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Inverness Restaurants


dougal

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Before today's game I decided to go for a bite to eat in the Castle Restaurant on Castle Street

Now this establishment is still my no1 favourite eatery in town and I have dined there many many times over the years

Delicious food, great portions, reasonably priced and always busy with hungry customers

Does anyone know when the Castle Restaurant opened in Inverness I'd guess it would have been the 1970's but my first memories were the early 80s?

Over the years many restaurants have opened and closed their doors in Inverness but the Castle Restaurant keeps out serving the lot

What memories do others have of restaurants from the great days of yore? (past or present)

Dougal

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I remember going into the castle rest. in the late 60's on the way home from lifeboys/BB's  the 'mama' used to sit at the door and would, if asked nicely provide thirsty loons with a large glass of water.

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Loved a Wimpy Burger when they were probs the only fast food joint in the town...whilst on Church St. Quarterpounder with Cheese was my fave.

 

As far as the Castle St resteraunt, the place is legendary in inverness. If it was to ever shut down, i think there would be a serious amount of unhappy people. Probably one oof the most loved estasblishments in the city

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I remember my folks used to take me to a chinese on the High Street it was downstairs think where Burtons is now 

 

 

 

I remember my folks used to take me to a chinese on the High Street it was downstairs think where Burtons is now 

 

That was a feckin laundry.

 

 

Hope you enjoyed the soup Gordie!

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Does anyone know when the Castle Restaurant opened in Inverness I'd guess it would have been the 1970's but my first memories were the early 80s?

 

The Castle Restaurant used to be called the Castle Snack Bar and, as far as I recollect, existed as such from at least the early 60s and in its early days was a very popular venue for local youth. It is still run by the Lipton family and Brian, the older of the two brothers, has been in charge for years. It has, as Dougal suggests, a very good reputation locally. Brian Lipton is actually Alan Savage's son Paul's father in law.

Does anyone remember the Chinese restaurant below street level on High Street? I think a snooker room was in there before. When it was a Chinese there used to be a rumour that 20 minutes before they brought your food you could hear dogs yelping :lol:

And of course we all miss the Italian cafes - the Locarno, Ness Cafe, Dorandos and, as already mentioned, the Rendezvous where used to nip in for a pee on the way home from BBs until the wifie caught me.

Morrisons in the market was also pretty good and of course just round the corner there was the Cafe George and the one in Queensgate beside what is now Fraser the butcher.

Nowadays we have to rely far too much on supermarket cafes which in Inverness are universally poor. The Tesco Inshes one is a nightmare where equipment breaks down on a regular basis and they take weeks to get it sorted. Tesco's regular excuse is that it's a franchise run by somebody else so not their fault but I'm sure they're happy enough to take the rent and in any case this is just another example of the contempt with which Tesco have treated the people of Inverness for years.

I would have thought Asda might have taken the opportunity of cashing in when they opened but, quite frankly, their cafe is downright awful as well. One morning their breakfast service was in such disarray that they were giving them away for nothing but you would actually have had to pay me quite a lot to eat the disgusting cold gelatinous mass which they handed me.

And not even Morrisons can fully upstage these twin disasters. The food is actually a fair bit better than the others because it is individually cooked, but the service is so slow (as it is in the rest of the shop because they are understaffed throughout) that you can sometimes wait half an hour for your food.

I actually miss the old Safeway cafes - especially the one in Margaret Street - which were the best Supermarket cafes in town.

But for a really decent breakfast and by far the biggest and best bacon rolls in town - Cobbs at Highland Industrial Supplies!

Edited by Charles Bannerman
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Coffee or hot orange in the Rendevous after B B bible class on Sundays.  late 40's / early 50 's.

That was long before I was born :ohmy:

 

 

The Rendezvous was one of my favourites too.  I think it was still there right up to the 70s at least.  I remember treating my old mother to a high tea there in the mid 60s, and she was horrified that it had cost 7 shillings and sixpence (37 and a half pence in today's money). 

I also liked the ice cream in the Ness Cafe, next door. 

A few of the chip shops had seating areas too, Pagliari's in Academy street, the West end in Eastgate, and I think the Young street one.  Isn't it strange how fish suppers always seemed better in one's younger days?

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Coffee or hot orange in the Rendevous after B B bible class on Sundays.  late 40's / early 50 's.

