Roast Dinners in London

Konnichiwaaaaaaaaaah why are the trains delayed? It was time for a review of The Pig’s Head in Clapham.

Yes, I’m back from Japan and yes I’m going to wank over how amazing it was and maybe also the Lolita women. Well, it’s either that or bang on about Donald Trump’s corruption again.

Pretty sure they are all 40 year old women dressing as though they are much younger in the same way as I wear colours other than beige and navy despite M&S and Next insisting they are the only colours middle-aged guys are allowed to wear.

Guess I could always talk about roast dinners, but what the hell else is there to say after 370+ reviews? There isn’t any more original roast dinner content to write. Well…unless I go vegan.

I’d love to say that I was excited about having British beef instead of Wagyu beef, paying £13 for a glass of red wine instead of £2, and paying 12.5% service charge for a miserable handover instead of no service charge from a super-polite Japanese woman.

Alas, excitement wasn’t my vibe, but we’d booked The Pig’s Head because it was one of the places on my to-do list that I had pretty high expectations for, it being recommended to me by someone that has followed me since Twitter being woke days and hence he must be wise. Also it was something to vaguely look forward to – if going to the Roast Dinner Triangle Of Doom is something that you can really look forward to. After two weeks on holiday in Japan.

Making a pig’s head of government

Gosh what kind of patriot am I. BRITISH BEEF IS DA BEST.

Hell, I’m such a shit patriot that I even laughed when Gabriel blazed the penalty over and the French Qataris won the Champions League again. I haven’t even put any England flags on the lampposts near my flat in Croydon or sung God Save The King this weekend.

So The Pig’s Head is a fairly new pub in Clapham from what I can tell – it seems to have been open a few years, an independent pub with a focus on sustainability, and apparently is carbon neutral, though I’m not sure anyone cares about the environment in 2026 – 35’C in May seems pretty normal, right? Just give the people cheap petrol. You can read more about their efforts to be sustainable here.

Beer choice was bang average, something I’d like to think isn’t sustainable in an era of being able to get gorgeous 9% hazy IPA near Mount Fuji – though it is Clapham so expectations were always going to be muted.

Hell, I even went to a place called Clapham Tap afterwards – and if your pub name has the word “tap” in it, one expects that you might have craft beer expertise, but no, there was nothing that I’d never heard of. Granted, a Signature beer is preferable to the basic range at The Pig’s Head. A Jubel was refreshing enough in the warmth though.

Best espresso martini in London, so I’m told by my expert accomplice. And the definitely not £2.00 a glass wine was reasonably decent.

Making a pig’s head of standing on the correct side of an escalator

The menu at The Pig’s Head was fairly interesting – two vegetarian/vegan roast dinners – celeriac, courgettes and asparagus – or wellington of fermented mushroom and beet, either priced at £23.50. Gosh, a whole sentence on vegetables, who even am I? I possibly had too much fried chicken, fried pork, fried bacon, fried wagyu, etc etc in Japan.

Other options were pork belly and pulled shoulder at £27.50, leg of lamb at £28.50, or beef sirloin at £32.50.

Beef? You think I want beef in this country ever again?

I may well have gone for the sharing brisket had I emotionally recovered from my holiday by the time I had sat down, plus there was a sharing chicken also – the latter as a concept in my head is just too much hard work for a Sunday.

So I went for the pork belly and pulled shoulder. Well, of course I did.

Making a pig’s head of these subheadings that nobody reads

So the wagyu carrot was sliced in half, towards the crunchier side of the spectrum, and quite buttery.

The wagyu cabbage, of which there was very little of, was soft and kind of buttery too. Though also this was on top of the wagyu puree’d swede which was a little on the sweet side itself.

Cauliflower wagyu cheese was a side that actually came with it – and not an upsell, and apparently no-waste, which I don’t know what that means exactly but I’d take a guess uses up other stuff – I thought I’d tasted some leek and mustard in it – but in limited amounts.

The cauliflower itself was fairly soft, the cheese quite goeey but also solidified a bit earlier gooey, and it didn’t take that cheesy to me.

Roast potatoes were crispy on the outside…well, actually more crunchy on the outside, and a bit dry/chewy on the inside. I guess they were passable – I’ve had far worse.

The Yorkshire pudding was actually really good, crispy to the top, soft and eggy to the bottom – reasonably freshly cooked, no signs of being under a heat lamp for half a week like in many other pubs.

Making a pig’s head of knowing what the hell to put in these titles

So the wagyu pork belly itself seemed to be 60% fat and 40% meat. Perhaps I’m being generous there – the outer rim was chewy, the rest was quite succulent and fairly enjoyable.

I enjoyed the pulled pork shoulder more, there was more flavour there – I’m sure you’ve had pulled pork before and this would meet your expectations.

Also it came with a chunk of cold crackling that didn’t really taste of anything.

My accomplice had the definitely not wagyu beef (the carrots and cabbage weren’t wagyu either, sorry if you believed me but I was lying) – one slice of which was melt in your mouth, the other slice was chewy and a let down compared to the other slice.

Finally, the gravy was pretty decent, quite on the thin side, not enough of it – more on the red wine gravy vibes than anything else, though it was tricky to detect.

The Pig’s Head

In booking The Pig’s Head, I’d booked somewhere that I thought might be really good…but also somewhere in the Roast Dinner Triangle Of Doom.

So that I am neither impressed nor disappointed feels about right.

The highlight was probably the yorkie – a nice, fresh, eggy yorkie, though the vegetables and the pulled pork were also good.

The roast potatoes were too crunchy on the outside, and too dry/chewy on the inside – though at least we got 4. Not entirely sure what the cold crackling was about either.

Service was good, the young lady serving us had a sparkle in her eye and made us laugh a couple of times – service charge was 12.5% but there was also a £1.50 charge for filtering water, and a £1.00 charge for sustainability – which I thought Trump had stopped. By the way, I had a plastic straw in Japan…life changing.

My accomplice’s score was a very healthy 7.85, and my score is a 7.46 out of 10. One of the better roast dinners in Clapham, for sure.

I’ll be back next Sunday – I have plans arranged for the 3 Sundays after that, but not this one coming. Anyone know where I can get a wagyu roast dinner from? Without travelling to Tokyo as I’m done with 14 hour flights for a few months at least.

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