As you may see from previous reviews I’m not a massive fan of Byron. I find their burgers in general uninspiring and once you add on all the extras it’s not the cheap meal you were led to believe. However their new Soho branch proved me wrong and I'm more than happy to acknowledge this. I had organised a bit of a night out to celebrate my birthday. Plan was beers, a bite to eat and then down to the ICA to watch Made of Stone, the Stone Roses documentary. We had planned to try flat iron on beak St but they quoted us 2 hours for a table so we skipped over the road to Byron. I was annoyed before I went in as this was the site of the late lamented Soho Pizzeria, who did nice pizzas and had a bit of live music most nights, and was now replaced by my burger nemesis Byron! However Big Matt and Villa Steve were happy to go in and I was sure Nick from out of town would like it after he got over the shock of us daft Londoner’s naming burger joints after early 19th century poets.
Well our visit started well and continued in that vein. Despite it being really busy they found us a table in the main room with plenty of room. Another big plus for us was that along with a really good selection of beers they were doing draft flights. The flights consisted of 5 third of pint samplers of their draft beers. A really very good idea. These lasted us throughout the meal so the amount was just right. Another plus for me was the food. Having eaten at other branches I always found the burgers a bit meh but the one I had here was really nice. Good tasty bacon, fresh bun and best of all a warm patty, other branches get so busy they seem to pre-cook the burgers leading to a nasty lukewarm burger. My courgette chips were also good, fried in clean oil which makes a big difference.
To complete my favourable impression Nick turned up late due to transport issues which he did tell us about in Partridgesque fashion. We asked the waitress if they could get his meal out quickly as we only had 45 minutes left. She said 15 minutes would suffice and she was good to her word so Nick was able to enjoy his meal unrushed. So there you go a chain place played a really strong hand here. Good food, professional service and great beer a real win win for my birthday night out. To put it into Stone Roses terms I entered expecting the Second Coming but what I got was Made of Stone! Happy!
Wednesday, June 26, 2013
Overall rating
Food 8 | Service 9 | Atmosphere 8 | Value for money 8