Frankie & Benny’s new dessert menu

We’ve had New York on our minds – so what better way to relive our holiday in the Big A than a trip to Frankie & Benny’s to try out their new dessert menu? The chain of Italian-American diner-ish restaurants is exactly the sort of place you’d stop off for a coffee while shopping in a mall, or for a pre-cinema ice cream treat. And their new dessert menu includes waffles and mega ice cream sundaes so we couldn’t wait to tuck in.

What do we think? There’s a lot of choice, including all the classics: Knickerbocker Glories, New York cheesecake, Tiramisu and more. We plumped for a Cinnamon Waffle Crunch – basically a deep golden waffle with vanilla ice cream and cinnamon and toffee sauce – a Banoffee Sundae, with banana pieces, toffee sauce and ice cream – and a mini sundae for Olivia: strawberry ice cream topped with mini eggs.

What can we say? If you’ve got a sweet tooth, you’ll enjoy them. We would have preferred them to be served in a glass dish rather than a plastic one – there’s something lovely and retro about heavy glass sundae glasses that you can’t capture with plastic ones (even if they stand up to wear better). The waffle was nice – like all the servings at F&B’s, it was an American-sized helping (that’s our kind way of saying that it was bigger than it needed to be) – and that cinnamon scent is just so fragrant and evocative.

We were sat deliberating whether we thought F&B’s really do serve the best American-themed desserts or not – there’s plenty of competition these days, and Krispy Kreme is always at the front of our minds – when a massive goblet whisked by us. I grabbed the waitress and said: “What was that?” in a tone of hushed awe. Turns out you can get the sundaes in a double portion to share – and that’s a mighty big portion – and the divine dessert we saw was a Yankee Doodle, strawberry, vanilla and chocolate ice cream with a red berry sauce. It looked a real knockout, and the two girls sharing it were diving in. Prices are great here too – sundaes are all around £5.25, and we had three courses for three of us for £50 all included. If you’re a sucker for sweets, you know where to go…

We received a £50 voucher to spend and were invited to try Frankie & Benny’s restaurant by the management. These are our honest views and opinions but we want to be transparent.