I’m so excited to be back from sunny Malta, ready to review another bang average Sunday roast for all my dear readers, this time from The Roebuck in Chiswick.
Yep. So excited to be back.
Harrow:

Croydon:

Malta:

But hey, the sunshine actually came out today – albeit it might still be the same temperature in April that it was in February. And we now at least we have a strong and stable government to warm us up, one that has just signed a trade deal that will increase our GDP by 0.02%. Roughly the equivalent of allowing the Marble Arch Mound to re-join the EU Single Market.
Oh…and what did a Brexiter say about the deal?
“It’s the first time we’ve joined a bloc like this in 50 years. There is strength in numbers.”.
No shit.
Row Back To Malta
Speaking of strength in numbers, this is roast dinner 245 in London. I should probably start planning to do something special for roast dinner 250. A whole quarter of a thousand roast dinners. That is practically Queen level’s of longevity. Though I reckon I can get to 2,000 before I pop my clogs.
I wonder if I could get a feature in the Daily Star? Or maybe MyLondon is more my level – though I feel like they’d just copy and paste my best bits and knock it off as their own anyway. The Daily Star has at least some integrity.
Or maybe Cosmopolitan. Maybe I could do a roast dinner vs sex toy special? Hmmm. Maybe my genitals are more FHM kind of sex toy article. Is FHM still a thing? Asking for a 90’s lad with curtains. Yes, I had curtains. And I don’t mean the fabric type.
This week’s roast dinner was arranged by my vegan friend who didn’t want to set foot outside of Chiswick. So hence she booked The Roebuck in Chiswick. I had no control. So you cannot blame me for the choice of venue. Not this time, anyway.
The Roebuck is a large and noisy pub on Chiswick High Street. The back had a large dining area with 56 guests celebrating someone’s 80th birthday party – 56 was the number of stops on one of the buses I caught in Malta. Now that is strength in numbers.

Yep, I’m judging you in the kitchen. Soz. There were around 5 chefs in there. Or sous chefs. I’m not sure what they are called – ask someone with a food blog if you care. Matt, are you reading? Educate us.
Row Back To Rwanda
They had a few slightly interesting beers on – I was drinking a juicy IPA from Two Tribes at first, though switched to Dennis Hopp’r by Mondo Brewery, which was pretty damn good.
We had a large table for 5 of us, but there was so much noise in the pub that you could only hear the person closest to you. A smaller table might have helped – I guess everyone else on other tables were also having to shout louder because of the similar logistics, and acoustics.

All the roast dinners were solidly over £20.00 – bear in mind that though Chiswick does have a bit of chi-chi about it, it isn’t exactly central London – I was early and popped into a cute shop selling cheese that had Gruyere at £14.00 for an ordinary sized block…ouchie-chi-chi. And The Roebuck is just an ordinary large pub on the high street.
I know food price inflation is over 15% so this isn’t criticism of The Roebuck. It’s more a fact of life in 2023. Or “bloody cheap” for anyone reading in 2025.
The menu had interest – sirloin of beef for £25.00, half a chicken for £21.00, lamb shoulder for £24.50 and porchetta for £21.00. My choice of porchetta was as predictable as my regular accomplice’s choice of beef sirloin, and even more predictable than my vegan friend’s choice of the vegan roast. Well, she might have ordered chips.
20 minutes later, this arrived:

I’m still so excited to be back from sunny Malta.
And yes, I asked for extra gravy. And yes, even I could plate it up more attractively, and I’m ugly AF.
Row Back And Re-plate It
According to the menu, we had spring vegetables. I guess carrots are a spring vegetable. Spring, summer, autumn and winter – given that I’ve been served them nearly every single Sunday. Maybe I should use a photograph where you can see the vegetables?

Well, you still cannot see the carrots. Oh well. But they were fine, soft with a hint of seasoning.
The green beans had been steamed/boiled seemingly in order to reduce their colour, giving that kind of dull green of bean death. Yet quite squeaky. Cannot say I was enamoured.
I was no more enamoured with the enforced condiment, or the orange sludge. It’s kind of difficult to judge it as it was just sloppy sludge that infected other items, rather than being something I could individually savour – or not, in this case. Maybe it was sweet potato, but I’m not overly sure.
The bits of cabbage were fine.

