Fanny Nelson's, 22nd September

I had a plan. I would try three libations of each sort on offer – one cocktail, one wine and one draught beverage. But best laid plans and all that… I did not stay long enough to complete the mission. Nor was I able to try as much of the food as I would have liked. But I was there long enough to realise that the Fanny Nelson is a charming, cosy little pub which manages to be perfect date material but also seems to have a very healthy handful of locals – both of the hipster and genuine East End local variety, who all seemed to know the bar staff by name.

What I ended up having was the Jamonero - dark rum, peach, red wine and yellow chartreuse. Which, it turns out, had only just been added to the menu. The barman was very keen to hear my views upon tasting it as he’d come up with it. It had quite a sweetness to it, reminding me of a punch, which was fine to start but I couldn’t drink it all night. It so happened he agreed but he said he thought he had a more sour palate than most. I guess I do too… 

I sipped at the dinky drink but before long decided I should try some food. I had been told the duck and the steak were very good, but I’d seen how much steak you got and wasn’t hungry enough for that so I did have the duck breast. It was cooked to pink in the middle sections though the ends ended up well done. It came with a beetroot hummus and a sort of couscous crumble all atop almond yoghurt which was too tangy for me and which I avoided. 

Alongside the duck I had to have a glass of red, of course. Having unexpectedly dined on my own up to this point, I decided I had spent enough time in this pub and left for elsewhere. So I only managed two out of the three drinks. I can’t wait for an excuse to go back and try more.

Sager + Wilde Paradise Row, 1st July

Way back in 2013 I think it was, Stephen and I spent an evening under the Arches in Bethnal Green – firstly having a few small plates at what was then called Mission – Sager + Wilde’s newest place, then a cocktail at the Craft Cocktail Co.

Both have just recently been rebranded, and I was invited along to try the new Sager + Wilde Paradise Row. Being a warm, though rather wet at times, evening, we sat outside and enjoyed several dishes from their bar snack menu along with a few beverages.

Should you want to sit inside and make more of a meal out of it, they do a four course set menu as well for £42.

My eyes honed in on the bread with cultured butter – thick slices of dense and chewy bread with butter to die for, the culture providing a pleasant tang. While deciding what to order, we noticed the couple next to us being brought a huge fried glob of something stuck together. What is that, we wondered. It was the whitebait – fried with seaweed and bean kakiage. All at once, it sticks together and you peel off chunks to eat a bit like you would an onion blossom. I enjoyed the veggie part of this, which was sweet, the batter being light and like tempura, but I couldn’t bring myself to eat the whole whitebait.

Stephen couldn’t resist having the clams with peas and flowers. A little heavy on the pea, perhaps, this was the prettiest dish by far, and Stephen said it was great. I did have one bite and the light flavours of the pea and flora seemed to combine well with the subtly briney clam, but I am still yet to be convinced on clams.

‘My’ dish was the iberico pluma – pork, with broad beans and herbs. It was supremely soft, being served in that new-fangled way of cooking it quite rare. Stephen wasn’t so much of a fan but I thought it was cooked delightfully.

And if there's a sandwich on the menu you know I'll want to try it. This one was mortadella in a roll, slices hanging out of a sweet roll with a nice garlicky butter in it. Difficult not to finish this in two bites. 

We’d had a cocktail each with our dishes, but moved on to wine while we considered whether to have anything else. Our friendly waitress brought us two types to try – Sager + Wilde’s own Syrah, and a French number. I liked the Syrah, Stephen preferred the French one so we had one of each and ordered the two cheeses they had on offer. One was a crumbly yet full of flavour Lancashire, which came with almost equally crumbly oat crackers, the other was a pungent and intoxicatingly strong soft cheese – St Cera, which we spread over chunks of (slightly too) grilled bread.

Even though ‘Mission’ seems to have upgraded itself to more of a restaurant, it still feels like a neighbourhood place that you could drop into for a drink or a few small plates without having to make a big deal of it. Has to be said that the staff were very friendly and there was very little to-do when I split an entire glass of red wine, mainly over Stephen, but also partially over the ground. They were quick to offer lots of reassurances that it *probably* would come out of his nice new jeans... (it did).

Natural Philosopher, 28th August

That Natural Philosopher is a charming, ramshackle little cocktail bar that I liked very much. It’s just a shame no one else seems to. Or perhaps they just don’t know about it. Even though it isn’t hiding itself you could probably walk past it and not quite realise it was there. It looks humble. Inside it is split into three levels with the bottom one being nothing more than a cubby hole where you and a small group of friends could hide away. It’s done by the same people who ran Manero’s (now closed) and it’s just as cool with the same kind of ‘being in someone’s house’ vibe. But as there was only me, my friend and two other people in there when we went at 10pm on a Friday night, it rather lacked atmosphere. A girl and her mum turned up when we were halfway through our drinks but I would hesitate to guess that was it for the night.

