Friday, June 15, 2007

Lunch Friday 15 June - The Albion Public House



Met up with Lisa at the gym and we headed out to for lunch after working up a good sweat and having a loll about in the spa.

Decided to try The Albion on Thornhill Road - another Islington institution that I have been frequenting off and on for years. Always has has the most incredible garden (and great old fashioned Sani-flo loos!) Food used to be your standard British pub grub - fish & chips, burgers, lasagna, roasts etc. Always reliable and used to be a favourite Sunday lunch hangout.

Well, sad to report the The Albion has had a make over. It looks very nice - all the horse brasses are gone and it has gone very minimal & trendy, which I don't mind especially. The garden has also had a revamp and looks lovely - and the Sani-flos are intact.

The menu, sadly, has fared rather worse! I had Grilled Halloumi & Roasted Red Pepper on a toasted roll. The roll was one of those airy, nothing-to-it bits of bread - dry, tasteless and just a mere puff of white flour. The halloumi was grilled and warm, but the peppers were cold and clearly from a jar. Very disappointing.

Lisa had a roast belly of pork which was massive, but had about an inch of fat on top of it - not crackling, just plain old fat. It came with a few spuds and not much else. I did not try it (of course) but Lisa did not have anything very nice to say about it - except that there was a lot of it, even if you would not want to eat the thick layer of fat.

The one exception was the chips, which were lovely! Big, fat chips; light and fluffy inside, cripsy and brown outside. But hideously expensive! They were something like £3 a portion and a portion comprised about 8 chips.
Beer is still good here - had a decent pint of London Pride and a refreshing white beer, but I won't be hurrying back for the food any time soon.

The Albion, 10 Thornhill Road, N1 1HW

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