A La Cruz - Gary's review

The Occupy Wall Street offshoots seem to be the current flavour of the month at the moment. Not to be outdone, Steak Club was directed by Stacy (to whom the Steaktober hosting honours fell) to occupy the Old Bank of England at Fleet Street for our own brand of protest.

Its quite a large venue with very smart décor reminiscent of the old heady days of high finance. Drinks are not the cheapest there but this seems to be a common theme in London at the moment (inflation at pubs definitely seems to be significantly above the national average right now!)

Wassie seems to be struggling to learn his lesson and again arrived later than the agreed upon 15min tolerance, adding to his already high strafdop tally.

A La Cruz itself seemed to be well off the beaten track, so when we jumped out the cab I initially thought that Stacy had made a mistake with the address. This impression wasn’t helped by some local hoodies staging their very own re-enactment of the August riots down the road.

However, inside the venue it was a different story!

The restaurant theme is dominated by an indoor firepit (and who doesn’t love a firepit!!!) behind a protective glass wall, with meat slowly roasting proudly on display. A sight to behold for any meatlover!

The indoor fire does mean that it is rather warm inside, which is great for winter but I’m not sure how pleasant this will be in the height of summer.

The menu has a good selection of steak options (both in terms of cuts and sizes), as you’d expect from an Argentinean steakhouse. I decided to go with the Cuadri (a 400g rump) rare. This turned out to be a great choice – surprisingly tender for a rump and very tasty. Despite that, I regret not being a little more adventurous and perhaps should have given the Parrilladas option.

On the wine front, Stacy started us off with the La Linda Malbec and followed up with a Tapiz Syrah (both 2009 options). The Malbec was a juicy light wine and a good introduction to the meal. My preference though was for the Syrah – a more fuller tasting wine. Special thanks go to Wassie for kindly modelling for the wine photos (see below)

Unfortunately, we had a waiter rather than waitress serve us so this category isn’t going to score well. A glitch or two in the service around the side orders doesn’t help either. Not a complete disaster by any means though…

To end the scoring on a positive note, the evening came to just under £50 a person, so definitely value for money!

All in all, I have no hesitations in recommending A La Cruz – a great evening out! Thanks Stacy!

Steak = 35
Venue = 7
Menu = 7
Wine = 8
Value for money = 8
Waitress = 4

Total = 69