It doesn’t help that it’s not near the other bars on Hackney Road – I expected it to be near Mr Buckley’s but it’s very much the Cambridge Heath end. Our cocktails were very nice and the sausage roll menu sounded delicious but we moved onto other pastures after just the one drink. That one drink being the Zabarella, a cardamom-infused tequila with lime juice, vanilla sugar syrup and pomegranate. An interesting blend – I don’t usually like cardamom that much but this was really nicely balanced. My friend had the special (I can't remember what it was called) which came with an ice lolly to dunk into the cocktail!

And I appreciated that the menu was short enough not to cause total choice paralysis, even though every cocktail sounded intriguing.

Resident of Paradise Row, 25th August

Just when I thought I was about to have visited every new place under the arches in Bethnal Green, another place opens up. That would be Paradise Garage, from the people behind The Dairy in Clapham and it is too expensive for me to be heading down there soon. So, I was at the other place with Paradise in its name – Resident. On a Tuesday evening it had a few people having a bite but wasn’t by any means busy. I think it deserves to be.

As it was my first time here I wanted to try a few things so we got a few dishes from the small plates selection. All of which sounded delicious but it was the fresh pea arancini with habanero sauce I had been fantasizing about all day so I had to have that. Our waiter told us it was a very good choice. Added to this I ordered the chorizo with rosemary pinto beans and we also got padron peppers, maris piper chips and a pork spring roll.

My date for the night proclaimed that arancini was in his top two favourite foods (along with mac and cheese) and so if anyone could judge whether these were on the money it was him. He declared they were great – very light and fluffy (but with a good crispy coating). I had expected the pea to be incorporated throughout rather than the actual odd pea here and there so was a little disappointed but they were tasty. The habanero sauce was in no way as fiery as I thought it would be but the habanero was discernible and we preferred dipping our chips in this to the ketchup we’d asked for. And the chips by the way were excellent. 

I hadn’t expected the chorizo dish to turn up the way it did but I cut it up and spooned it up with the beans. You can never go wrong with chorizo (or if you do someone is a very bad cook) so this was predictably delicious. 

Most impressive I think was the spring roll which contained actual chunks of pork and came with a really tasty soy-based dipping sauce. I would get this for myself another time.

House cocktails are only £6 but be warned that even though they do have a beer on tap, they still only give you a bottle-sized serving!

This is a great, laid back bar/restaurant that is perfect for stopping in for a few dishes to line your stomach for any drinking along Paradise Row later.

Corner Room, 9th May

The food at the Corner Room was just lovely! And yet, when Stephen asked me if I would go back I said probably not. Why is that? Well, because we go to restaurants for more than simply eating. We go for an experience we can't get at home and something about this experience lacked, though it is hard to say exactly why.

Something about the ambience was just a little off. This was meant to be Nuno Mendes's informal neighbourhood restaurant (though he's no longer there) but, while the prices are pretty good, it doesn't feel as laid back as it should. Or, it feels too laid back but in a non-comfortable way. A bit like a posh country house's dining room. A home but not your home.  I don't know. Stephen felt the same.

Anyway, as I say the food was much more than perfectly pleasant to eat. 

I started with the quail, asparagus and roasted garlic. What a fantastic garlic hit, and I loved the way the asparagus was shaved so thinly. The quail was well cooked and seasoned. A great start.

Stephen had the mackerel, which is a fish I don't like so I didn't try it. It looked very beautiful and Stephen had nothing but nice things to say about it.

On to the mains. For me, unusually, pork. The tenderest of loin, cooked pink and imbued with smoke from the smoky apple accompaniment. A lovely blend of sweetness and meat and I made sure to swipe up as much of the residue as possible  with the broccoli (though not the florets - hate those!)

Stephen had confit lamb belly (already sounds amazing doesn't it?) which came with chorizo (even better) spring beans and baby gem. I wouldn't say I had food envy, but I kinda had food envy. That lamb - a decent size with a great, crispy top.

We had both, for the first time, participated in a 5K run that afternoon so of course we had to treat ourselves with dessert (and cocktails!).

I think the dessert was my least favourite part though, I had a malted slice with pear which had a dry texture I didn't appreciate. I wanted more gooeyness. Stephen fared better with his dessert - a raspberry tart, that he said was very nice but I don't like raspberries so I just had to take his word for it. 

Club Hashtag, 10th April

A friend of mine had been to several Club Hashtags and had become something of an ambassador for the night, firmly believing it should attract more people than it was.

What my friend extolled about the night was its sense of randomness. Anarchy almost. It was essentially a clubnight but throughout the night, they would have performances of around 3 minutes – ten performances in all – with no announcement about them happening. They just started. These performances ranged all over the place, not being pinned down to any specific genre. You never quite knew what was going on, and I liked the sound of this. Finally it fell on a Friday I could make.

