The Blackberry Jack — Restaurant in St Albans

This is my first 'Sizzling' pub. It's another one from the Mitchells & Butler crew. Expectations were not high.

It is probably the cheapest pub in the St Albans area.

It has an impressively unpleasant care home feeling to it.

The outside seating area is surrounded by houses and roads making it one of the worst places to sit out of all the pubs in town. Yes, the ash trays were full despite it having only just opened. God knows what the staff get paid, not a lot if they haven't even the incentive to empty an ash tray before opening the doors.

Coincidentally, the only pubs I can think of that have worse outside areas are also Mitchells & Butler pubs. The Three Horseshoes on Hatfield Rd for instance. There you have traffic roaring past and the stench of diesel from the adjacent petrol station mingling with the car park fumes. Either M&B has no taste or style (obviously) or it just doesn't care (obviously).

Inside Crackberry Jack is no better. There are fruit machines in every corner just to make sure every last penny is extracted from the more guillible of the poor people who have to come in here.

The only reason it gets three stars and not less is because it is cheap, open and no one tried to start a fight with me. However, those are no grounds on which to recommend it.

I just hate the thought that some of my money has helped the knobs at M&B justify their undoubtedly six figure salaries. All for providing the crappest, lowest common denominator, pubs in the country, so the low of wage can get hammered cheaply.

Cheap. That's what it is. Jersey Farm...

We booked five people for a meal on boxing day 2023. The conservatory area they located the table in was freezing, no heating at all. Then we ordered at bar, after half hour or so, two meals came, then five mins later another appeared then after ten minutes another appeared and order was wrong, so we waited whilst they cooked the bit that was missing , so that person ate on their own, tas everyone rose was finished by then. Finally we had to ask where the mladt persons meal was? turned out it had been forgotten altogether so he had to wait whilst they cooked that, so he ate on his own also. As we had all finished by then . All told wouldn't eat there again, shame as we used to eat there all the time, no special offers were pointed out by staff, we all had the App no mention was made of 2 burger meals for price of one, no asking if we had the app to add loyalty stamps,so no 20 per cent off meal, no mention either that app had 10 per cent off drinks either. Lucky we had good company, as we were all freezing by the end of our long drawn out meal , and mostly ate our meals one at a time. But fair play to chef it tasted nice. I told waitress we were freezing so heating put on as we left, hopefully next diners benefitted from that chat. There are lots of places I'd visit again, but...

This used to be a great place to come with friendly staff, a nice atmosphere and decent food. Unfortunately everything has gone downhill since it has been under new management. The conservatory has been ruined by bringing the bench seats in, the food is much worse (we were served nachos with cold sauce poured all over them instead of warming them and garlic bread so burnt it was inedible). The staff now aren't friendly and leave you waiting ages. The wait time for food is really bad but this was always the case before as well. The barman got my order wrong. They often are out of stock for food you want as well. I used to really like that you could help yourself to tap water at the bar and this has been taken away. The prices are good and the food is mostly decent but overall it's a disappointing experience now.

Edit April 2025: I've raised my star rating as they've removed the bench seats from the conservatory and put it back like it used to be. The food and wait times have improved. The staff have improved too and are friendly now, especially...