View Full Version : El Panzon...
gaijingirl
11-05-2006, 18:52
Now that it's in the Dogstar.. can you eat upstairs or is it just in the main bar bit?
'Cos if it is, isn't it a bit noisy and clubby?
Thinking about going out for dinner when 'Enders is finished and struggling to come up with a good excuse not to go to Khan's!
gaijingirl
11-05-2006, 20:48
So.. answered my own question. It's downstairs. It was yummy.
Dubversion
11-05-2006, 20:49
it is yummy, but the last burrito i got was chicken, not prawn :(
i don't eat chicken :(
gaijingirl
11-05-2006, 21:01
Yes.. the only problem was that we asked for a sharing thingamebob that had some meat and some veg on it (very saucy food like meat chilli and veg chilli) and I asked if they could bring the meat and veg chilli in separate bowls. "Oh yes" he said "they come separately"... except they all came on the same gravy swimming plate.
I sent it back. The guy's first language obviously wasn't English, he might not have realised that it was an issue for me, or understood what I was getting at. They brought back separate bowls and I'm assuming and hoping it wasn't the same lot scraped into separate bowls.
Anyway, it was very nice, but yet again, I've come away smelling like an ashtray - I'd hoped that it would be less noticeable than eating in The Hobgoblin.. but not especially. Sorry to all smokers, but I can't wait till it's no smoking in public places. I'm sick of having to get home and chuck all my clothes in the wash and wash my hair. :(
The other thing was that our drinks - a lime and soda (half a pint with not enough soda) and a G&T came £5.50!! Does that not seem a bit pricey??? I've never really noticed drinks prices in the Dogstar before, 'cos I've gone there to drink.. but 'cos we went there ostensibly to eat, I noticed it more keenly!
Brixton Hatter
11-05-2006, 22:27
i think the el panzon geezer always did good food in the hobgoblin - fresh herbs and veg, always nice....i dont eat meat so i guess i cant comment on half the menu, but the stuff i ate was always good - vegi burrito with hot chilli was me fave ;)
it definitely encouraged more people into the hob and was just a nice change for the locals to have some decent grub in there for a change. just a shame he had to move on really...
The food i had in the Hob was great, i was only just talking to Innit about this the other day, we were saying that this guy needs his own place (but obviously money is an issue) rather than being stuck in some half arsed club/pub/not sure what we're doing venue.
From what i see and hear he works really hard to offer tasty, good quality food reasonably priced and i really hope the Dog Star doesn't mess him about.
What would be cool is if he did an evening of Mexican food at the Albert :cool:
Mr Retro
12-05-2006, 07:36
struggling to come up with a good excuse not to go to Khan's!
The soulless dining room and slow service?
Panzon is great but totally agree about the Dogstar not being a very good venue. Not conducive to a mid-week bite to eat and a chat.
Sorry to all smokers, but I can't wait till it's no smoking in public places.
Amen to that
tarannau
12-05-2006, 07:49
I've got a lot of time for the bloke behind El Panzon - he's definitely passsionate and committed about Mexican food and it shows. Compared to the flood of old El Paso style mediocrity ususally served in Mexican restaurants it's a pleasant surprise. And no novelty Sombreros either!
I agree that the Dogstar isn't perfectly suited. It's fine for a quiet daytime, but it's not the best evening dining experience to say the least. It is a real shame about leaving the Hob - not just because it's my local - but because the big beer garden and the back room (initially kitted out as a restaurant) there potentially offered so much more - looking at the full beer garden there now, it's impossible not to believe that El Panzon wouldn't be doing very well for itself over there again.
I like the idea of a standalone restaurant, but there's something right about the majority of the menu being served in a pub - things like the burritos are perfect pub/street food.
gaijingirl
12-05-2006, 08:20
He is great that bloke. Everytime i've eaten at El Panzon - both at the Hob and now at the Dogstar he's been straight over to welcome us and have a chat.
