginger to merit the name.
If I went in a couple of weeks I bet I would go with a four, but with the teething problems a three is a fair rating.