UPDATE 2018: Bit of a late update, Arties has been a place for tapas for a good two years. Although I believe they still serve a normal breakfast menu (forgive me if I’m wrong), lunch is now tapas. I’ve been there a couple of times but as I’m not a great lover of tapas (my husband is and in fact very soon we’re going to Seville where we have a tapas tour booked) I much preferred the Arties of old when they served good old smashed avo’ on toast.
Arties have taken over The Foresters Arms in Graffham, a pub. We’ll check it out and let you know very soon what it’s like.
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My sister had a Groupon voucher for brunch at Artie’s Kitchen in Southgate, Chichester. How could I refuse when she asked if I would like to go with her? It’s my favourite café in Chichester.
Artie’s Kitchen was the Artisan Café not so long ago. I remember going along to their open evening just over a year ago. Now they have new owners and a new name.
Not a lot has changed, the two original barista’s are still there, the decor appears to be the same, they have a licence now selling wines and cocktails etc., new tables and are also open Thurs-Sat evenings with a rather nice sounding dinner menu. (They’re not open on a Monday).
The menu for lunch is nice and simple whereas the breakfast one is a little more extensive. We chose Mr Treagust’s breakfast – this is a butcher (H.H Treagust and sons) whom we are familiar with from Emsworth, just a few miles down the road. We had to pay an extra £1 each on top of the Groupon voucher for this which was fine with us.
I had a nice flat white coffee. Unfortunately they don’t have Mr Fitzpatrick cordials any longer, which is a shame as I loved their sour cherry, red grape & hibiscus 🙁
The breakfast was nicely presented and consisted of dry cured bacon, poached eggs on potato cakes, Mr. Treagust sausage patties, grilled cherry tomatoes and a salad garnish. This was served with granary toast. Very nice indeed.
Service I’m sorry to say, is still very slow. It generally starts off fine and the staff are friendly enough but then they sort of forget about you. We waited at least 15 minutes for our plates to be cleared and to be asked if we wanted anything else. Eventually my sister Gill went downstairs to see what they had so I told her I’d have either the pecan pie or the brownie and another flat white. She quickly came back up and said that they were coming up to take our order which was a bit daft as we knew what we wanted – even though I changed my mind 😉 . I waited ages for my second coffee too, again at least 10-15 minutes.
The tart or flan which I had instead was ok, the pastry would have been nicer had it been a sweet, crisp shortcrust pastry. It was more of a custard pie topped with raspberries and strawberries. I was expecting a French tart like the fruit tart I had at Boulangerie Victor Hugo’s in Southampton from what was described to me.
The photo above is the goat’s cheese & caramelised red onion tart served with coleslaw and a little side salad which I had back in May. Whenever I come here I always have this for lunch.
Alas the Hungry Guest’s fabulous pecan pie wasn’t on the menu on this particular visit, again this photo is from May. You can also find the Hungry Guest’s chocolate brownies and pecan pie at their bakery/deli (which is lovely and sell Mr.Fitzpatrick cordials – or they did last time I went) and café in Petworth (which isn’t quite as good) and at Salt Café, Wicor Marine, Portchester (which is very good).
The Jazz music in the background was that awful stuff which just sounds like all the musicians are playing different tunes all at the same time. There’s no way you could whistle or hum it afterwards or recognise the ‘tune’ if it came on the radio.
Okay, now this might sound like a few negatives in this review but I still keep coming back to Artie’s. Each time I visit my friend Linda who lives in Chichester, nine times out of ten we always have lunch there and shall continue to do so.
The food is good, nicely presented too and the cakes are (usually) to die for. When I shared my brownie later that evening with my husband Geoff he mentioned how good it was and asked where I’d bought it from. I thought it was pretty obvious myself. Don’t ever change that recipe Hungry Guest!!
Ambience 8
Service 6
Value 8
Quality 8
Living life, loving cake
A x
[…] Café has changed ownership and is now called Artie’s Kitchen. We’ve written a new review which you can read on the above […]
[…] and we met my cycling friend Linda. Whenever Linda and I meet up in Chichester we normally go to Artie’s Kitchen in Southgate – which was once Artisan Café – but I had told her about the new pub so […]