The Meson advertises on the main Pollensa site, and that’s how we’d heard of it, so I guess it’s OK to post a review.
In truth, I’m not sure what to make of it. It has a restaurant style menu, yet it’s effectively, a poolside bar and cafe – and one that’s bit run down at that. I bet it's really popular with local families at the weekend – what with its swimming pool, kiddies playground and all.
We’d gone for its €9 menu lunch. Now, I’m not about to be ultra critical of anywhere that feeds me three courses for that sort of money. But I always remember, from 25+ years back, food critic Egon Ronay doing a TV programme about motorway service station food. What he said was that places should aspire to serving the best food of the type they serve. If you’re serving egg & chips, make it the best ever egg and chips, was Ronay's point. So, I’m not about to be uncritical of a place just because it’s cheap.
We started with a generous portion of macaroni and bolognaise sauce. Nothing to fault here – this was properly cooked pasta, still slightly “al dente” and with a rich meat sauce mixed in, just coating it.
Next up, suckling pig with fried potatoes and salad. But, yes, you’d want the skin on the pork to be crispy, not the flabby fatty inedible stuff that came. And, yes, you’d want the potatoes to have been cooked at a higher temperature so they weren’t soggy. And to have been drained, so your plate wasn’t swimming in oil, ruining the salad at the same time. Yes, it really was that poor a plate of food.
Dessert made the main course seem quite good. Apple tart – the sort Mum might have got at Iceland on a bad day. Undercooked, soggy pastry, overly sugary sweet and with little actual taste of apple. You wouldn’t want to eat a second piece - and I was offered one, as my companion in life thought it too unpleasant to want even a second mouthful.