We ordered cauliflower cheese also – fuck knows why, I’ve supposed to have realised that this is pointless. It was ok, the cauliflower was soft, something was browned on top, and it tasted of cheese – but also it felt a bit limp and lifeless. And was £6.00 extra. I do not need cauliflower cheese. I do not need cauliflower cheese. I do not need cauliflower cheese. I do not need cauliflower cheese. I do not need cauliflower cheese.
Tatler. That’s my market, isn’t it? Inside Jacob Rees-Mogg’s childhood home as it goes on the market for £2.75 million. Inside Lord Gravy’s home as the landlord puts the rent up to £2.75 million per month.
4 roast potatoes – though all small. They do look undercooked AF, but they weren’t that bad – there was evidence of crispy sides, they were nicely seasoned, they worked well with the gravy – better than the London standard.
Row Back Brexit
Maybe the plate looks better the other way around?

Ahhh that’s so much better presented now. A bit like when I changed from wearing a thong on the beach, to wearing speedos.
The biggest news from The Roebuck is that they had a gravy waiter – someone coming around with a huge jug, asking if you wanted extra gravy. Of course, I said yes multiple times, including when in the (much quieter) beer garden two hours later.
Perhaps the downside is that the Yorkshire pudding just became so soaked in gravy that it was as sludgy as the orange sludge by the end of the meal. My fault, of course. Otherwise it had a good structure, and a fair balance between crisp and softness. Can you believe that someone actually slagged off my photography on Instagrim?
Porchetta is just slow-roasted pork, said with an Italian accent, of course. It was tender, and the fat was gooey in places, but it did lack both a bit of flavour and texture – and the crackling being separate and kind of tough didn’t help.
The stuffing seemed more like sausagemeat with apple – I’m not sure I needed extra pork to go with the pork, and would always prefer sage and onion, or something similar. But it was decent.


My accomplices that had the beef and chicken, respectively, were complimentary about their meats – the chicken was apparently really juicy, or at least the breast was. The beef was part nice, part too fatty, if I recall correctly. Personally I’m more concerned over the colour of the chicken…it really was that white, that isn’t just me being an expert photographer.
Finally, the gravy. It had an oily sheen to it (big shout out to Saudi Arabia for causing my oil stocks to rise in price today), yet had some depth and consistency. I quite liked it. Quite.
The Roebuck
A strange roast this one. I definitely didn’t love it – or anything about it – yet I didn’t hate it, or anything about it. Well, maybe except the presentation, which really needs some re-thinking. I’m a substance over style kinda guy, but nobody seeing this roast on my socials is going to think, “oooh I need to go to The Roebuck”.
That said, it was busy inside – they are certainly not struggling for customers, at least on my one visit.
Staff were friendly – well, one looked like she didn’t want to be there, but those that looked more like they were in charge of things were actively welcoming and jovial – large venues can lose a human touch, especially with a 56-person table to serve, but they seemed to be doing alright on that. There’s a nice garden out the back too, for when/if the sun finally graces us with some warmth.
In terms of complaints, apart from the presentation, the green beans were a bit miserable, along with the orange sludge. Otherwise, everything could be improved, but nothing was that bad.
My compliments were more along the lines of “I’ve had worse roast potatoes”, and “I’ve had thinner gravy”. I guess the gravy was the best part, despite being oily.
The two vegans mentioned that the pastry wasn’t so good, but otherwise their roasts were alright, scoring it a 7.00 and 6.50 out of 10, respectively. The meat-eating accomplices scored a 6.90 and a 7.00 out of 10.
My score is a 6.87 out of 10.
Next weekend is THE Sunday Funday. Easter weekend, oooh 4 day week! Easter weekend, The Vegan is with us, The Regular Accomplice is, of course, in attendance, The American is visiting, the pub looks gorgeous, the roast looks highly rated – what could go wrong?

Summary:
The Roebuck, Chiswick
Station: Turnham Green
Tube Lines: District
Fare Zone: Zone 3
Price: £21.00
Rating: 6.87
Loved & Loathed
Loved: Not much, guess the gravy was good, despite being oily. Kind of welcoming, a nice garden out the back for sunny times.
Loathed: Also not much, presentation was bad, green beans were lifeless, orange sludge...had worse roasts.
Where now, sailor?
Random roast review: Sussex Bar & Restaurant, Soho
