Sunday Roast @ The Spaniards Inn

It’s been around a decade since I haven’t worked regularly on a Sunday. Travel agents and chefs alike always work weekends, well it’s our busiest time. Although strangely enough, with my new job weekends are our quietest period, and on Sundays we are closed. Phew.

So with this new strange regime in order, we are making the most of our Sundays in London. No more lazing around the house all day like we used to on a precious Sunday off together.

During my many moments at work where I really have nothing to do, I can be seen trawling the internet for stuff happening in London over the weekend. I have found some right weird things. Some have been interesting, and a lot really dull.

I found a website, which gave ideas and maps for some unknown strolls in our capital. There was only one around us, this was going from Stoke Newington to Hampstead Heath. As we live near the middle we started it from there. Seeing all those kids on a Sunday morning is too much for me sometimes.

Thankfully we had good weather up to a point. The nicest part of the walk was a stroll from Crouch Hill train station along a wooded path to Hampstead. It reminded me of being back in the countryside. Ahhh heaven. But then both Crouch End and Hampstead both have a kind of countryside feel to it, to which Crouch Enders are extremely proud of to the point of being overly annoying about it.

We shared this path with Sunday morning joggers who I find quite maddening at the best of times. It seems to be a fashionable thing in Islington at the moment. Jogging. Damn I am so untrendy. Never a follower of fashion, but I am on the verge of joining a gym just so I can tone up this belly somewhat. It’s now getting a bit out of control.

The walk took us about 90 minutes from door to door. The other door is the Spaniards Inn on Spaniards Road, funny that. It calls itself a country pub in the city, and kind of pulls it off, especially as it is adjacent to the Heath. The pub dates back to around 1585 and the Spanish Ambassador to King James lived here. It also had Dick Turpin hanging around watching those rich folk go past in their carriages before he robbed them.

Lina had been here before for Diana and Marcin’s post wedding drinks. Sadly I missed them as was somewhere in Burma at the time, but the reviews were fab and had to check it out.

The inside is definitely of a country feel, nice carpet and lots of wood everywhere. They have a good selection of proper beers that would make CAMRA proud. The clientele is very N6. It oozes wealth and snobbery. They are also very dog friendly as in the carpark is a dog cleaning service, so quite a few people were popping up with their messy dogs, dropping them off at the poodle parlour, having a bit of lunch and then picking up a model dog. Bonus. Damn good business if you ask me.

Inside was jammin’ and no space to spin a cat, so we sat outside in their lovely (award winning) garden. As it was a Sunday. It had to be a roast. The portions are pretty big. The ½ chicken looks enough for 2. But we settled on the roast beef and lamb, which we kind of shared. Kind of.

Unfortunately the food let the place down a lot. The beef was pretty tasteless and under seasoned, and cut way to thickly for a Sunday roast. The coarsely shredded lamb was much better and had a good lamby flavour. The potatoes and veggies were adequate but nothing special. The sautéed leeks were squeaky, and I hate that in veg. The carrot purée was ok. The tatties were not roasted up. Very disappointing.

All in all it was an average Sunday roast in a great pub. Shame really, as had a good feeling about this place. Maybe, just a bad day. Who knows, as it’s unlikely I’ll ever go there again to eat.

As we left the heavens opened up and we just managed to catch the bus into a rather wet and miserable looking Golders Green. This place I do want to return to, as have heard there are some good Japanese restaurants here. We’ll see.