Roast Dinners in London

I go two weeks without mentioning the orange-skinned peado man-baby and another really shit assassination attempt has been arranged to get him back into Roast Dinners in London. This is also a review of The Hanbury in Islington.

Speaking of oranges, have you been watching Fruit Love Island?

No, neither have I.

And if I were a half-decent roast dinner reviewer that really cared about his readers, then I’d have loaded up Sora and created Roast Dinner Love Island so you could all check out the broccoli flirting with the Yorkshire pudding, or something like that.

Then again, Sora isn’t a thing any more, as OpenAI need to concentrate on their core mission, which seems to be destroying humanity quicker than Elon Musk can manage it. Bro got to get the credit in the afterlife.

Curiously, the guest for this roast dinner has a friend who’s mother is the chiropodist (or something like that) for Sam Altman’s brother (or something like that).

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Most of the Sundays when I head out, I have a reasonable idea of whether it’s going to be a good roast dinner, a wanky overpriced roast dinner, etc. Sometimes I’m still surprised (normally to the downside of expectations), but there’s often enough reviews on Google Maps (it’s ok to do evil now) to make a judgement – hell, there may well have been a plethora of Instagram videos and shit, not that I ever watch videos.

Except Fruit Love Island.

I cannot believe they kicked out the banana. Damn those data centres are soooooo worth the environmental damage.

Oh yeah, The Hanbury. Normally I have an idea of what the roast dinner is going to be like, but I had very, very few images/reviews to go on on Google – mostly just a tip from Reddit, I think. Or was it Threads?

The Hanbury has a local’s vibe to it, though Islington locals which has a very different local’s vibe to a local’s pub in Croydon, say. Or Hull.

It does look like any other pub inside, part of the True Pub Co – of which I’ve reviewed zero of their other pubs. Again, nothing to go on.

Also it has a hotel upstairs – cue the obvious idiotic reviews:

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The Hanbury has a little outdoor seating area around the front of the pub, and being there early enough I was able to bag a seat for the first al fresco roast dinner of 2026. And probably the last, as autumn and/or wasps will soon be on their way. Hey you’d be cynical if you were writing about roast dinners every week.

On the menu was beef sirloin at £21.00, leg of lamb at £21.00, pork belly at £19.50, half a chicken at £19.00 or a vegetable and nut roast wellington at £18.00. Bonus points for offering a kid’s size roast.

All rather inexpensive for Islington. Wonder why not for too long though.

Not starting with the carrots because you cannot see them on the first photograph, the broccoli was welcome yet watery.

Cabbage was fairly ordinary, but pleasantly so – some pepper going on and it had a balance between crunch and softness.

This photograph has the carrots on – they were really soft and floppy, likely cooked on some previous day, though still some flavour – I suspect honey glazed.

Also there was a small piece of parsnips which was somewhat chewy, but packed a punch in terms of flavour.

Heading. I Have No Other Inspiration Because They Made Me Go To The Office On a Monday And Fuck That.

So far, all fine but unspectacular. The roast potatoes continued on that vein, which is a small mercy in London – they had been reasonably freshly cooked, were fairly soft inside – no crispy edges, but not burnt/aneamic/undercooked, etc.

The Yorkshire pudding was on the cold side, and had a texture as though it was pre-packaged. Quite tearable but also again it wasn’t burnt, and hadn’t been sat around under a heat lamp for a day. Even if it wasn’t homemade (I couldn’t be sure), it was reasonable.

And then, the lamb.

Quite possibly this had been in the oven since Kennedy was assassinated, this was some of the driest lamb I’ve ever experienced.

This really was grim. I was having a pleasant enough though very unspectacular roast dinner until I started eating this. The texture was shoe leather, it was dry, it was very overcooked. Even my mother wouldn’t over-cook it this much. Well…

This wouldn’t have happened if there was a giant ballroom next door.

The beef was likewise notably overdone – though the pork belly looked even grimmer than either, alas not photographed, and not even finished by said accomplice.

Thank fuck I didn’t record this as Roast Dinner Love Island. Imagine the scenes as the soggy hungover carrot tried to get together with the aged, dried-out leg of lamb – be thankful that OpenAI cancelled Sora before I got this inspiration.

Then, just to confuse matters, the gravy was really, really good. A homemade, thick, proper gravy – tomato based and I think with some red wine influence (unsure on that), it was a damn good gravy that made the acceptable parts good. Though nothing was saving that lamb.

The Hanbury

Until I tried the lamb, this roast dinner was perfectly acceptable. The gravy being good and everything else being more or less alright in a mum’s cooking kinda way.

But then the lamb…how can you describe it.

Erm…

What’s the word?

It’s coming to me.

Just hang on.

Erm…

Shit.

So it’s a slightly confusing one to rate – had the lamb been at least half-decent then you’d be looking at a score in the 7’s, were the gravy not so good then a score in the 5’s.

The pork accomplice scored it an 6.10, the beef accomplice a 6.70, and I’m going for a 6.23 out of 10. The Hanbury is probably the only place where I can suggest that maybe you should try the vegetarian, given all 3 meats on the table were rank.

Service was pleasant enough without being notable, beer choice was pretty standard for London – Jubel, Two Tribes, etc. It’s a decent enough locals pub, and prices are on the afforable side too.

No roast dinner next week as going up north to see the folks, and Mother Gravy does need an extra hug or two right now. I shall be back the week after – no plan as of yet.

I shall leave you with some words of wisdom.