Pizza Hut, Monks Cross Shopping Park, York

RESTAURANTS keen to attract more families should take a leaf out of our book and hit the Hut.

At the Monks Cross branch of Pizza Hut, youngsters are not looked upon as noisy nuisances, but as little people who are entitled to have a fun and friendly dining experience just like everyone else.

In fact, we had only just sat down when our waiter came over with a free goodie bag for our two-year-old son, Elliot.

While he rummaged through its contents - Garfield The Movie colouring book, crayons, a card game and some snazzy black shades - we got the chance to check out the menus.

Then Elliot spotted a balloon, and of course, he had to have one. No problem, said our waiter. What colour would he like? Seconds later a bright red helium balloon arrived.

"Make sure you tie it up tightly, or it'll end up on the ceiling," said the waiter, pointing to the balloon graveyard above our heads.

Sure enough, seconds later, our balloon slipped its moorings and floated to the ceiling. Our waiter quickly returned with another one. Nothing seemed too much trouble.

On previous visits to Pizza Hut we had enjoyed the £5.49 "all-you-can-eat-from-the-buffet" lunch time offer, which we found to be great value. But the evening offer of £6.99 for a starter and main meal (Monday to Thursday after 5pm) seemed to be an even better deal, because some of the starters were £3.29, while most of the pizzas cost £5.99 and the pasta dishes are £6.99 each.

Knowing we had about 40 minutes before Elliot's timer went off (he had already spotted the play area next door), we ordered fairly quickly.

From a choice of starters which included garlic dipsters (£2.99), barbecue chicken wings (£3.29), crispy coated mushrooms (£2.99), potato wedges (£2.99) or potato skins (£3.29.), I went for the Dippin' Chicken (£3.29) - six goujons of "melt in the mouth" chicken breast pieces covered with light crunchy breadcrumbs.

It came with a tangy barbecue sauce for "dippin'" and a handful of lettuce leaves. Very tasty.

For her starter, my wife Jayne helped herself to a bowlful of salad from the salad bar (you can also have this as a side dish or have a plateful as a main meal).

She had the choice of all the usual salad suspects, such of tomatoes, green peppers, cucumber and lettuce, but also various pasta salads, rice, potato salad, together with different dressings and toppings.

Elliot tucked into a £2.99 children's meal of crispy chicken pieces and potato wedges (which made a nice change from fries) plus fresh orange juice - the alternatives were spaghetti Bolognese and pizza.

We all shared a garlic bread (£1.99), which Elliot thought was delicious.

If you thought pizza was simply a piece of dough covered in various vegetables, meat and cheese, then you've never been to Pizza Hut!

The restaurant offers four different types; its famous Pan Pizza - "light and fluffy inside, golden brown outside"; The Italian - a light pizza, finished with flour; the Stuffed Crust "which is filled with hot cheese"; and The Edge, which is crisp and thin and covered in thick-cut toppings.

After much deliberation I chose a Super Supreme, cooked "the Italian way".

It was covered in a mountain of toppings - spicy pork, pepperoni, ham, spicy beef, mushrooms, green peppers, red onions and black olives. Super in every way.

Jayne was impressed with her Pan Pizza vegetable supreme, which was topped with fresh mushrooms, green peppers, red onions and chunks of tomato.

But she was so full she only managed two portions, the rest was put in a takeaway box so she could have it at home.

If you don't fancy the pizza then there's always the pasta - tagliatelle carbonara, Mediterranean vegetable penne and spaghetti Bolognese (all individually priced at £6.99), or there's Caesar Salad (£5.99) and Chicken Caesar Salad (£6.99).

Despite a tantalising dessert menu - chocolate fudge cake, New York-style baked cheesecake, hot sticky toffee pudding and double chocolate sundae (all priced £2.99) - we decided to skip sweets,

choosing instead to treat Elliot to a trip to the Ice Cream Factory (£1.49 extra on children's meals).

You get a little tub, pour in the required number of Smarties, chocolate buttons and Dolly Mixtures (which in our case was quite a lot) and then place it under the ice-cream machine and pull the lever. And you can go back as many times as you like. Brilliant!

With a couple of diet cokes (£1.59, including a free top-up), the bill came to an extremely reasonable £22.14 - which was so cheap we thought they had made a mistake!

Pizza Hut, Monks Cross Shopping Park, York

Tel 01904 6755555

Food: tasty

Service: attentive

Value: great deals

Ambience: fun

Disabled access: Yes

Simon visited on July 26

Restaurant reviewers aim to be fair and accurate. Any comments on this review should be addressed to Chris Titley, Features Content Editor, Evening Press, 76-86 Walmgate, York, YO1 9YN or email

features@ycp.co.uk

Updated: 08:26 Saturday, August 07, 2004