Gastro-pub serves up old-school British bar snacks with lots of oomph

If you want to eat good traditional British food in the UK, it’s the gastro-pub you go to rather than a restaurant. “The gastro-pub scene in the 80s and 90s was about taking faded old street corner pubs and revamping them with young chefs and fresh locally-sourced food,” says Tim Scuddamore, who has now brought the best of British to Bree Street at his Crazy Horse Gastropub.

“When I moved to Cape Town in 2000, what I missed about the UK was the pub scene, the gastro-pub culture, hanging out in a place that was comfortable and casual, but where you could still eat great food.”

With fellow Brit, Matt Manning, as consultant chef, The Crazy Horse menu is a short collection of British classics, starting off with a selection of bar snacks available all day.

Forget tapas, these are old-school pub snacks with plenty of oomph that will get you through the big match together with a pint from the wide selection on tap. The scotch egg is rich with meat and black pudding, egg yolk runny and luscious. The pork scratchings are crunchy crispy crackling dipped in a home-made mustard mayo, and the cauliflower cheese bites are superb.

Lunch is a short selection of specials, including the pie of the day with mash and gravy. This may sound humdrum, but with good meat slow-cooked to melting tenderness the pie is made even better with the rare find of made-from-scratch gravy: meat juices reduced overnight for concentrated flavour and thickened, it’s worth splashing generously over the velvet smooth mash.

Gammon, egg and chips is a pub classic and here the juicy gammon steak comes with roasted pineapple and thick, hand-cut chips, with home-made tomato ketchup to dip. 

Everything is home-made at Crazy Horse including the sausages, with a new recipe each week. The Beef Wellingtons have been a hit on the evening menu provoking severe FOMO, a limited number are made fresh each morning and when they’re gone that’s it until tomorrow.

The weekly Sunday roast carvery sees families hanging out in the spacious button back booths in the upstairs restaurant over board games, while downstairs in the bar there’s darts, a big screen for the big matches and a laid-back pub atmosphere.

This article is adapted from one originally published in the Sunday Times Neighbourhood: Property and Lifestyle guides. Visit Yourneighbourhood.co.za