Review: The Pear Tree, W6

We have been decorating.   The flat has been turned completely upside down.  The vast majority of our possessions are in the sitting room  where we are also sleeping with about 2 square inches of floor space around the mattress.

Happily I have now got my kitchen back, which looks very splendid with its new colours but on Wednesday night it was a different story so escaping and going out for supper was the only option.

I had read the London Foodie’s favourable review of the Pear Tree and as the pub is a stone’s throw from the flat we set forth for supper.   Sadly I do not have any photos as the camera is buried somewhere in the piles of stuff!

The Pear Tree is a traditional local pub that has been semi gentrified.   It has that traditional pub feeling without having been overly interior designed.    Whether you are going for a pint or a 3 course meal it is a pleasant unpretentious place to spend a few hours.

We ordered, and after what felt like quite a wait (in fairness we were both starving) our starters arrived.    I had chosen the tempura vegetables with sweet chili sauce and aioli (£4.25).   The batter was perfect: thin, crisp and delicious and not at all oily.     There was a fantastic selection of vegetables including mushrooms, broccoli, red & green peppers, aubergines and tomatoes.   The aioli was fantastic, homemade with oodles of garlic.

Ed ordered mackerel pate toast with sweet mustard sauce (£5.50).   I was expecting a pot of pate with separate toast, but it came ready assembled brushetta style.    The pate was very smooth (I would have prefered some texture) but tasted just fine.   The star of this plate were the roasted baby cherry tomatoes which were delicious and bursting with flavour.

Predictably, Ed ordered the Aberdeen Angus burger with handcut chips (£9.50).  This was splendid, the meat was tender and flavoursome, the burger had great grill marks!  We ordered rare and thought that our burger was cooked medium (although our interpretation of rare is possibly anyone else’s blue!).  The burger was served in a generic lightly toasted plain white bun with a salad garnish.   The star of the dish was the chips,  they were cross between chips, roast and wedges served with more of the scrummy aioli.

My main was spaghetti noir with seafood and white wine sauce (£10.95).  This was fine, but nothing stunning,  the pasta was served with scallops and mussels, crushed black pepper and rocket leaves; whilst I was delighted to find scallops the mussels were slightly tough and I was slightly disappointed that there were only two types of seafood.   The pasta was slightly too al dente for me, although Ed thought it was perfectly cooked.    Being a wet food aficionado I would have liked slightly more sauce.

Both being totally full we skipped the pudding.

I had food envy looking at everything that anyone else was eating which is always a good sign, a pizza looked especially good.  I loved the food styling, the pub has a collection of fabulous mis-matched vintage plates and cutlery which works well.

We will certainly be going back for the burgers, but I think that the kitchen needs to refine some of the other dishes, especially with the direct competition from the second Idle Hour that is opening within a 2 minute walk.