George and Dragon, Ighthamback to pub details please note - reviews on this site are purely the opinion of site visitors, so don't take them too seriously.
The building beckons you, a small central village location and leaded windows. At a glance you expect this to be a hostelry of merit.
Appearances are however highly deceptive. I have not been back since they tried to charge me £10 for a few paltry slices of pork and coleslaw under the guise of it being a village fete and hog roast.
This time I decided to venture in for saturday lunch. This could be a central London "plastic pub" with its extensive wine list and pretentious menu. However although it may aspire to be everything I despise it fails in that too for in the City atleats they have a decent choice of real ales. This is a lager palace for anyone who has lost their tastebuds and had a lobotomy.
Thus I walked up the Tonbridge road and went to the ever reliable Golding Hop.
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Enjoyed an overpriced and bland meal amongst the company of some OTT city banker sorts, who were quaffing the champagne as if it was Christmas bonus-time already. The serving rugby brute - whose mind was clearly more focused on London Irish than London Pride - did not exactly make us feel welcome. Things took a turn for the worse when he asked matter-of-factly if I wanted to join him for a 'scrum'; completely ambivalent to this fan-dangled new-found term, I agreed.
Boy, he looked strong, and had two big fat thighs like a thoroughbred stallion. He disappeared, and I heard him calling for me from deep in the kitchen, and then found him sitting on the worktop, nothing but a Sports Direct mug covering his modesty, with his fat thighs far apart and his face deep red with anger and a cane in his hand. He whipped me HARD, like an angry nurse whipping a child's bottom, and with that I realised I had been mislead, made my excuses and left through the back door as quickly as I could, only to then be accosted by a very odd little half-ling in the car park who insisted on calling me "Daddy" and asked if I wanted to be spanked in his BMW-Mini. A very odd pub indeed and also a lack of real cask ales here, so I cannot rate higher than a 4.
To read the rest of this and other reviews, you can purchase Cashpig Evans' Guide to Kent & Sussex Pubs (ISBN-10: 1905548052), available from all good retailers.
Thanks,
Cashpig Evans
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Visited for the first time recently on a Saturday lunchtime and was pleasantly surprised. Although a Shepherd Neame pub the Late Red was in good condition and reasonably priced. Food, whilst not cheap, was good value for what you got and we would definitely visit again.
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The comment made by frederickson is extremely reminiscent of the landlord himself, right down to the speech mannerisms so I suspect the revue was a valid one.
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I could not disagree with you more!
The food is excellent and so is the service. The landlord, with whom i personally know, is the nicest friendliest guy your ever likely to meet, and i know for a FACT that he would not ask anyone to leave if he did not have good reasoning to do so.
You painted a very pretty picture in your elaborate review, im sure there was another ugly side to the story, which of course, your not going to divulge in.
So, your poor attempt at bringing down The George and Dragon, has been most effortlessly foiled.
This has been an honour, i thank you.
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I'm not sure I could agree that the landlord is all that friendly.
Being a publican myself, and having a short break time to enjoy on xmas eve I went to eat here with my husband. They were very busy but found us a table and our order was taken promptly.
Starters arrived and were eaten but then we waited for almost half an hour for our main course. The couple on the table next to ours were eating their starters the same time as us and had received their main course some time before I asked a waitress if ours would be very long.
She went to check and said it would be a few minutes more, my husband mentioned that we were under a bit of pressure time wise and if it didn't arrive in a minute we wouldn't be able to wait any longer. There was no hassle, we could see they were busy and she understood our situation perfectly, she was very helpful. She went off and brought our main courses. No problem, everybody happy.
We had barely raised our knives and forks before the manager flew through the restaurant towards us like a thing possessed spouting abuse at the top of his voice and making a scene. He seemed to think we had somehow been out of order for asking about our main course and wanted us to leave, which we did.
When we got back to our place and mentioned it to some of our locals we found out we were not the first to be treated in this manner.
I would like to stress that the waitresses were great, it was busy but they were keeping it all together. I can only suggest that they lock their manager up in a cupboard somewhere to stop him from spoiling their efforts!
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Popped in last week late afternoon and wasn't overly impressed. The landlord seemed friendly enough, but most of the customers seemed to be men who like to swear a lot and didn't care if it was in front of a woman. Not a pub i'd return to in hurry!
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Lovely old wordly pub inside.
Nice mixture of Stone and wooden floors with lowed beamed ceilings throughout.
Hot dark haired barmaid in her early twenties had a massive pair of Doombars.
Well worth a visit this pub.
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You need to head to the Black Horse in Borough green... two guys there running the kitchen are very serious about food. They call themselves 'Hoodens'.
I thought it was a bit odd at first to have fine food in what is clearly very much a proper 'locals' pub rather than a restaurant or gastro get up but by the end of our visit I was completely won over to the idea, it has a nice feel to it. I have no doubt that you would be delighted with it.
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I was very pleased when I sat down here - the staff clearly knew what they were doing and it looked well run with a decent atmosphere for a large pub.
Being Sunday - a roast was in order - as all pubs depend on the quality of a Sunday roast and we were eating early, I did mention a request for 'pink'.
What arrived at 1.00pm was beef cardboard style and had clearly been roasting all Sunday am. What is strange that The Hare at Langton Green did the same thing prior to Christmas after the same request, but on returning my plate as I was so annoyed, produced a superbly sliced pink rib cut which was truly delicious.
Is it only The Chaser chef that knows how to cook among the Kent pubs? We come from the West Country where if a pub produced floury Yorkshires, cardboard beef and chilli flavoured horseradish - they would be strung up!
Comments and recommendations please, this is an expensive search and probably at this rate we can eat better at home....
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I think the answer to ThirstyMing's problem is that, sadly, there's not much call for cask beer in this place as it is now. The people who use the bar drink lager, and the ones in the restaurant drink wine. And the restaurant trade is certainly where the emphasis lies.
I haven't been in since I was there after a christening in the summer; they have a nice function room upstairs, did us very well, and the beer was OK - but it's not my sort of place for day to day drinking, I'm afraid. Pity - the building's an absolute classic.
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Popped in this week , it is a Shepherd Neame pub , not my favourite brewer if I had a choice . However , Bishops Finger ....off . Spitfire.....off , Whitstable ....off . So only the cooking bitter Masterbrew was available. Either this pub has been over run by beermonsters this week or the cellar management needs a bit of work .It should be a nice pub , great location ,looks fab from the outside , an interesting mix of locals , diners and other passers through but there is something just a little bit plastic and souless here.
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Oh dear! Attractive whitewashed old-timbered exterior gives way to a completely lobotomised, open plan characterless interior, a fine example of what should not be happening to our country pubs. I was so disappointed by the evident architectural vandalism that I can�t be bothered to relay the d�cor here and will restrict myself to asking why fireplaces and tables were decorated with lit t-light candles at 15:30 on Thursday, wtf? They were serving 3 Sheps beers and, at �3.10, the EarlyBird was distinctly average. There is a bus stop immediately outside and, when I heard a bus arrive, I left most of my pint & did one.
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Visited recently and were very impressed with the restaurant. Pleasant welcome, broad menu, excellent food and good service. We will definitely go again for a celebration and will try the pub for a casual bar-food occasion.
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Under new management for the last 20 months and what a fabulous job Mark and Fiona have done! Very clean and welcoming, open all day with a good selection of beer. A good wine list too and a seperate restaurant area that is non smoking. Food is outstanding and a mixture of traditional and restaurant fare. Service is excellent with plenty of parking for vehicles too. A super pub that has never let us down.
Hambafrika - 30 Jan 2007 19:28 |
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