He had quite a bit to say about why he had left the Hob to go to the Dogstar!
gaijingirl
12-05-2006, 08:21
The soulless dining room and slow service?
I'm surprised to hear you say that... I've only ever been extremely warmly welcomed by the guys in there, they're super friendly to me - but it may be that they know my face??
Service has never been slow either!
tarannau
12-05-2006, 08:51
He had quite a bit to say about why he had left the Hob to go to the Dogstar!
I know. I hear different versions of the story from all kinds of sources. Last time G nearly bent our ears off in the Dogstar last time we were there. I think it's fair to say that male pride kicked in on both sides of the fence and it's difficult to get an entirely objective view of what happened.
Still, it's s different regime in the Hob now. D from the Hamilton Arms is now in charge and doing a good job - Blue Beat Special's even making a comeback on Saturdays. I keep hoping that they'll shake and make up, and I'll be able to enjoy a burrito in the brilliant sunshine of the suntrap beer garden, but it seems unlikely..
Mr Retro
12-05-2006, 10:28
I'm surprised to hear you say that... I've only ever been extremely warmly welcomed by the guys in there, they're super friendly to me - but it may be that they know my face??
Service has never been slow either!
They are very friendly to me too but I just hate the dining room. I find it depressing.
What's the food like in the Hob now?
I reckon I'm going to watch the footy in there tommorrow.
tarannau
12-05-2006, 11:36
What's the food like in the Hob now?
I reckon I'm going to watch the footy in there tommorrow.
They took on G's assistant after he left for the Dogstar. Standard pub grub now - burgers, nachos, steak sarnies etc. It's alright, as are the generous roasts, but it's hardly inspired. Meat quality's pretty variable - every time I strike lucky, LQ always end up with the gristly one - and they've a tendency to overcook the steaks.
That said, they do some pretty darn fine chicken wings, full of flavour.
I may well be in there myself tomorrow Pootle. It's a fine football pub but it's probably best not the best place if you're a Hammer tomorrow - huge numbers of the regulars are Liverpool fans..
:)
dogmatique
12-05-2006, 11:38
Aye, also going for footie tomorrow, thought it'd probably have the best atmosphere in the area...
What's the food like in the Hob now?
I reckon I'm going to watch the footy in there tommorrow.
Ooooh tempting! I might join ya...
I may well be in there myself tomorrow Pootle. It's a fine football pub but it's probably best not the best place if you're a Hammer tomorrow - huge numbers of the regulars are Liverpool fans..
:cool:
I'll be in red, with the name "McAllister" on my back, and a liverbird on my chest ;)
mr pootle is a hammer. He'll be the one crying.
gaijingirl
12-05-2006, 13:23
What footie is on tomorrow?
I might send gaijinboy down to you, get him out so I can do some work... :(
What footie is on tomorrow?
ROFL! Bless you GG.
It's the FA Cup Final. Arguably the most important cup in the English FA. It's going to be won by Liverpool, but West Ham will be playing. Most people who don't even support the teams playing enjoy the FA Cup
Well given that the only other cup in the FA is the Carling Cup, I spose u're right ;)
In reality tho, the bigger teams only start giving a shit about it once all hope of winning anything else has evaporated. It's a consolation prize for Liverpool really. Still, itll be a fun way to fill in tomorrow arvo.
gaijingirl
12-05-2006, 13:37
ROFL! Bless you GG.
It's the FA Cup Final. Arguably the most important cup in the English FA. It's going to be won by Liverpool, but West Ham will be playing. Most people who don't even support the teams playing enjoy the FA Cup
What time is it on? I might even go with him. He'd be so happy! I'd get best girlfriend award for sure... :D
(BTW.. I do actually go and watch footie quite a lot, but gaijinboy supports Sheffield Wednesday - despite coming from Ladbroke Grove - so things like important cups and stuff sort of pass me by - I'm usually more intestered in whether or not we're going to get relugated. However, I think it's fair to say, I'm not completely up to date on what's what in the footy world)...
tarannau
12-05-2006, 13:37
:cool:
I'll be in red, with the name "McAllister" on my back, and a liverbird on my chest ;)
mr pootle is a hammer. He'll be the one crying.
