london restaurants

a plate of really salty bacon in whatever the sauce was. i got an extra starter (that wasn't free) of rather average, overly greasy squid to make up for it.

jeez

I had excellent, cheap Vietnamese at Cafe East in Surrey Quays on Friday. Not what you'd expect from an Odeon/Hollywood Bowl car park restaurant at all, and I will be going back.

Surrey Quays = best place in London.

pub in london that can fit approx 20 people, good range of beer, pref central london, not noisy, any tips?

if it can be hired all the better but not essential. pool table would be good.

e.g. pembury would be good if it weren't in hackney

http://www.queensheadlondon.com/

had my 30th here. it's v quiet at weekends, lovely pub, amazing beer selection, and quite nice ploughmans/pies. the guy will reserve tables for you if you email him.

Yeah the Queen's Head is a good one. The room upstairs at the Crown in Clerkenwell can be hired out as well and that's lovely, no pool table though.

fucking hate the pembury

Yeah I've never seen the appeal, it's weirdly devoid of atmosphere.

really horrible family atmosphere.

joking but you get me.

Also there always seem to be like three dudes sitting on their own with laptops and headphones plugged in.

and they dont even have a pool table any more iirc

where do you all go for a beer these days? kinda revolve between palm tree, the camel as it's right beside my flat (and has improved a bit, plus sells redchurch beers), the cock tavern, and occasionally well and bucket on bethnal green road, it's alright really, not amazing.

i always push for the cock tavern but my friends like going to the scolt head :/

I always like the scolt head more than I think I will

there are a lot of terrible ppl there

that is definitely true. I think I always end up happy because a pint is cheaper than it looks like it would charge.

i always push for the cock tavern but my friends like going to the scolt head :/

i hate the scolt.

the palm tree still is the place where i find you're most likely to meet people or make some new friends.

been going to the old coffee house in soho a bit lately. it's fairly divey, tho no more than most soho pubs. it has really nice brodies ale and it's 3.50 a pint.

The Scolt Head is legit one of the worst pubs I've ended up in in London, outside of yr standard West End vertical drinking holes and depressing outer London high street places. Like you can see how in a different part of town it might be good, and it's not like there aren't great little back street pubs elsewhere in the area, but that place just has so many cunts in it.

It's the shape of the pub and everything, it's just a crappy space. It reminds me of being in my local back in Dublin, and not in a good way.

*shuffles back under rock*

I think the Scolt is ace when it's quiet in the afternoon. We used to do our performance reviews there when I worked at the Duke. They were less ace.

I am probably asking the wrong people here but I have a bit of time to kill near Tooting Broadway station this evening while waiting for someone. Is there anywhere that suits a quiet beer with a book in the area? This may be impossible on a Friday night and I'm sort of expecting rampaging Aussies but you never know. It's not a place I know at all.

*shuffles back under rock*

haha sorry for flinging "my opinions" at you.

lol no was joking. Can't deny it's full of cunts.

Normally go to my local wetherspoons in Brockley but if I'm actually properly going for a pint I love the following:

Marquis of Granby in New Cross (really cozy, err 'traditional' pub, full of NX locals and art students. Could happily sit there all night. My housemate did last year. For ten nights in a row. He spent at least £500. Oops)

Stormbird in Camberwell (does crafty type beers, nice and quiet, well laid out, not vastly expensive)

Royal Albert (it's an Antic pub so you know what to expect. Does a great roast as well).

i swear the scolt head used to be perfectly pleasant back in the day when it was guaranteed half-empty. i've avoided it for so long that i'd be prepared to believe it's come full circle - à la the price george, which i found myself in recently and it was actually not rammed and quite nice.

have found myself in the old fountain near old st a lot recently as it's one of the boyfriend's favourite pubs. apparently the ale selection or whatever is good but i don't know anything about that. it's nice enough i guess. feel v lucky to have the elderfield in clapton as my local.

looking forward to being in the spaniards inn on hampstead heath this weekend! love that place.