But everything was different. There was now an MC! And only three acts instead of ten! And these acts were very much introduced as the night went on, so you knew they were about to happen. They were still performances lasting roughly the length of one song so the amount of performance was drastically reduced.

However, the flavour of the previous events (that I imagine) was there in the form of these performances and the eclectic music played. They left you slightly bewildered though ultimately pleased. The first was the ‘youngest cannibal in Europe’ – a sweet girl who just happens to want to eat your flesh. About an hour later we had a fabulous performance from Fancy Chance doing an impression of Prince. Her singing wasn’t the strongest but her panache and stage presence was. It helped that she was actually smaller than Prince and was very convincing in stature!

And finally, after a false start, we had The Fabulous Russella doing a drag lip sync performance. I mean, I guess that’s what you’d call it. He first removed his fabulous shoes, and took up his position facing the back of the stage. The music started too quickly for him so he made them start at the beginning again, thus heightening our anticipation. He then spent the whole song miming with his back to the audience! Baffling. I’m sure it was meant to make a statement about something but I have no idea what.

The music was great. It tended to be stuff that everyone knew but without descending into cheese. It ranged from The Clash and Jilted John, Uptown Top Ranking through to a lot of drum n bass and jungle towards the end of the night. We danced and pogoed and jumped around until our feet hurt (or mine did at least).

I should also mention Steve Nice who was a very good host, not least because he caught wind of my meetup being there and decided to meander through the crowd until he found my little group, MCing over the track along the way. My meetup has never been sought out like that before!

In truth I was a little disappointed with the night because it was so different from what I’d thought it would be (bring back the randomness!). If I hadn’t had those expectations, however, then I would be all positivity, saying what a fun and slightly weird night I'd had, which I did. I would gladly go back again. 

The Sun Tavern, 30th November

The Sun Tavern, formerly the Sun Tavern (a pub of that name has been there since 1851), is the second establishment from the guys behind the Discount Suit Co. and I'm happy to report that it is just as likeable as their first place. 

From the outside it doesn't look open, but have faith and push open those doors. Inside is, indeed, what I would describe as a tavern - cosy and low-lit with blinds covering the windows giving it the darkened look from outside.

I went at about 5pm on a Sunday afternoon for my first visit and there it was populated but there were still a few tables available. I went back again the other night - a Saturday night - and we again managed to get a seat, but only just. 

Discount Suit is an underground cocktail den, whereas this place is more pubby so you won't feel like you're missing the point if you have a wine (as I did on Saturday) or one of the local beers and ciders written on a board at the back of the bar. But, of course, they do still know their cocktails and this makes up the focus of the menu. So on that Sunday evening I had to try a couple in the time I was there.  

First up the Peach Fuzz. Gin, sherry, creme de peche, served in a metal tankard with a pile of ice like a julep. Their menu is divided into Tankard Drinks and Mixed Drinks. So I went for the 12 Mile Limit off the Mixed Drinks to try one of each. White rum, cognac, rye mixed with some grenadine and lime. This was my kind of drink. Strong and punchy and prettily garnished with flowers. And all the cocktails are either £7.50 or £8.00. My kind of prices. Well, sort of. Wine comes in choices of red, white or fizz and a very small glass (125ml) is £4.50. Expensive for unlabelled wine. Better to go for a bottle which is a very reasonable £16.

Bethnal Green is turning into the place to be if it isn't already and The Sun Tavern makes it even more of a worthy destination. 

East London Liquor Co, 6th October

Once again London Cocktail Week was badly timed for me. Last year I was on holiday, this year I was in the middle of a month of ‘not drinking’. Of course, I had to make an exception for London Cocktail Week but not so much of an exception that I took full advantage of everything LCW had to offer. I didn’t attend any masterclasses or tours, I didn’t go to a different bar every night and I didn’t even get to Monkey Shoulder’s Cowbell Bar. But I DID manage to go out a couple of times in the week for a few drinks at discount prices.

My first stop was meant to be the Craft Cocktail Co. After much checking of Google, the LCW booklet and more I was assured the places I’d planned to go would be open on a Monday. Not so. We rocked up to the arch and found nothing but a shutter, forcing us to revisit Satan’s Whiskers up the road instead. On a Monday, getting in was easy peasy and we enjoyed their LCW offering of their Silver Pineapple (like a pina colada but without the horrible coconut) before ordering one each off their menu – a classic champagne cocktail for me, a New York Flip for Stephen. Mine was as expected, but Stephen’s was absolutely delicious, like a mini, liquid dessert, perfect for the cold weather outside.

