No booking policy- fine, if you get a table at the time they say you will. We arrived at 6.30, told our table would be ready at 8 but then had to wait till 9. There was no where to sit and wait as it was packed so we had a drink in a pub down the road.

When we finally ate, the waitress mixed our orders up so we got the wrong meals (and didnt realise due to having spent the past 2 and a half hours waiting and steadily drinking wine). We did get a complimentary desert as compensation however.

I would say the food is good, but not so good that this place deserves the right to assume it is so brilliant that it warrants a no booking policy and can make people wait 2.5 hours (on a week night), for the wrong meal.

Had a pre-theatre meal at the Anchor and Hope based on recommendations from friends.

Arrived at 6PM on Saturday and seated immediately. The rest was a disappointment however.

Food was pretty poor - my main course was small, served on a cold plate and the food was chilly by the time it got to me.

Deep fried 'rabbit arms' were so thickly coated in breadcrumbs they became tasteless, but not as tasteless as the lobster soup.

Service was friendly, but incompetetent (it's OK not to write an order down provided you actually remember it, and it's a pain to have to ask for your bill twice when you're in a hurry).

Shan't be going back.

I went to The Anchor & Hope on Friday night with four friends. We arrived early (18:30) and got a table at 20:00.

The wait didn’t seem long and friendly staff kept us informed of how much longer we'd have to wait for a table.

Because we were aware of the no-booking policy we were prepared to have several drinks before getting food.

The bar area was relaxed and cocktails good so there were certainly no complaints from our group.

Once seated, the food and table service was excellent; we were the last to leave and had a very enjoyable night. I would definitely go again.

Dear "anonymous" who keeps posting flimsy defences of the awful service in this place...take it from me, it's chronic, and I won't be coming back.

The management are clearly resting on their laurels and their reputation as a "gastro pub". This means that you can treat customers badly and still keep chargning the earth.

Just like the good old days.Are you by any chance related to the patrons, Anonymous? I think we should be told.

I have been to The Anchor and Hope a few times as its round the corner from where I work. The food has been great everytime and the staff are friendly.

No, you cannot book and yes you have to wait a while for a table because it is so popular. But it is worth the wait!

The Anchor and Hope's food may be fine but the wait on service is hard to bear. And if you can bear it, the likelihood is that half the menu will have vanished, making dining here a bit of a lottery.



Even if you are a regular, sooner or later the Anchor and Hope will let you down - spectacularly. One to avoid.

Thr Anchor and Hope has a great atmosphere and some of the best food I've had in London. The moans about bookings, service and staff bemuse me. They don't take bookings and the atmosphere is rushed and noisy, but The Anchor and Hope is a pub, for God's sake, and they're never rude.

A real shame, The Anchor & Hope had a good atmosphere and the food was nice but it was very much marred by the service and attitude of the staff. We booked a table for 6.30pm and weren't seated until 9pm.


It also took an hour and a half from ordering our food to actually get served. We found the staff were also extremely rude and we will not be going back to The Anchor & Hope again.

I don't know where the complaining has come from The Anchor & Hope because it has the best food and the best staff I have ever come across in a pub!

My boyfriend lives in Waterloo so The Anchor & Hope is his local and we eat there at least once a month and have never had a bad experience. The food is amazing, the staff are friendly - we know most of them by now anyway and we have always had a great experience

The Anchor & Hope certainly polarizes opinions! I eat there quite regularly. I call it my 'London Local' though I live 25 miles away. It’s a great place to have a reasonably priced dinner with friends.

If you're going to go to The Anchor & Hope you simply need to accept the ground rules and won’t be disappointed. You’ll eat reasonably priced food which is innovative from a constantly changing seasonal menu.

If you like the sound of this go ahead!

The staff at The Anchor & Hope were brisk and business-like and appreciated that we didn't want to be kept hanging around.

We shared the fresh crab starter - very good. I had the rabbit and my friend had guarnard. Both good.

We had the wine the waitress recommended. It was fine. No one at The Anchor & Hope was rude to us!

The Anchor & Hope has the rudest owner/manager manager I have ever met at any restaurant. The food was ok but the prices are ridiculous.

I don't care what kind of pigs have to give up their lives to become parma ham but £9 for 4 slices of ham served with nothing at all is a rip-off any way you slice it.

The Anchor & Hope is just a pub pretending to be a restaurant. Avoid this place if you want value for your money.

Do yourself a favour and find anywhere else to eat other than The Anchor & Hope. The staff are the rudest people I have ever encountered in my life.

The food at The Anchor & Hope is expensive for what is essentially a pub. Diners beware.

The Anchor & Hope is a great gastro pub just up the road from the Old Vic theatre. Lot’s of interesting dishes to try and a really warm atmosphere. You can’t book at the Anchor & Hope but it’s worth waiting in line for the top drawer traditional food.

This place has a great atmosphere about it. It does get very busy & I think the staff are still trying to figure out how best to deal with it. The food is wonderful though. Yes, you cannot book in advance and yes, most often you share a table. That's part of the experience & I have had quite a few fun conversations with strangers. I agree however that different glasses for the wine would be better.

Remember this is still a social after work watering hole. It will be busy, buzzing, happy, loud & crowded. But it's fun.

Whats all this complaining about the Anchor & Hope? I eat there regularly and the food is fantastic. Fresh produce cooked superbly with a creative twist; zesting up classic dishes. I've never eaten badly there and I'm one fussy diner.

Terrible. Really bad. The food is poor, to be generous, and the service is surly. The guy who told me I couldn't sit at my table before all of my 5 strong party arrived (there were already 3 of us there, and we were ready to spend a lot of money) should be given an award as the rudest man I have ever encountered, taking a perverse pleasure in annoying his customers. Avoid this place at all costs.

What a terrible experience. We arrived at the place and we were told that we couldn't sit down until all of our party were there - so three of us had to stand next to an empty table for five minutes. When I asked why I couldn't sit down and wait for my other colleagues, I was told that it "wasn't their policy" to let people sit down. The bearded apparatchik who told me this seemed to take great pleasure in denying me the simple courtesy of being able to sit down! What is this - the Soviet Union? The cassoulet was terrible, fatty and bony all at once. The first bottle of wine we were served was corked. We were charged for it at the end of the meal. Avoid at all costs. Possibly the worst, surliest, rudest, most unwelcoming service I have ever encountered in my life.

Horrible. My experience at this place was unbelievable, and you should know about it!

My dining companion broke his tooth on the first bite of his Duck Ham Salad - a salad!

We were treated very poorly by the owner when we informed our waitress.

He came over, hands on hips and very belligerently proceeded to suggest:
a. that my friend's teeth must be weak

b. that this was a risk when you order a 'nut salad' - an interesting term for Duck Ham Salad

c. that this wasn't America where everyone sues over everything - presumably directed at us because my friend is a Canadian?

d. that they had no responsibliity for what was in their food - that if there was 'something' in the dish then it wasn't their responsiblity.

Nary an apology in sight, in fact very much on the contrary.

We paid and left in disgust, with my friend in great pain. What a NIGHTMARE!!

Enter at your peril, and do have a dentist on standby.

Had a fantastic time, food great, booze good and friendly and helpful staff. What more can you ask for?

With a reputation as a gastropub and a winelist the size that the Anchor & Hope has, you'd expect something decent to drink. I arrived 10 minutes after the blonde. "Don't try the house white, it's undrinkable". I didn't. I ordered a glass of cabernet sauvignon. With my eyes closed I couldn't even have sworn that it was a red. We both left our glasses more than half full and walked over the road to one of the competition. The food may be good - but we're not going back after that experience to find out.