Cool. I'll keep an eye out if I'm there. I'm likely to be the one in the corner with all the shady regulars, moaning about all the fairweather incomers coming for the football...
;) :p
I'm likely to be the one in the corner with all the shady regulars, moaning about all the fairweather incomers coming for the football...
It's not like it was in the old days, eh, all these woollybacks moving homes and daring to go to a different pub, and not the pub that they're family has visited for generations ;)
Although, it's kind of coming full circle, cos I used to go to the Hob lots, like 5+ yrs ago, when I first moved to Tulse Hill (but then had a mental episode and moved to North London....)
I shall also be trying to suss out who rennie and gg look like
Hmmm...what distinguishing features do halloumi lovers and fab surburban types look like? :D
I shall also be trying to suss out who rennie and gg look like
Hmmm...what distinguishing features do halloumi lovers and fab surburban types look like? :D
:D :D :D
I might smell of halloumi!
gaijingirl
12-05-2006, 18:01
I shall also be trying to suss out who rennie and gg look like
Hmmm...what distinguishing features do halloumi lovers and fab surburban types look like? :D
I'll be knitting in the corner. :)
Actually, I'm not going to go, but gaijinboy is.... it'd be cool for him to meet up with some urbanites..
can he.. please?
I'll pm you his photo....
Please look after him - he has a tendancy to come home wankered with a kebab!
William of Walworth
12-05-2006, 21:57
the only problem was that we asked for a sharing thingamebob that had some meat and some veg on it (very saucy food like meat chilli and veg chilli) and I asked if they could bring the meat and veg chilli in separate bowls. "Oh yes" he said "they come separately"... except they all came on the same gravy swimming plate.
Fucks sake. There's zero excuse for that :mad:
And frankly, the fact that English wasn't his first langauge is absolutely NO excuse either.
In the UK, we have a reasonable range of veggie friendly or at least veggie tolerent/veggie aware restaurants, pubs, etc. The UK is probably one of the better countries to be in the EU from that point of view. Chefs and waiters from less veggie-aware countries generally adjust their menus and awareness levels when running restaurants here, and that's impressively cool. There is a higher percentage of vegetarians in the UK than in any other EU country as far as I'm aware, so in my experience I rarely have any complaints, which is why egrerious incidents like the above piss me off so much because they're so unusual. Where the minimal level of adjustment required for veggie friendliness doesn't happen (and we're not THAT picky or fussy honest!) .... well :mad:
Anyone tempted to call me a xenophobe or a bigot for expressing the above thoughts can fuck right off. Try being a veggie and trying to eat out in (for instance) many areas of France and see how you like that.
They brought back separate bowls and I'm assuming and hoping it wasn't the same lot scraped into separate bowls.
If it was they're fucking twats. Let's hope not.
ETA next morning : some of the above is very badly expressed and logically flawed ..... please read with the awareness that I posted it while drunk ...
I would still stand by the basic point though. Over the last 50 years, the UK has changed from being a very veggie unfriendly country in terms of eating out, to one of the places where it's a usually a pleasure and rarely a trial to eat out as a veggie. Of course there are exceptions, and there are still veggie ignoramuses, whether foreign or home grown!!! in some places. But I'd say dodgy service for veggies is the exception rather than the rule these days.
William of Walworth
12-05-2006, 21:59
The food i had in the Hob was great, i was only just talking to Innit about this the other day, we were saying that this guy needs his own place (but obviously money is an issue) rather than being stuck in some half arsed club/pub/not sure what we're doing venue.
From what i see and hear he works really hard to offer tasty, good quality food reasonably priced and i really hope the Dog Star doesn't mess him about.
