GAL Restaurant, Frodsham Street, Chester

Feb 8 2008 by Glyn Mon Hughes, Liverpool Daily Post

Calorie-counting Glyn Mon Hughes found a healthy choice at one new eaterie

IF MY GP wasn’t a genuinely good guy, I’d hate him. "You need to lose weight," he said. Short of taking up residence in the gym and becoming a total keep-fit bore it means one thing – eating and drinking less.

No easy task for a would-be foodie who sits notebook poised every time Jamie or Nigella grace the screen.

And then there are these reviews. So what better than to seek out a restaurant where healthy salads are not made life-threatening after being doused in oil, where everything is deep-fried and where vegetables – save for chips – are an endangered species. Not an unreasonable request difficult to fulfil.

So to GAL, a new restaurant on the Chester scene which only opened its doors 10 days before Christmas. In a former life, this place was known as The Office, which started off promisingly and then faded into a kind of nothingness.

GAL – formed from the initials of the investors in the venture – is minimal though not clinical. It’s not cluttered, feels light and airy and diners are bathed in a blue light. Having said that, it was little wonder it was uncluttered since there were only four diners when we went – and this a stylish place with an interesting menu and richly deserving of a place on the somewhat uncrowded list of Chester restaurants.

But could they deliver what I wanted – a calorie-counted meal which would taste of something and would not leave me craving chips on the way home? As it happened, they could.

We did choose a bottle of wine without veering too far off the straight and narrow, though I also had some sparkling water – a perky little Italian number, which was very refreshing.

The wine list is in thrall to no nation in particular, with a widely representative range available. Both reds and whites range in price from a very reasonable £9.95 a bottle up to £45, while sparkling wines and Champagnes start at £17, with the top of the range coming in at £100. In the end, we were torn between a 2005 South African Pinotage from Forge Mill at Wellington at £12.95, or an interesting-sounding Valpolicella (£13.95) which had been aged two years in wood, 25pc in barrique and 75pc in laye barrels.

We eventually selected the South African offering which was rich and heavy, as they always are. "A lot going on here," suggested Mark.

As far as food, it would have been perfectly possible to have a light meal or gorge on some of the specialities. There are marinated olives and bruschetta as appetisers along with salads: the hot smoked salmon, flaked and served with baby gem lettuce, cucumber and red onion served in a minted yoghurt dressing sounded perfect.

And there were also some different dishes on the list of starters: creamed butternut squash and sage soup, for instance, or spinach and ricotta tart with pear, watercress and rocket salad.

For main course, I was tempted by the pan-seared scallops with a lemongrass and coriander risotto finished with a sweet red pepper dressing, though it was the list of specials which attracted us both.

For Mark, it was to be the sauteed chicken livers, which came served with crispy pancetta and baby onions in a red wine sauce as well as chargrilled polenta (£4.95).

"Excellent," he said when it arrived. "I’m not a fan of liver but this is melt- in-your-mouth and the sauce is just right. Rich, to complement the liver, but not overpowering."

I tried to pay at least lip service to being healthy and opted for beetroot, goat’s cheese and baby spinach salad with crème fraiche and chervil dressing (£4.95). The cheese was unusually subtle for a goat’s cheese and the salad a tasty combination of strong tastes set off well with a slightly piquant dressing.

Although the main courses offer a mixture of pastas, steaks – the usual fare – I stuck with the specials menu and asked for oven- roasted sea bass with crab and spring onions, served with tenderstalk broccoli and sauce vinegre (£13.95). The bass was plentiful and succulent, though the crab was a little disappointing, as it was tasteless and added little to the subtlety of the seabass.

Mark went for a six-ounce Moroccan lamb burger flavoured with garlic, red onion, cumin and coriander, with a yoghurt and cucumber sauce, and served with fries (£8.50). The fries arrived carefully arranged, just like a dry stone wall, though the rest of the meal looked extremely appetising.

The lamb was excellent, the spices not too overpowering and well suited to the wine.