catering at center parcs - cooking IN as well

[AugustusGloop]

We are going for a weekend this winter and don't want to spend too much on eating out. Have booked the american place for the Sat but want to eat in the rest I think.

How good is the oven - I havea vague memory of someone telling me they are shit, are in a woodland exec. We were thinking of buying some Marks or Waitrose stuff , or even bbq ing.

And next time we go we will be taking the cafetiere for some proper coffee

There is no cafetiere? FGS you get that in a caravan in france.

I've been a lot recently... Aug08, Oct08, and have booked Jan09. Though prior to that, it was Aug07, Dec06 (I think). Can you tell I like it there

Hucks has been redone, according to my latest Village Life magazine. Hucks has a children's buffet. Can't say I've ever been in it - I prefer the Sports Cafe (even the children who I sometimes go with, like the Sports Cafe menu - most things come with chips!).

I have on my list of things to take:
Large frying pan (the one's in the villa seemed a bit small to my liking)
Deep bowls (for my porridge)
Washing up liquid plus dishwasher tablets (why buy a new bottle/packet, when I have a 1/2 empty bottle at home already).

There are cafettieres in the exec accomodation.

No cafetiere in the cheapy special offer accommodation

If anyone finds a large pair of tongs in the cheapy accommodation in Pine, Elvedon, they are my dh's.

Thank you

Hucks Menu's - note, file size of some can be a bit large... the children's main menu is 3.5MB. Children's Buffet is £5.25, selection varies, will contain some of the following items plus some seasonal dishes: British Beef Burgers - Fish and Chips - Penne and Tomato Sauce (v) - Meatballs in Tomato Sauce - Macaroni Cheese (v) - BBQ Pork Ribs - Grilled Chicken Breast - Chicken Nuggets - Grilled Salmon Teriyaki - Mashed Potatoes (v) - Rice (v) - Broccoli with Olive Oil (v) - Green Peas & Sweetcorn (v) - Green Beans (v) - Garden Salad (v) with choice of dressing.

If catering for a large family, taking a electric steamer is handy (such as this Tefal one, £18 at Robert Dyas)... for steaming veg, fish etc.

Actually I think it was sherwood

The childrens buffet in Hucks is especially vile

Can anyone get the MADE menu to load on this link www.centerparcs.co.uk/thingstodo/restaurant/index.jsp or is it just my computer? I really want to see what it has but keep getting an error message.

Buffets of any sort are usually worth avoiding in any restaurant, anywhere, not just at CP.

Cooking in the villa is fine, just need to plan ahead a bit and take a few bits with you, such as a steamer. Love the slow cooker idea, that's a great suggestion.
In Summer, I found that certainly lunches were a non-cooked affair... lots of salad, cooked meats, potato salad (we cheated and brought it, though could have made our own).

The MADE menu is 2.8MB. I find a few of the menus 'stick' whilst downloading. If you Right Click and select Save As, then they tend to work. I've just managed to download the MADE menu by Right Clicking and saving it to my desktop.

Ah... but it's corrupted. Adobe failed to open it.

Found an alternative MADE menu. It's from MADE at Whinfell. MADE Menu

Excellent - thanks! We need to eat some lunch when we get there at midday so MADE sounds perfect. It wasn't there whe we went last year.

was at center parcs in elvedene in December 08 and self catered as past experience have been ;-

1. crap food
2. long wait for it (nearly an hour)
3. very expensive for what you get

found that we just did simple easy cook food and also took the slow cooker which will defo take again as could put food on in the morning and come back to nice comfort food .

I'm at Center Parcs (Longleat) this week, so if anyone has any questions, price comparisons with the onsite shop (Parc Marc) then do post and I will try to check in and answer where possible.

Went to Cafe Rouge for a coffee after swimming. Time was around 3.30pm. Asked for a table overlooking pool area, they said they were set for dinner, so we couldn't have one of those and had to sit in the bar area. Sat in the bar area and waited for service, they didn't come over. My mum went to the bar and asked for two coffees - was told it was table service. Waited another couple of minutes... gave up and went to our villa. So that was our experience at Cafe Rouge today, not great.

Strada for dinner tonight was nice. Bit of a sting in the tail though, as we had booked online and they didn't automatically deduct the pre-payment (£20+VAT) from the bill. We realised when walking back to villa, so went back and they did refund £20... no mention about the VAT. So if pre-booking a restaurant, do remember how much you pre-paid and check the bill when they give it to you.

With regards to the ovens in the new style lodges - be aware that they take a VERY LONG time to go off - I mean the fan in the oven is extremely loud and once you have turned the oven off it takes anything up to almost TWO HOURS - yes TWO HOURS - to switch off. We could hardly hear the TV over the noise, and when we spoke to guest services about it they said it was perfectly normal for them to take so long to shut off - so try not to use the oven unless you can handle the racket!

However, other than that we LOVE it there and go at least once a year.

My tip is to take your own non-stick frying pan. Theirs always shed the non-stick coating over the food. Horrible!

We did a mixture of cooking and eating out. I think the best meal was probably the indian take-away that they delivered on our first night - Huckleberrys was awful but that was a couple of years ago and I think they have improved with more 'chain' restaurants etc. My advice would definately be to take your own food or go to a local supermarket because the supermarket on site was really expensive.

the indian restaurant is good at whinfell, the others are pants. The oven was reasonable in the new style lodge, not the best i've ever used but not the worst.