A La Cruz – Brad’s Review

I entered this steak club meeting with vivid memories of a tray of white spirits that led to terrible headaches (for all of us). What scared me more is that the guys did not learn from this and we all got our reviews in late again. Luckily mine was only 1 week late, so only one compulsory penalty strafdop for me.

Stacy chose a really nice old traditional pub called The Old Bank of England on Fleet Street. It is a grand old pub, with high ceilings..... and very expensive beers. When did 2 pints of Peroni start costing almost £10? As usual Gazza was first. I arrived 2nd, closely followed by Stacy and Roger. Warren is starting a new trend, being the last to arrive at drinks....again. You would think that entering this steak club with 4 strafdops already accumulated, he would have been on time. Nope... he was more than 15 minutes late again. That means 5 strafdops. Oh no.... At this stage I was starting to have flashbacks from the previous steak club and the dreaded long next day at work.

As per the tradition, we all jumped into a cab and Stacy escorted us to our secret destination. Stacy, again seemed to drive us miles to a remote venue. Stacy discovered a well hidden little Argentinean Steak Restaurant in Farringdon, called A La Cruz. It had a nice simple vibey relaxed decor’ and a nice original touch to have a spat-cock type split BBQ (braai) over coals on display behind a wall of glass.

Rog left ‘Frank’ at home. I think he was still licking his wounds from his first Steak Club evening out. He did however have a hilarious realisation during the evening that he had left ‘Frank’ at home alone with his better half. What was Frank getting up to in Rogers absence? As usual, he had us in hysterics over some of his antics.

Voting time: I made a suggestion to keep Rog as a regular, which means we would increase our membership to 6 members. This poses a minor issue with cabs, however the new cabs can now carry 6 passengers.

Don’t forget to vote boys: ‘Yes’ for him to join, ‘No’ for him to be an option for an invitation if someone leave the membership.

It is amasing how Andre’ always seems to get the highest scores for Waitress. I recon he scout’s out his venues beforehand and ensures that they either have loads of waitresses or ensure they are working on the steak evening night. Tell us the secret, Andre’? Will this trend continue now that he is an engaged man? Anyway, back to the point... Stacy again failed in the waitress category as we had a hairy Argentinean Man serving us. The service was good, but as tradition goes the Waitress Scores = 5.

Stacy ordered two bottles of wine, the first was a Malbec, La Linda. This was a rather light wine but very easy to drink and smooth. The second was a 2009 Tapiz Syrah. This was also good, but was slightly heavier, but still smooth. Wine scores: 7.5

The menu was less steak focused than most of the places we have been to in the past, but they still had a reasonable choice of cuts and 2 sizes per steak. There were also two combo options to share, which Warren and Stacy actually went for. It was called Parrilladas, which came with 2 pork sausages, 2 black puddings and 2 400g cuts of Sirloin and Rib-eye. It is served to the table still on coals, so a bit of advice is to order it slightly less cooked than you would normally have it, as it continues to cook at the table. My menu score = 6.

I went for a 400g rib-eye, which was nice and tasty but tough compared to the last 4-5 steak club venues. The guys all seemed to enjoy their steaks, but I got the feeling that the quality was good but not fantastic (relative other top steak venues). My steak score = 5.5 x 5= 27.5

The steak, as mentioned above is not the best I have had, however it was certainly very good when you look at the price for the entire evening. The bill came to £46 per head which is the cheapest we have had by about £15, which makes my average steak more palatable and acceptable. My score for Value = 8.

Is La Cruz a place I would recommend? Yes. However, If you are looking for the best steak in London, this is not your venue. However, if you are looking to go out for a good quality meat feast with a vibey atmosphere, that won’t cost the earth then it is a steak restaurant worth trying. My score for the venue = 7.

As usual, we always have to end the evening with a night cap. I had already had my 1 strafdop, so I was just tagging along for a nice final social pint to close off the evening. Warren however had different plans. Another clear spirit / water roulette arrived and unfortunately I chose a horrible clear vodka and some of the guys who were still due strafdops fines got off lightly. C'est la vie...

Total = 61