Marquess Tavern

Fab pub, love it to bits. Unpretentious staff, unpretentious food. If you like good honest British food and real ale served by smiley, knowledgable staff then this is the ideal place. Not too exspensive, maybe more so than for everyday 'pub-grub' but saying that, this isnt everyday 'pub-grub'!
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Hal
Overall rating
Food 10 | Service 9 | Atmosphere 9 | Value for money 7
Friday, July 20, 2007

We keep trying other Gastropubs but time and time again find ourselves returning to The Marquess tavern. It has consistently provided us with great fun and fabulous food and I think we're giving up on trying to find anywhere that comes close. At the risk of repeating what everyone else on here has said, the forerib of beef really is the best beef you'll ever eat. 32 day hung, cooked to perfection with all the trimmings - heavenly! Marquess, we're sorry we ever strayed - you'll never lose us again.
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Solly
Overall rating
Food 10 | Service 10 | Atmosphere 10 | Value for money 9
Thursday, July 12, 2007

I really enjoyed my meal at the Marquess Tavern and would certainly go back. I've just moved into the area and will be definitely be making this one of my regular locals. It took a long time to choose from the menu as everything sounded so good. I eventually chose sprats with horseradish to start. The horseradish complimented the fish really well. For my main course, I had rump of lamb with barley and runner beans. The lamb was perfectly cooked and tasted fantastic.

There is an amazing choice of beer and the staff are happy to make recommendations. The wine list isn't huge but there's enough choice to work with the menu.

Services was a bit slow but as we had planned to spend the whole evening there, it was quite pleasant not to be rushed and have a decent amount of time between courses to enjoy our drinks and chat.

I'm now looking forward to going back and trying the rib of beef. I saw other people ordering this dish and it looked great. There's a blackboard with the weight and the price of each piece of beef, so you can select the appropriate one for your party.
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Ann McP - View all reviews by this user
Overall rating
Food 9 | Service 6 | Atmosphere 8 | Value for money 7
Monday, July 02, 2007

I wish I lived closer. A friend who has been raving about it for ages took me last night and it lived up to her raves. Simple food that you could tell was made with really good quality ingredients. The real standout dish for me was the rump of lamb - cooked just right and with a real depth of flavour. Combined with friendly people and nice beer! we had a really great meal. After we finished eating a barman suggested I try an apple brandy from Somerset. And good choice it was too! My friend went for a glass of Mead and wasn't so convinced so I finished that off as well and loved it!
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simon11 - View all reviews by this user
Overall rating
Food 10 | Service 10 | Atmosphere 10 | Value for money 10
Thursday, May 10, 2007

I ate here recently after a recommendation from an Islington local. I went on a Sunday and the place was really busy. we had to wait for about 20 minutes for a table, but the food was amazing. We had the 'legendary' beef and the pork with creamed leeks and were v impressed. I think the wine list could do with work and I didn't get a drinks menu (although its on the blackboard) but other than that I thought it was great!
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Dave Buckley
Overall rating
Food 9 | Service 8 | Atmosphere 6 | Value for money 7
Wednesday, May 09, 2007

My partner and I recently went here for lunch on a Saturday. We were the only 2 customers eating at this point. We ordered wine, which was very nice, and main courses only. When the main courses arrived I was presented with something completely different to what I had ordered. The plate was taken away but my partners food was left on the table: he began eating as his dinner was getting cold. Around an hour later (remember, we are still the only people eating) my food arrives but my partner has completely finished. By this point I have lost my appetite somewhat and just want to leave. The food itself was okay, when it eventually arrived, and the staff were polite enough apologising for the mistake, although by this time it really didn't make an awful lot of difference. They knocked the cost of the wine off our bill; but we would rather have paid the full price and had an enjoyable meal. We won't be returning, and certainly won't be recommending to anyone else.
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c clement
Overall rating
Food 4 | Service 2 | Atmosphere 2 | Value for money 2
Monday, April 09, 2007

Based upon the "best gastropub in the universe" award we recently went as a group of ten people for Sunday lunch to celebrate my birthday. We were shown to the 'private room' and promptly abandoned for over fifteen minutes until one of us decided to try and hunt down a menu or wine list. We should have read the signs, but we didn't!

Basically, the service was at best random. The food arrived cold (in the case of the lamb stew, stone cold) and over a period of half and hour so very few people got to eat together. The beef rib was overcooked (i.e. well done) despite being requested as rare to medium rare..........we only went as far as scaling up to medium rare due to the French manager (Damien) and the expectation that in France rare means rare, the meat wasn't even pink! The vegetables were served cold, returned to the kitchen and replaced by more cold vegetables several minutes later and what was supposed to be a nice lunch descended into a bit of a farce..........(Fawlty Towers)!

Enter Cybil (I don't know her real name), but she handled our complaint very well, so well that we were suspicious that she might have been getting quite a lot of practice in recently. We ended up having a £500 bill reduced to just under £300 however, I'd be reluctant to trust them again and will be staying well clear.
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Chris Ashburn
Overall rating
Food 3 | Service 2 | Atmosphere 3 | Value for money 3
Monday, March 26, 2007

Fairly good restaurant; not overpriced but the dishes to share are ridiculous. These tend to be served as whole joints of meat, which sounds very rustic but in reality: very messy. We ordered a pot-roast pheasant to share and it was served whole, with an ordinary knife and fork to cut it with placed on the side. It was like a Tudor dining scene trying to rip the meat from the carcass. Service is friendly, but could be better. Starters were excellent. Wine list good and not a rip off.
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Overall rating
Food 7 | Service 5 | Atmosphere 6 | Value for money 8
Monday, February 12, 2007

Had an absolutely appalling experience tonight (Sunday night). Firstly, after trying 5 times to get through on the phone to make a booking, we left a message with our booking details on their "Reservation Request Line" and left our phone number . Not hearing anything back we assumed all was well and turned up for our meal, to be told that we didn't have a reservation and that we needed to "speak to a human" to get that. The waitress managed to find us a table with the condition that we would have to be finished by 8. Fine, we thought...until it took 10 minutes to get our order taken by the waitress, then 40 minutes after that to get our food. After finding out that half the options were not on the menu tonight, we settled on ordering a fish pie (bland, ugly and boring, came with some coldish greens on the side) and the sirloin steak (beautiful and tender meat, too bad about the charcoal yorkshire pudding accompanying it). After seeing the quality of the food, we decided against dessert and waited for another 20 minutes to get the waitress' attention to get our bill.

Not worth "Gastropub Of The Year" thats for sure
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Nicole
Overall rating
Food 2 | Service 1 | Atmosphere 3 | Value for money 2
Sunday, January 28, 2007

Fab pub, open fires and sofas, however the restaurant through the back was rather cold. Food was lovely - a number of the dishes are to be shared between 3-5 people, makes sense to go in a group. Thoroughly enjoyed it!
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Pip
Overall rating
Food 9 | Service 8 | Atmosphere 8 | Value for money 8
Saturday, December 30, 2006