MEATliquor Bar & Restaurant N1 Angel Islington — Restaurant in London

About 2 years ago we found Meatliquor entirely by accident in Brunswick. We had burgers and despite the place being empty, we collectively agreed they were probably some of the best burgers any of us had ever had. Forward 2 yrs to now, we decided to visit it again for our first lunch on annual meetup on Friday 14th March. We didn't know what the place was called or even exactly where it was. All we had to go by was a small picture of a menu with a feature for 1 pound pickles. With some detective work on our phones, geolocation narrowed it down to a postcode area; which we went to and then remembered where we thought the restaurant was. Found a disused vacant unit.

Absolutely gutted. We kind of weren't surprised given that the location maybe wasn't the right one, and that it was empty on a Friday afternoon for lunch with what looked like literally one staff member on shift. We ended up in Nandos but refused to give up and found the name after a search - Meatliquor. Then spirits were lifted to find it was a brand, with more locations. We made a date for N1 Meatliquor for Sat lunch (15 March) as it was on our route.

To cut a long story short, yeah I still think you have the best burgers in London, on my first bite I smiled and said 'they're still amazing' and everyone loved them inc members of our group who hadn't been before.

Where you lost a point is service. I generally take two off for multiple service faults however I deem this unfair to the serving staff on shift who weren't the problem. First, open kitchens are great, but not when we can clearly see the chef on his phone when we're waiting to eat!

With the distractions, we are not surprised at the mistakes although two mistakes were team member's mistakes.

Server error - We ordered 1 garlic fries, 1 nashville, 1 chilli cheese loaded fries. We got all of them, but then for whatever reason an extra chilli cheese fries (which weren't touched) - but we were billed for two garlic fries somehow. This was removed from the bill when raised with staff.

Server error 2 - When ordering drinks, I asked if they were premixes due to the reason that if they are, you're stuck with the ingredients listed. When going to pick something else the server was attentive and asked what specifically I didn't like in Game Over. I said the Absinthe because whilst I don't have an issue with absinthe, it's hit or miss in cocktails with fruit. He advised this is actually sprayed on at the end and could be removed so I ordered it. However someone else made it at the bar, and when it came I sipped it and straight away I was like 'thats got absinthe in it'. However, it actually was a 'hit' and worked well. Whoever came up with that is a genius. So I didn't complain about it and no marks lost here.

Chef Error 1 - Two bacon cheeseburgers ordered. One requested no pickles. Both came with pickles. We believe this to be chef error as when mentioned to staff; they insisted its on the POA as no pickles and were surprised that both had them. I didn't see the input, but I believe them.

Chef Error 2 / Minor server error - As you know we got a chilli cheese fries we didn't ask for. But hilariously double error whammy, as the ticket was for an extra garlic fries (also unrequested). Somehow, server didn't notice either.

However yes, we would absolutely return to this venue. I think Meatliquor's burgers are severely underrated in London as a whole and I hope the business is doing...

They will try to CON you! I went there a few weeks ago with my friend on a later afternoon to grab a bite. Orederd food which was fine apart from the chicken wings which were cold in the middle.During the meal we asked if we could get a glass of Coca Cola and ice separately please. Initially, we were ignored until the lady realised that we kept on looking at her. We finally got a glass of Coke after 10 mins of waiting which roughly came with 97% ice, it was dumped on the table and the person just ran off again before we could have asked her anything else. We decided to finish and set off so i went to request if i can pay. The manager who i spoke to said he will be with me shortly. He approached the table with the card machine rushing to take the payment. The receipt was folded neatly at Sub total(this didn't include service charge). I overlooked the amount which seemed fine but since he was distracting and didn't allow us to look at the receipt he quickly brought the card machine to me to tab. I payed with my phone and just when the manager was going to walk away i asked for my receipt. He gave me a copy and walked off. Now i saw the amount that also included service charge. Since, service charge is optional you are meant to inform the customer if they are willing to accept or not. As a customer you have the right to refuse to pay service charge(if you deem service as unacceptable or do not wish to pay)and if it is compulsory at a restaurant it is mentioned before. I then had to queue up and wait for the manager to ask him to refund the service charge. I was then told they can't refund me the service charge back to my card and they will give me cash and i should wait for them at my table, five minutes later a staff member came and pushed the plate with the refund and just walked off. I have had good experiences everytime i have been to other branches but since this visit it has tremendously changed my view on the enterprise as to how they operate with such...

My partner and I ordered food from here via UberEats for dinner. 1hr later it still hadn't arrived and for some reason our driver cancelled collecting the order altogether and the status changed back to "Preparing your order" - I rang the branch to find out what was happening and they said they weren't sure what the cause for the cancellation was (fine, that's not their fault, I can accept that) however not even the slightest bit of empathy was shown for the delay in our dinner. The person I spoke to said the food had gone cold so they had to remake the order and that a new driver was confirmed and on their way to collect, I asked if they could confirm it was coming this time and if there was a rough ETA because we would rather just cancel the order altogether if not, the staff member said they would call the driver and make sure they collect it.

30 minutes later the food finally arrives and the disappointment continued, we were missing an item from our order, our fries were completely cold and the burgers were in a horrible and almost squashed state (this couldn't have been the driver because the burgers are wrapped and then packed in a box so this was definitely how the team made it), it makes me wonder if they actually did remake our order.

1.5hr wait for an over priced disappointment. Toasting some bread and putting some butter on it would have been fine dining compared to what was delivered, we didn't even finish it. MEATliquor in other areas have been good at least for dining in, but this branch I would urge anyone to be extremely cautious from ordering here unless they're planning 2 hours in advance and enjoy recooking...