The Lord Tredegar / Bow

Who are they?

The Lord Tredegar is a fantastic, old East End pub located in the heart of fashionable Bow and a stone's throw from Roman Road market. While the nearby Morgan Arms takes some of the limelight away in terms of places to eat and drink, I hadn't tried the Lord Tredegar before. So after some evening exercise classes were out of the way, I joined the girlfriend and our best gay friend to see what they could offer.

Thoughts

With The Morgan Arms completely full by 8pm on a Thursday night, it didn't bode well at the Lord Tredegar either, whose cosy bar area was completely full with punters warming themselves next to open fires with a pint or two. Going round to the back, the dining area was also full, though as it wasn't a particularly cold night we opted to sit out back with the few smokers who had dared to venture outside.

Judging by the menu, it is entirely fair to call this place a Gastropub, offering a dozen hearty mains paired with a great selection of lagers and ales. As it would be rude not to have a beer and a burger, my craft lager went down a treat while waiting for the burger and chips, plus the extra chorizo of course!

Only half a pint later (which suddenly had the company of another pint as I was drinking slowly), my burger arrived; a wonderful stack of meat plus more meat, cheese and token lettuce leaf encased in a toasted bun, accompanied by a sizeable bowl of crispy chips and mayonnaise. To a hungry fool like me, it's an amazing thing to behold after a long day and more than I could have hoped for from a pub.

I doubt whether the order to cook the burger medium rare actually resulted in a burger cooked that way, but nevertheless, the burger patty is made of excellent quality beef that melts in the mouth, no doubt aided by the mature cheddar, sparingly added to melt over the top of the patty. Furthermore, the addition of two small chorizo sausages, halved down the long side and cooked to a crispy finish, made for an excellent, spicy alternative to slices of bacon. To be honest, I had expected to receive only thin slices on top of the burger, so getting two sausage's worth for just £1 extra is not only a pleasant surprise but excellent value to boot and something I highly recommend. Whether you have the hunger for it or not, the combination of beef burger and chorizo sausage makes for a lovely mixture in the mouth, though tempered by the inclusion of a crispy toasted bun that is slightly on the more crispy side of toasted than I would have liked - though those who crave polar opposites may not find this such a bad thing.

Moving on to the sides, I am happy to report that the excellent value continues with the chips, with a suitably-sized portion to match the burger. I'm not entirely sure whether these are chipped in the kitchen, but the variety of sizes leads me to believe this is the case unlike some establishments that seem to serve oven chips straight out of the McCain factory. Regardless, these are well-cooked to leave them lovely and golden brown which a crispy, slightly greasy finish, as if they are the natural evolution of fish and chips shop chips, plus the seasoning means that they go really well with the supplied mayonnaise.

Now, I know it would be crass of me to compare the fare on offer here favourably with the relative tat on offer with your standard pub, so here I can confidently say that the food on offer is good enough to rival a restaurant. Pubs on the whole haven't really got a good reputation on this blog, so it's lovely to visit a place that cares enough to do something really well, offers a great selection of beers to go with and provides both surprise and value.

Conclusion

Top stuff from The Lord Tredegar, with plenty of excellent pub food done properly to soak up a beer (or three). Who says you can't have quantity AND quality?

Score

9/10

Where can I find them?
A stone's throw from Mile End station