From there we headed on to the East London Liquor Co, which is a fairly new addition to Mile End, and thus of much interest to me. It is closer to Victoria Park than Mile End so may get a little footfall, even though the area doesn’t get many visitors beyond those who live there. This place is also set back from the road, and it was a Monday, so I wasn’t surprised to find it bereft of clientele. It literally was empty when we walked in, making us feel guilty at putting the bartenders to work. They took it in good spirits though and we had a little chat with them about whether and how busy the place gets. Stephen recognised the male bartender and it turns out he was working at Hoxley andPorter when we went.

We stuck to the LCW cocktails here - the Darjeeling Sour, made with the East London Liquor company’s own Batch No. 1 Premium gin distilled on site. This was a light, frothy concoction, which would make pleasant sipping on a summer’s evening. The exact opposite of this evening in fact, but it was nice enough to warrant a cheeky second as a nightcap before heading home. I feel the place didn't have its best side on show as it was so very empty. I can imagine it doesn't ever feel exactly homely as it does have a warehouse feel to it, especially with the grand machinery of the distillery peering from the back of the bar. But, with the calibre of bartender, and based on our drink, a second visit is very much warranted. I"m feeling positively spoiled - this place and The Victoria right up the road from me!

Discount Suit Co and Peg + Patriot, 7th August

The Discount Suit Company

This place is another basement bar serving cocktails speakeasy-stylee. Nothing groundbreaking there. Nothing groundbreaking in general really but that didn’t stop me from really liking the place. It takes its name from the shop that used to be here, and the original signage and façade are retained, giving pretty much no indication that there’s a bar below the dark hole that constitutes a doorway. It’s an odd location – near Brick Lane and near Liverpool Street but among the odds and sods of the environs of Petticoat Lane. Inside, the feeling is cosy and comfortable, with love seats in one corner to mooch into. The lighting is low (annoyingly so if you’re trying to take photos) and the music is excellent. We had some country, some soul and some disco in our short visit as well as My Sharona and that song Jessica Rabbit sings – Why Don’t you Do Right?.

The rest of the décor borrows heavily from the theme of a clothes shop with the bar made of drawers that you can imagine once held material to be tailored. In fact, the whole place reminded me a bit of a shoe shop. So far so good in terms of atmosphere.

And they kept it up in terms of drinks and service. As we weren’t sitting at the bar we had to rely on one of the staff regularly checking on us to be sure our drinks were replenished and our guy was pretty good at keeping on top of that. We stayed for two, not wanting to turn up at The Culpeper where I wanted to eat too late in case we couldn’t get in. I really enjoyed both my drinks, and even though the Peg + Patriot where we later went was good too, Discount Suit Co was the victor on this occasion.

First I had a Zizi Jeanmarie and Stephen had the Skipper. They were similar in taste, both of us having chosen drinks with fortified wine in them (mine sherry, his port) and both having pretty much nothing but alcohol in them. They were good, strong drinks.

We then had a quick second which were equally as tasteful. Stephan followed his Skipper with a Clipper, managing to make even absinthe taste good, and I had a Charlie Chaplin. Gin, more gin and apricot brandy. Delicious! Prices here were pretty good – one side of the menu had cocktails at £8.50, the other a bargain £7.50. They have a new place opening up in Bethnal Green (where else - and who decided this was the next 'in' area?) called the Sun Tavern which I shall be putting on the List.

Find bar information on Zomato

The Peg and Patriot

After our dinner at The Culpeper we made our way home via The Peg and Patriot, recently opened in the Town Hall, another place poshing Bethnal Green up a bit. We took a stool at the bar and took a gander at the amusingly named cocktails. I was drawn towards the odder-sounding concoctions but chickend out and ordered the relatively normal ones instead. They have a penchant for savoury cocktails, or those taking inspiration from a dish – hence the cocktail Pho Money, Pho Problems, designed to taste like pho, and the Rice Rice Baby, which uses rice ice cream liqueur. Needless to say they make all these crazy thigns in-house (where else would they get them from?!). I had the Rice Rice baby as a bit of a dessert to the evening and I really enjoyed the sweetened, bubbly drink. But first I ordered the Riot Cup Number One.

Stephen had the Barley Legal to start which tasted like a grown-up pina colada, and which he wasn’t very taken with and on the basis of this, didn’t want to stay for a second. I must admit, in comparison to the ones at Discount Suit Company, I wasn’t too enamoured either. The drink was eminently quaffable, but also reminded me a little too much of a Pimms. For drinks that sounded so different, they were a bit too familiar. But I persuaded him to take another bite at the cherry and our second drinks were much more to both our liking. His Rye your Eyes Mate came with a cherry dipped in beeswax for either peeling and eating whole, or, as he did, squishing into your drink. I’ve already said my Rice Rice baby was a lovely little number. 

The place was pretty swanky looking though not exactly full of life on a Thursday night. Prices for this kind of establishment were pretty standard – 8 or 9 pounds.

Find the menu & restaurant information on Zomato