Sounds like his own waiters might be messing him about???
(see above)
William of Walworth
12-05-2006, 22:00
He is great that bloke. Everytime i've eaten at El Panzon - both at the Hob and now at the Dogstar he's been straight over to welcome us and have a chat.
He had quite a bit to say about why he had left the Hob to go to the Dogstar!
Did you sort him out about the veggie fiasco, though?
gaijingirl
13-05-2006, 00:00
Did you sort him out about the veggie fiasco, though?
Well I explained the problem gently to the waiter. I would like to think that he will now realise the problem in the future. I suppose a good thing to do would be to write to the owner and let him know the problem I had so that he can let his staff know the etiquette with vegetarians. It is extremely rare that something like that should happen in the UK, so I honestly do think that it was that particular waiter's 1st time to come across a vegetarian.
To be honest, I've never found that getting arsey over it has helped. But, I guess I'm also very "British", despite not really being British, in the sense that I hate making a scene!! :o
Mr Retro
13-05-2006, 00:34
I do find that they take extreme care over things you don't really give a fuck about and slip on very basic things.
Dubversion and gaijingirls experiences are an example of this. I've had the Sunday lunch once, which though really tasty, wasn't hot enough. But then the guy will come to your table and tell you how much trouble he goes to getting authentic ingredients.
If you serve me chicken instead of prawns I don't give a fuck if the chillies in the sauce comes from one of Saturns moons.
Bumping this because it seems history may have repeated itself. El Panzon has gone from the Dogstar and apparently is now in Camden :eek:
Went in there last night to grab some food and was suspicious at lack of menus and the guy behind the bar told us they'd left.
Not sure what happened but someone in the Albert had heard there was another falling out. Whether that's true or not I don't know but it would appear El Panzon is now lost to Brixton :(
Oh fucking fucking fuck :(
That's made me really mad
Oh fucking fucking fuck :(
That's made me really mad
Too fucking right - there, Ichiban and Asmara were the only really great places to eat in Brixton and it's really disappointing :(
Have the other two gone as well? :eek: ( i haven't been out much lately)
Have the other two gone as well? :eek: ( i haven't been out much lately)
No - don't panic - just meant it was a shame that one of them had gone :eek:
Phew!!! I really like Ichiban - much better food than Fujiyamas
Bugger, had only eaten in there once but really liked it.
Good Mexican is hard to find in this country :(
The facebook El Panzon group sent out a message saying the dogstar 'had other plans' or something slightly odd. It was really good food, simple and cheap and tasty - I'm quite sad its gone.
it would appear El Panzon is now lost to Brixton :(
shame. :(
tarannau
21-08-2008, 16:33
Yep, that's a shame indeed. Good, reasonably priced food. Would have popped in for a final slap-up feast I've had known in advance.
Guess it was always likely to happen - the head honcho from El Panzon could veer towards busybody levels, but imo it always seemed more borne of a desire to make his piece of the business work. A break-up with the slightly flaky Dogstar management always seemed likely in retrospect.
Is the Comedy Club still at the Dogstar? Not been since Hobgoblin days, but that place used to be a real draw - be interested to see if they're still pulling the punters and top acts in.
Brixton Hatter
21-08-2008, 23:18
yeah the comedy club is still there - think they might be on a summer/edinburgh festy break at the moment but i still get the emails from them. like you, i havent been since the hob days, but it's still popular according to various people. you can actually buy tickets online now :eek:
shame about losing the el panzon - ate in there about 2 months ago and it was ace as usual.
[QUOTE=tarannau;7937053]Would have popped in for a final slap-up feast I've had known in advance.
QUOTE]
That is exactly what we said! One last burrito, damn them. No point telling me once they're gone.
When I was there for my birthday a friend made me fairy cakes and the chef guy said we weren't allowed food without it being passed by the kitchen. This was a very thinly veiled tactic to get a cake, but he seemed a nice guy.
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