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Reviews (Current Rating Average: 3½ of 10) see review guidelines
Please Note: This review is over a year old.
Just a quick pint, then I'm off left this review about Botanist
This upmarket gastro-pub is about as far away from a public house that you can get whilst still being able to by a drink from the bar without buying a meal (but only just...). Nicely decorated of course (if you like that kind of thing), but that can't outweigh negatives such as a very poor choice of beer - no real ale, and just four expensive premium lagers on tap - and eye-watering prices (such at £5 for a bottle of Purity Mad Goose). I've avoided this place for several years as I thought I would hate it, but (in a moment of madness) having finally called in I'm relieved in a way that it fulfilled all my (admittedly low) expectations.
On 9th October 2010
- rating: 4
[User has posted 8117 recommendations about 8117 pubs]
Please Note: This review is over a year old.
Roger Button left this review about Botanist
Sometimes memories are best left alone. Returning here for the first time since I worked in the area in the early 80’s I thought I would rekindle some old haunts of which the Royal Court Tavern (as it was then) was the prime drinking venue in our kingdom of local hostelries. Under the managemnmt of Dave “Cheers, I’ll have an ‘alf wi’yer)” Lamb, a bevy of wonderful barmaids (one of whom I almost ended up living with) and a customer base ranging from office workers to bohemians, the RCT was a place that life revolved around.
Fast forward to the Botanist and any similarities between the old and new couldn’t be further apart. What we have now is an unbelieveably posey dining bar, in fact it is more a restaurant with a bar attached. The place is usually packed to the rafters with people who are happy to fork out £4+ for a pint of premium lager and enjoy change on a plate service. The crowds inevitably spill onto the pavement where a suitably painted line marks the the no go zone and prison guard style bouncers patrol along the pavement to ensure that the boundary is mainatained. In short, if you fancy a pint of real beer, forget it. If Duck egg ravioli, truffled pea velouté, poached wild halibut, grand aioli, Ginger pudding, citrus Anglaise, crème fraîche, orange crisp washed down with a Louis Roederer, Brut Premier, Reims is your thing, it’s all yours. Mwah, Mwah.
On 30th April 2010
- rating: 3
[User has posted 1239 recommendations about 1233 pubs]