A fantastic restaurant. Excellent food, imaginative and fresh, good use of fresh fruit and vegetables. Excellent service, only down fall being a bit pricey.    [02 Jun 2003 14:33:52]

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     ­Anonymous   

Not worth the money
The service was ok, although a little slow. You can only buy the house wine by the glass which is 3.50 and not that nice. The starters (mediterranean vegetables; chicken liver parfait) were good and generous size portions. The main courses were overly salty which ruined them and for the price (23.50 for 3 courses) this was a major dissapointment especially as when we commented nothing was offered to compensate for this. Dessert was a good finish to the meal which had been a bit of a dissapointment.    [11 Aug 2003 18:19:29]

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     ­rebecca   

Best Tiramisu I've tasted!
Food: Wonderful, though quite fussy. You have got to like everything herbed and spiced and generally flavourful. Had a very nice mushroom soup, a lovely limey chicken dish and the best tiramisu I've had!
Service: I'm fussy about service and this was just right - helpful and friendly, but not overfamiliar, attentive, but not too quick.
Ambiance: The only downside - the small stone-walled rooms mean it's cold when empty and hot and noisey when full.
Price: Bit expensive, but worth it.    [03 Nov 2003 15:51:21]

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Recommended Dishes: White Chocolate Tiramisu

     ­Sharon   

Pooh Pooh
It must have been a bad night, waiter short tempered, could do with changing the housewine, that said, food was excellent.    [10 Dec 2003 10:20:23]

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Recommended Dishes: Starters

     ­KFC Lover   

Absolutely Awful!
I had telephoned three days before to make a reservation where I asked if it was actual Brazilian authentic cuisine, I was told yes. I was also informed there would be live Portuguese music that evening. There was no live music, the food was awful. Little did they know my partner is Portuguese (Brazil formally Portuguese) he asked to speak to the chef three times where we were told he was busy (the restaurant- if you can call it that had 6 people eating! I thought it was common courtesy for the chef to come to the table?! There is no way the food was Brazillian, my partner had the feijoada of which he said had NOT been cooked by a Brazillian or Portugese person. We could not eat the food and left with a £65 bill! Complained politely but no apology, why did they not want us to see the chef-mmmm i wonder! The caipirinha had to go back twice as they had forgotten the sugar- quite an important ingredient! I would seriously not recommend anyone to even think about eating here and i really mean it. The service was awful, the people rude and lied about the Portuguese chef and the music.    [20 Dec 2003 18:05:05]

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Recommended Dishes: Nothing at all !

     ­Tania   

Ignore the negative comments - it's great!
Bocanova is one of my favourite restaurants in Bristol. I just wanted to write this as an antidote to the no-holds-barred comments of Tania. How her partner can tell whether the feijoada was not cooked by a Brazilian/Portuguese person, I don't know. It also seems rather presumptuous to assume the descendent of ex-colonialist Portuguese would be some kind of expert in modern Brazilian cuisine. Suffice to say, I think the comments are narrow minded and far too harsh. My Brazilian friends have had nothing but praise for the restaurant. I strongly recommend it myself. The food has only improved since it opened four years ago. Although a tad pricey, the food is excellent and the atmosphere very pleasant. Judge for yourself    [13 Aug 2004 07:26:16]

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     ­Matthew, Bristol   

I agree
I've eaten there a number of times and love the place. It can seem a touch cold at times when empty and is a little on the pricey side but I have nothing but praise for the food. There always seems to be some sort of live music when I'm there (although this could just be pure luck on my part) but overall, I'd have to give this 4.5/5    [28 Jan 2005 17:08:04]

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     ­Anonymous