The Parakeet Pub — Restaurant in London

If haven't tried the food - hence 1 star missing. But service 10 stars out of 5. Friendly, polite, knowledgeable and charming bar staff. They know traditional as well as modern cocktails. Some of which are priced very reasonably by randomly assigned promotional days. Nuts.....mmmmmm mixed with some herbs and mainly cashews.....a dash of salt.....perfect inducement to linger and, perhaps, have another drink.... simply because nuts should never drink alone.

I know this may sound a little old fashioned....but, staff visual presentation is (I think) important. I don't mean uniforms...I mean a clean and casual appearance. Why? Well, because people want to relax and if the staff are too formal..... one can feel out of place and perhaps not so welcome. NO PROBLEMS AT THE PARAKEET. Staff present just right, which accompanies their light and pleasant interactions. No pushing of you to consume. But, also attentive to signals for an encore. They have a jazz night (upstairs) on Mondays. A quiz night - can't remember.... probably because I attended the "how to acquire dementia lesson somewhere". Or maybe I had one more than "merry"?

I don't have a local because I rarely drink. But, if I did - it would be the parakeet. Maybe after I've tried the jazz night - I will. I went their to celebrate my clean bill of health from a long running illness. Next time I won't need a reason. But, I could always pretend it was my bath night or something. I spent a bit because I was trying to persuade staff to have shots. That's come out wrong and implies that the staff immediately accepted. The opposite was true. They are all very modest and refuse drinks offers as a matter of course - not a rude refusal, just a "you don't have to do that". Took some persuading. Judging the prices on what I bought and not the quantity - I would say it is reasonably priced. The £5 for an "old fashioned" was very reasonable. But, it was that nights special. I don't know if they do "happy hours". I am in two minds as to whether happy hours are a good idea. But then I am a split personality in training. Special thanks to Joe for...

First off, it's a gorgeous pub with a chilled atmosphere. Very buzzy and welcoming, mainly thanks to the staff who were all smiles when we arrived. We ordered some cocktails in the pub to start (spicy margs) which were great.

We were seated in the restaurant situated beyond the curtain that separates pub from restaurant, which is a nice touch. You feel like you're in an intimate restaurant but you still get the pub vibe, which was cool. Loved the window into the kitchen as I personally like to watch the chefs do their thing. Our server Lorenzo was super attentive and very knowledgable. You can tell he has a passion for what he does which added to the experience.

We had the potato bread (delicious) for starters with the oysters, which were lovely and fresh. I've not had oysters with ginger before but it added a nice kick. For mains, we couldn't decide so Lorenzo recommended the sea bream and with that we ordered the braised leeks and cucumber and courgettes in chilli. Lorenzo suggested for our wine, a chardonnay from Tuscany called Bramito, which he said would pair nicely with the fish (he was correct).

The sea bream was so soft and flaky, and went well with the cheesiness of the leeks (absolutely my favourite thing we ate). You can tell everything is cooked on the grill/over fire because the leeks, mushrooms and sea bream had this smokiness to it, but not enough to overpower the other flavours. The cucumber and courgettes balanced out the pecorino. Everything just went very well together.

I'm not massively a dessert person but we finished with a chocolate mousse which was served to us straight out of a massive bowl – I wish I took pictures! It was laid on a biscuit base and was honestly divine.

All in all, we had a wonderful meal and I'd highly recommend giving The Parakeet a visit. Not just for the food, but for the fact that you can tell everyone that works there takes pride in their work. A lovely edition to...

We spent 5 days in London and wanted to try to experience as much of an authentic UK experience as one can experience while still being a tourist. A part of that was trying to find a non-tourist trap location for a Sunday Roast.

After speaking to several locals, our concierge and our own research, we picked the Parakeet Pub (in Kentish Town) for our Sunday roast.

I am not going to get into the food, although it was superb (we had Beef, Lamb and Chicken) in our party and all were excellent, but if I had to pick, the Lamb was certainly the best in my opinion. The Yorkshire pudding was amazing and the crispy roast potatoes are something I could not get enough of. However, as good as the food was, it paled in comparison to our server Miguel.

Miguel is an absolute treasure to the Pub. Smart, friendly, knowledgeable and made us feel like we were at home having a Sunday Roast. We told him a bit about our trip and he gave us recommendations of where locals would go for food and drink around different parts of the city. For example, he recommended a Pizza place near Craven Cottage (because we were going there for a game Fulham vs. Man United). He was so helpful and useful in recommending food and drink and at the end of our lunch, he even bought is four drinks. A real class act.

The reality is, even if the food was terrible (it wasn't), we would have still given this place 5 Stars because of Miguel.

Now... it also didn't hurt that seated right next to us having his own Sunday roast was Charles Dance, but we made sure to leave him alone to enjoy his meal and he could not have been more kind and generous with his time because he came and spoke to our party of four when his meal was done. He's a regular at the pub and a true gentleman. Thank-you good sir.

In any event, this Pub has it all, had a real genuine feel and experience to it and I cannot recommend it...