Historical version 2 of Green Man, W1W 7EP (view current version)
- 020 7307 9981
- 36 Riding House Street, W1W 7ES (streetmap) (osm) (gmap) (bingmap) (streetview)
Pub in Fitzrovia, newly (as of late 2007) refurbished.
Kake, Bec, Katie, Sarah, Kat, and Ruudboy visited for lunch on a Friday in late November. The cider-drinkers among us were pleased to learn that they had several choices of real cider available, though we mostly stuck to the rather decent Addlestone's Cloudy (£3.10/pint). They also had real ale; Kat tried the Doom Bar, but it tasted a bit strange, somewhat sour.
The decor inside is a bit Soho, but quite comfortable; the downstairs part has lots of leather banquettes and dark wood. There's another room upstairs but we didn't check it out. The music wasn't bad at all, and not too loud.
Unfortunately the "lunch" part of the outing didn't go as well as it could have. Bec and Katie were lucky enough to order just before the rush, but when Ewan and Kake ordered 15 minutes later at just before 1pm, we were told there would be a 25-minute wait for food, and this in fact turned out to be a 50-minute wait. (We were comped a couple of drinks later on in an attempt to make up for this, but one of the people affected had already gone back to work.)
This place probably deserves another try; it's most likely better outside peak times, and it is nice to have a decent choice of cider.
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Comment added by Kake: Damnit, none of the photo of my macaroni cheese came out. Anyway - it wasn't bad. A bit bland; very little cheese flavour, somewhat underseasoned, but I didn't think it was at all stodgy (though Sarah tried some of mine and thought it was overly floury). It did come properly hot though, and the pasta wasn't overcooked. Just a bit more flavour would have been good; more cheese, or a bit of mustard, or some celery salt or black pepper.