The Queen's, NW1

This is still a Youg's pub, which had on their Bitter and Special, as well as Truman's Scorcher and and Adnam's Mosaic. I thought that the food was quite expensive, even for this well-heeled area; beer-battered cod, triple-cooked chips, mushy peas and tartare sauce is 14.5 (or £14.50 in my language), as is the sausage and mash. The best area to sit downstairs seems to be on a small raised area on the left as you enter which has just a couple of tables and chairs, but has views out over Primrose Hill. At the other end of the room is a seating area with a wall consisting entirely of latticed and bevelled mirrors. There's another seating area upstairs, which has a small balcony on the left, which of course also looks out over Primrose Hill. This is clearly an ex-Charrington pub, judging by the "House of Toby" panels on the exterior, now sadly painted over in grey. Also sadly painted over is the original brewery tiling on the ground floor walls. But despite its upmarket ambience I quite liked this pub. The furnishings are comfortable normal tables and chairs, and the Truman's Scorcher I had was in excellent condition.

On approach, this looks like a large Victorian street corner pub, but upon entering it comes as a great surprise to find such a shallow interior, with the pub essentially offering two small seating areas either side of the servery. The original two bar layout is very much evident, with entrance doors at either end of the pub now opening into the same room. The servery occupies the mid-section of the back wall and is split up by a couple of large pillars. The left hand side is small and rather basic, offering limited seating on a raised platform from which you should be able to get a half decent view out towards Primrose Hill. Some stairs here lead up to a compact first floor dining room which provides some much needed overspill from the cramped ground floor. There are a couple of high stools in the narrow space opposite the bar, before the room eventually opens out a little into the marginally bigger right hand seating space. There is a bench along the end wall, which has been covered in mirrors to give the impression of a larger space, and standard chairs around chunky square tables filling the rest of the room. The front windows here boast a bit of stained glass, which looked quite attractive with the winter sun shining through. Boards around the bar area listed a wide range of activities planned for the festive period including a pub quiz and a Christmas jumper party. We stopped here for something to eat after a long walk and thought the menu was pretty pretentious and too expensive, which seems just about right for this particular part of town. I had some sort of fish dish and remember wishing I'd held on a little longer and bought something tastier at half the price from Camden Market instead. This is a Youngs pub and four of their beers - Ordinary, Special, Winter Warmer and Queen's Speech - were available, although the Special went off shortly after our arrival. My pint of Winter Warmer was okay but nowhere near as good as I remember it from previous years. A Weston's Cider occupied a final handpull. The area around Primrose Hill has always struck me as a fairly unlovable part of London where everything is overpriced to make the people who live there feel like they have somehow made it in life, and in many ways this pub reflects everything I dislike about the neighbourhood. A charming traditional pub has been reduced to a bland gastro-style identikit venue selling bland beer and sub-standard 'on-trend' food well above the going rate. Worth a quick look for what is left of the building, but I certainly won't be returning.