The Hope — Restaurant in London

Perhaps The Hopeless would be a more fitting name? It certainly is a perfectly fitting description. After a dear friend visiting from Paris decided to stay in the neighborhood, I booked a table for lunch here so that it was not far to walk and because, heck, he wanted an English pub experience. We arrived to a non welcome where, after waiting six minutes at the bar, someone finally looked up so I could tell them we had a reservation. We were asked to pick any of the tables that were free outside which was helpful, only until we discovered that one part of the outside is basically on a polluted Main Road with fumes and combustion engine sounds for ambience, and the other part of the outside is a dingy and ignored corner [although painted a 'heritage gray' (lol)] and frequented by the occasional crack addict. We sat in the dingy corner because it was the only set of tables with some shade and were soon joined by the harmless but continuously interrupting crack addict who kept wanting my French friend's cigarettes and asking us if she should have another Diet Coke from her giant Sainsbury's bag filled with the beverage. It made catching up properly virtually impossible, even though we were pained to see the sorry state she was in. We decided to order some beers after scanning the QR code at the dusty table, only to realize that it wasn't working so it was back inside and a six minute wait at the bar to get two beers. Eventually, after some kerfuffle and conversation with said addict, we ordered what we thought was going to be food. My dear Frenchman obviously leaned heavily into classic pub dishes - sausage and mash; and fish and chips so we could share and he could savour two English Culinary Delights. The "food" (sic) arrived in good time, which soon wasn't a surprise because much of it had been pre-prepared/cooked. The peas were Stone Cold Steve Austin and the fish had at least four tablespoons of salt in the batter. The sausage was meh, and reminded me somewhat of lunch in a small village in Romania where I had appreciated the slightly basic flavors of the sausage because, well, it was a small village in Romania. The only mild saving grace was the server who arrived with a reasonable smile but did nothing to make our experience of being continuously interrupted by said addict any better. Apparently this is a popular joint for the locals which I found marginally depressing and hilarious at the same time. After being so inordinately depressed and a much awaited catch up with a dear visiting friend near ruined, I will be avoiding this. Like. The. Plague....

tables sticky with beer & the whole place seemed grotty and ran down, there was crumbs everywhere even though not busy, i was preturbed wy the whole grotto experience mainly considering its location as i expected much much better indeed. i ordered food which was way below the avarage in taste, apperance and quality and the chips and fries come pre salted in way too much salt, that much that we couldnt eat them. we was served the cultery in what looked like a little dustbin with paint missing inside it and more crumbs and filth inside with bottle of ketchup and mayo like i was in harvestor and just to add insult to injury the napkins looked like they had been sat in the dustbin for time and had what looked like a blood stain and a boggy on them, this was told as such to the waited which just simply got more napkins. Well what i say is that the local residents who go there repeatedly are too blame for this hell hole of a place existing as if they simply stop going then the place may be forced to make these simple inprovements to it so it can be brought in line with the area, simply know your worth and stop funding horrible places like this to be in business. I left the place feeling like a weatherspoon experiance which should not be the case for Wandsworth Common! Shame on the owners of this business and all returning locals with standing, needless to say we will...

So, we had lunch today and ordered the fish and chips. But guess what? The fish had a whole bunch of scales on it! It felt like I was biting into a sequin dress. I couldn’t even swallow it, so I had to spit it out onto the napkin. Meanwhile, my husband decided to brave it and eat it anyway. And boy, did he regret it! He ended up throwing up all night, and the fish came out first.

When we told the waitress as she was taking away the dish, she apologised and said she’d tell the chef. She also said it was fresh fish. Fresh fish doesn’t mean it’s so fresh that it’s not descaled.

We asked for the final bill from another waitress and foe service fee to be taken off the bill, she was hesitant and also said it was fresh fish. Again, fresh fish doesn’t mean you should have to bite into a mouthful of scales. It wasn’t until we said we could either take off the service fee or the fish dish itself that she finally agreed to take off the service charge.

My friends had also ordered the fish, but luckily, no trace of scale was found. It must have been just a fluke.

The atmosphere was great, and the service was initially good, but then we got zero empathy when we told them the dish was inedible. I’m not so sure we’ll be...