That was long before I was born :ohmy:

 

 

The Rendezvous was one of my favourites too.  I think it was still there right up to the 70s at least.  I remember treating my old mother to a high tea there in the mid 60s, and she was horrified that it had cost 7 shillings and sixpence (37 and a half pence in today's money). 

I also liked the ice cream in the Ness Cafe, next door. 

A few of the chip shops had seating areas too, Pagliari's in Academy street, the West end in Eastgate, and I think the Young street one.  Isn't it strange how fish suppers always seemed better in one's younger days?

 I must have been around 17 or 18, I had a Norton Jubilee 250 twin bike. With a mate of mine I travelled North from Heywood which is now in Rochdale on a two weeks camping holiday ( cica 1960) . I can remember distincly Inverness town centre and on the roundabout or nearby  ( somewhere were the Jarvis hotel is now ) , a very nice restaurant I think was the Rendevous , no objection to bikers dressed in black leathers..

Being bad cooks for our age, we got most of our fodder there. When I moved up here some 50 years later was I disapointed to see my old watering hole was no more . Instead a ruined town centre the planners have a lot to answer for.  I would leke to vapourise all the alterations.

The other week I noticed a small back St cafe'  low and behold, " The Rendevous", I did wonder if there was a conection. Imagine my amazement to read this post.

I well remember the waitress chiding us to leave the Invernes-shire girls alone.  We were never short of company that's for sure. Like something out of Greece.  Long before Olivier Newton Bomb. Nothing ever changes.

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I well remember the waitress chiding us to leave the Invernes-shire girls alone.  We were never short of company that's for sure.

 

Was this in your "Men Behaving Badly" phase?

 

You could say that, hardly a man only a boy though.  Always in bother, I think the expression “Jack the Lad “fits

It all changed when I met my lovely wife and she made me grow up, and do something useful

When you get old and you look back, it’s like your life is some sort of novel, very surreal

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Isn't it strange how fish suppers always seemed better in one's younger days?

 

Think it was the old newspaper it was wrapped in!

 

 Aye and the extra salt and watery vinegar, fish supper, pickled onion all for under a bob.

 

I was a pickled egg man myself, and I remember wipeing my greasy hands on the old newspaper before throwing it in the bin and when you got home your hands were all black!  I think it was about 2/6 in my day from Charlies.

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  • 2 weeks later...

Nobody seems to have mentioned the cafe on Greig St, where the elderly Italian gentleman (what was his name? - was it Serafini? - he had a really beautiful daughter!) used to make terrific coffees with MILK (NOT water!)in a wee pan on a gas stove, and didn't mind how long one stayed in one of his cubicals (as long has one had bought a coffee)

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Nobody seems to have mentioned the cafe on Greig St, where the elderly Italian gentleman (what was his name? - was it Serafini? - he had a really beautiful daughter!) used to make terrific coffees with MILK (NOT water!)in a wee pan on a gas stove, and didn't mind how long one stayed in one of his cubicals (as long has one had bought a coffee)

It was Salvadori's Jock. They did legendary ice cream as well with raspberry sauce if you wanted it. For some strange reason I have a random memory of sitting in one of Mr Salvadori's cubicles watching a Wimbledon final in the mid 60s on his TV where a German called Bungert got thrashed by, I think, Newcombe.

I think the old man's name was Salvatori Salvadori and the son was called Vaaro. The daughter who, by the time I was taking notice of these things might have been late 20s early 30s, was indeed a looker.

Salvadori's has been a Chinese takeaway for over 30 years now and indeed most Greig Street businesses have changed over the years.

Champan's Garage is of course the ICT Social Club, Frank Hill's paper shop is a barber's, Mr Baddon's bike shop is a general merchant's, the Coop is Highland TV services, Jimmy Munro's grocer shop sells and mends computers, I'm not sure if the Post Office, which still has the gold letters embedded in the pavement, is still a Post Office, I think the Chemist's is still a Chemist.... and Diggar's is definitely still a barber's with his son Dennis, who must be a few years over 60 now, still running it.

And the ghost of Diggar still stands out on the pavement, coupon in hand,shouting good natured abuse at John Brooman or any other passer by known to him......

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Funnily enough I thought it was Serafini too, He had at least two cracking daughters one blonde and the other whom I believe went to live in the USA was a dark haired beauty. That was in my BB days again we were a noisy bunch when we went in there on a Friday night. but nobody ever objected to us. I was madly in love with the blonde one but then so was everyone else. Those were the days.

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