The Old Dairy, N4

A very good review from Steve of N21 says it all,this is certainly a large pub with several different sections,and the wait to be seated dining area,although initially infront of the open kitchen,opens out into a formal dining room with it's own street frontage.The section at the apex of the building looks a good place to sup,but it had been hired for a function on my Saturday afternoon visit,and several alcove tables also had reserved signs.The clientele is mainly young professionals and many babies and toddlers were present inside.The high ceilings cause noise to reverberate off the wooden floor,so I wouldn't say that my visit was relaxing,but the pub is functional.You can eat food anywhere (Starters around £5-7,mains £13-18) ,but the lack of demarcation detracts from the pub atmosphere,while surprisingly the restaurant was hardly used. The bar has 5 handpumps with GK IPA and an Old Dairy (Up & Under) as regulars with guests on my trip Signature Brew Wild Winter,Dorset Brewing Keep Calm and Swing Low and Mad Squirrel Hop Fest .It's listed in the GBG ,and that seemed fair enough.It serves it's market well but I found it a bit too hectic for my purposes.

The Old Dairy is a large pub that i presume is housed in an old dairy. Once inside this is a very large pub with lots of different areas,the bar is sited in the middle area,the floor is bare boarded and the seating is a mix of different types. There were four real ales on the bar,i had a drink of Sambrooks Wandle which went down well,the other beers were Sambrooks Lavender Hill,Hackney american Pale Ale and GK IPA. There were lots of TVs showing cricket and decent background music was playing. Not really my sort of pub. Pub visited 4/8/2016

There were several ales on here - Windsor & Eton Guzzler, Sharp's Cornish Coaster, Darkstar Darkness, Growler Brewery Gladness, and Stroud Green Hobbler, the latter presumably being a house ale. This place brands itself as a pub and dining room, so obviously food’s a big player here. Main course are in the £11 - £18.50 range, from “Cumberland sausages, champ (? – I’d prefer mashed potatoes), onion gravy” to “Longhorn rib steak on the bone, etc, etc”. This is an enormous rambling affair, sited in an old dairy as the name suggests, and I guess dairies were big places. It’s reminiscent of a large US steakhouse restaurant. At the front on the main road is an area where it appeared that all tables were reserved for diners; to the left is an area containing the bar counter and which is the area to be used by drinkers, containing a few normal tables and chairs, sofas, and some small tables with small round stools. This in turn leads to a further area guarded by the “wait to be seated” sign and with the open to view kitchen at the back. Obviously I spent my visit in the bar area – this area has exposed brick walls with some old black and white photos on them. The loud rock music was an unnecessary addition in my view. This place has all the charm and character of a chain restaurant in Downtown Chicago. Fine if you like those sort of places where mass occupancy is sought after, but it’s not really my cup of tea. But you can't fault the ale selection.