Last year a branch of Shoreditch’s Red Dog Saloon opened in Clapham. This is another one of the numerous American style BBQ and burgers joints to spring up in our capital. I can’t pretend that the prospect excited me much. If it had I’d have travelled to Shoreditch to try the original restaurant but really, there are only so many times variations on ‘dirty food’ can thrill me. However, my (mostly male) friends make a lot of noise about this place so I decided to check it out.
The first thing that struck me about Red Dog was the spacing between the tables – the utter tininess of which is rather at odds with the calorific contents of the menu. Despite being a constantly eating food blogger, I’m hardly a porker but even I could barely squeeze myself across the room and being pointed to a table at the far corner was enough to bring me out in OCD sweats. God knows how the waiting staff cope. It’s the sort of layout where you’re forcibly inserted into the personal space and private conversations of the tables you pass and meeting someone coming the other way is negotiated only by a form of interpersonal ‘traffic light’ system. Tip: take your coat off at the door!
But all these things can be mitigated by excellent service and great food right? Sadly not. The service was decidedly lax. It took literally 20 minutes of actively attempting to attract attention to get a drinks order taken and when our food order came I kid you not and state with not even a modicum of exaggeration that 5 of our 8 food orders were incorrect. We’re not talking totally incorrect – like getting a fish finger when you order spaghetti – but the sort of annoying small errors which make you feel like the server just wasn’t really paying attention. Things like not getting the fries you ordered, no cheese on your burger or getting beans when you asked for ‘slaw. All cause delays whilst the rest of your food sits there getting cold. They’d make things a lot easier for themselves if they included any sides at all with your main. But then again, they would make less money that way….
Really, you know what you’re in for when you read a menu and it tries to compensate by listing out the salad fillings for the burger at the top where you’d normally see sides. Quite funny really.
The food itself wasn’t bad, to be fair. They cooked my burger rare when asked and the patty itself was juicy. I love blue cheese and bacon and they had a burger with that on the menu. It was decent. However, it was small and it did cost £10.45. When you consider that places like Honest Burger are doing similar burgers, made with 32 day aged beef from the Ginger Pig butchery, for £8 including their signature rosemary fries it puts Red Dog’s into rather a dim light. Plus their fries were ove salte (even for me with an exceptionally high salt threshold) and the mac ‘n’ cheese was floury in that unpleasant way only achieved by a poorly executed roux.
Whilst out of professional curiosity and a desire to be thorough I’d go back to sample their BBQ, I wouldn’t bother with much else unless they reduce their price point considerably. By addressing this, their seating layouts and staff training they could dramatically improve their customer experience; something which in an area so ‘young professional’ laden as Clapham could turn Red Dog South from a disappointment into a regular.
Rating: 4/10
http://www.reddogsaloon.co.uk/
Really, you know what you’re in for when you read a menu and it tries to compensate by listing out the salad fillings for the burger at the top where you’d normally see sides. Quite funny really.
The food itself wasn’t bad, to be fair. They cooked my burger rare when asked and the patty itself was juicy. I love blue cheese and bacon and they had a burger with that on the menu. It was decent. However, it was small and it did cost £10.45. When you consider that places like Honest Burger are doing similar burgers, made with 32 day aged beef from the Ginger Pig butchery, for £8 including their signature rosemary fries it puts Red Dog’s into rather a dim light. Plus their fries were ove salte (even for me with an exceptionally high salt threshold) and the mac ‘n’ cheese was floury in that unpleasant way only achieved by a poorly executed roux.
Whilst out of professional curiosity and a desire to be thorough I’d go back to sample their BBQ, I wouldn’t bother with much else unless they reduce their price point considerably. By addressing this, their seating layouts and staff training they could dramatically improve their customer experience; something which in an area so ‘young professional’ laden as Clapham could turn Red Dog South from a disappointment into a regular.
Rating: 4/10
http://www.reddogsaloon.co.uk/