queen's head is a good shout!! thanks I'll email them and check. reserving a couple of tables should be sufficient

a good thing about the queen's head is he kinda unofficially serves till whenever he wants. when i had my 30th there i asked if he'd let us stay a bit later than it was about 0330 when we left, albeit with the hour having changed that night.

the new burnt enz thing is pretty good - less interesting beers tho and it's more expensive. food is similar to last year even tho it's now lucky chip doing it.

yeah we went there the other night after work, food wasnt quite as good as last time but still pretty enjoyable

Hey Dwight, I drink in the Royal Albert all the time, it's an excellent place, and I tend to find Antic pubs hit and miss generally. I tend to sway back and forth on the Marquis, not bothered to go in there for years. Apparently back in the late 60s/early 70s my parents were in there with Hattie Jacques (!!!) who had been doing something at Goldsmiths during the day, and the night turned into this legendarily enormous session. Apparently she liked a drink.

I was in the Granby on Saturday. There's truly not a pub in the world I'd rather be sat in.

I love the Granby, but I don't get in enough.

Feels like there should be loads of pub like it, but there just aren't.

Comfortable london irish pub, dose of art student. Feel at home.

It's because pubs, especially in areas like New Cross, tend to be increasingly polarized in their clientele. Pubs that attract a genuine cross-section and (importantly) seem to keep everyone pretty happy are a pretty rare thing these days.

find it hard to think of the granby with any great personal warmth but it has always done the job without irritating and like matt says that's something ever more worthy of respect as the years go by. it's like the best ever student union or train station pub i guess

maybe i just never feel fully committed to irish pubs idk

Yeah I'm just happy it's there amid all yr New Cross Houses and what have you, not to mention the beyond terrifying looking places a bit further towards Deptford.

perseverance is the only irish pub i like, and i use "like" in a loose sense meaning it's fairly divey but is good for watching sport in and the landlord and landlady are really decent. the regulars are pretty depressing.

is this the one on broadway market. yeah so depressing. so BRIGHT too, i hate bright pubs. was it someone on here that told me it was john salako's local?

why wouldn't you just go to the albion for sport tho. now there's a decent pub

i've seen salako in there alright. i don't mind it being bright, there's something about the room and the bar that actually works pretty well imo. once the spell of a match is broken unless you're with a huge group of mates it quickly is time to go.

i've never been to the albion, must give it a go. howl at the moon in hoxton is actually pretty good too imo.

Doesn't telegraph its irishness (though I feel like there's a connection?) but I've always enjoyed watching football at the faltering fullback in stroud green. Plus the beer garden is v. crystal kingdom dizzy.

Really enjoyed trullo tonight. We were downstairs, which I think helped. Service was just the right side of attentive w/o being overbearing. Menu much more carnivorous than I'd expected (a positive). Got second belated birthday meal on thurs at Newman St Tavern, which I don't really know anything about but sounds good.

after this bank holiday weekend i can fully recommend the duck and waffle breakfast at 6am on a brilliantly clear blue morning having been up all night. the food was nice and all but as an experience - THAT VIEW - it was pretty special. amusingly they quiz you about whether you've been drinking at the door, it was a weird situation because obviously their policy is not to turn away people who have been drinking all night, but they sort of say it is to, i guess, warn you not to misbehave. luckily one of the girls i was with was formidably persuasive and determined in that very posh way, lesser people might have slunk off, chastened

also, riding house café brunch is actually amazing, foodwise http://www.ridinghousecafe.co.uk/

I'll keep that in mind the next time I am piloting the good ship Drunk Friends, though I can't imagine why a chew-with-a-view place right in the middle of the City might want to nudge its play-hard clientele towards basic manners...

Whenever I've been to Riding House, it's always been incredible.

i don't like the room much in riding house, but i didn't eat there, only had a drink.

i wanted to go to barrafina on sunday but it was jammed so i went to brindisa opposite the john snow instead, it was actually pretty good, not as good as barrafina but still decent. great wine.