Ribs and Rumps was not on my return list...

Ribs and Rumps
Marina Mirage

Shop 16/74 Seaworld Drive
Main Beach, QLD 4217
T: 5591 1677

Rating out of 5:      2.5 child friendly forks (maybe 3 as it was a nice location)

Clean highchairs available? Yes

Pram access? Yes.

Kids' menu? Yes.

Play area? No.

Activities at the table? No

Room for kids to move around? No.

Child friendly atmosphere? Okay, but not ideal.

Prices? Expensive but the children ate free.

We were holidaying down at the Gold Coast and decided we wanted to check out the new restaurants at upmarket Marina Mirage shopping centre.  Ribs and Rumps seemed to be the most child friendly on paper.  From the entrance it looked to be more like a wine bar, so we were worried when we arrived that we might be out of place carting 4 children in there.  But once we went into the restaurant there were a couple of other families there too.

The waitress looked at us strangely when we asked for three highchairs (which we had asked for when we booked as well), but when she saw the triplets toddling behind, she fetched the chairs with haste!

The children's drinks and meals came out very quickly.  The kids meals were huge and in fact I could have ordered two meals to feed all four children.  Plus the children's meals were free.  How do I keep stumbling on this??!!  Again, I don't know if this was a short term promotion, so ask the question when booking.  The kids menu was very much deep fried options.

Our meals were extremely slow, as were our drinks.  So by the time we received them, the kids were getting very restless and were keen to go.  It is hard to entice 3 x 2 year olds to sit in their highchairs for over two and a half hours in total!  So we really scoffed our meals which was a bit disappointing.

I felt the adult meals were fairly high priced when looking at the menu.  But when they came out they were viking sized servings!!  We also could have ordered one meal to feed the two of us.  The menu was very meaty, which I probably should have anticiapted from the name "Ribs and Rumps" but there were not many light options.  My meal was okay, but not great.  This could be partly due to the fact that I was a bit stressed by that stage as our meals had taken so long and the children were tired.

We had a lovely new mum come up to us and compliment how well behaved our children were.  Her comment was quite funny "...two against four...I don't know how you do it.  I struggle taking one out to dinner."  Seasoned diners at the ages of two and five!

It is a beautiful location and it was an enjoyable night, but we won't be rushing back there.  It was too disorganised and when dining out with children we need a lot more structure than that.