László Varga

I have been meaning to write about this restaurant we went to in mid December, but I got lost a bit among all the stuff I had to do, so I did not really have the time to write about it. So, better late than never, I would lke to present to you Bricks, the hidden restaurant.

Due to its location and maybe due to the previous bar that was in its place, Bricks is not a well known restaurant in Cluj. It is also relatively new, so people did not really have the chance to get to know it. II think it is something that needs to be remedied 🙂 . The place deserves a bit more popularity. I like it’s style, it’s furniture and the general atmosphere that immediately gets you, once you go down the stairs and enter the restaurant.

To move matters into a more objective light, I’d like to write firstly about the food. The food is… well, I would say special. You do not really find anything here, that you eat in other restaurants. There at lots of varieties to choose from, like Italian food, Chinese food, French food and special sea food (I guess that is the reason the place was given the sub-name:”(M)eating point”). From this huge variety it was quite difficult to choose from, but in the end I settled for pork meat with ratatouille and my girlfriend ate chicken with green pea pure. Both were strange, but great combinations and the way that they were presented were also quite stylish.

Next, I will move the focus to the table. There were no table-cloths at all on the tables, which is something that you would expect from a high-class restaurant. Instead, the actual table-cloth was a piece of stylish A3 paper, containing the menu, which is usually an indication of a low-cost restaurant (although I’d rather have a piece of paper that is constantly being replaced than an old sheet that sometimes gets washed). In this case, however, the stylish menu had a special designation: the great big question mark at the “Desert” section. Well, we could not leave with this big question open, so we decided to also have desert and asked the waitress how we could find out what the desert was. She told us she’d be right back with the menu. Why the menu? – we though – we have already seen that and there was no desert in it… Well, we were in for a big surprise, when instead of a menu, she brought a huge stamper and just stamped the missing piece of the menu there 🙂 .

Having the desert options in front of us, my girlfriend decided to buy a cheesecake, while I went for the Bricks Special, and boy I made the right decision :). It was delicious. It had all sorts of flavours in it, ranging from orange to cinnamon which I think are best tasted than described.

In conclusion, I can say the restaurant is great. The way you get treated for the money you give is well balanced. It is perfect to get out for a little bit of “fine-dining” for not too much money.

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In the past year we have developed a habit of somehow winding up at Marty, a local restaurant-chain just to enjoy a cheesecake. While the overall satisfaction of the services is not the best, the meal at Marty is quite acceptable and I like the overall theme and atmosphere of the restaurant.

Lately a new restaurant has been opened at Polus Center further enlarging the chain. It so happened, that yesterday we forgot to buy something from the supermarket and we decided to fill this gap by some quick-shopping and a visit to the new Marty restaurant called “Marty West” (referring to the fact that it is in the western part of the city).

The atmosphere is again, very Marty-like, the menus are colorful and appealing. I can just congratulate their designer and general “stylist”: the place looks great. I would like to comment, however, on the impression left by the waiters. There are lots of them buzzing around trying to serve everyone and they genuinely look busy and ready to serve. The problem is when they actually serve you. It is not the fact, that they have bad service or the food was brought late or anything usual one might not like. I think there’s just a general lack of organization and devotion from the individual waiters. This would be OK, if it happens only once, but the truth is that this is the general feeling I get, whenever I get to Marty and that is not OK… They should at least try to sell that they are devoted. A smile, a bit more attention would help a lot 😉 .

There is, however, a real business-saver at Marty: their cheesecake. And not just any cheesecake, the original cheesecake. It’s delicious. It is not just me, it is everyone I talk to 😉 . It is a bit pricy 13 RON (€3.00) compared to other local prices, but it’s taste and the stylish way it is served is worth it. Once in a month or two it is a must 😀 . So, if I got your mouth watering already, and you haven’t been to Marty lately, my advice is: get to the nearest Marty restaurant, order a cheesecake, try to ignore the incompetence of the staff and just enjoy the cheesecake 🙂 .

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