A lot has been written about the Devonshire pub in Soho, with 90% + of it extremely positive including it being the  highest new entry, at the number 2 spot, in the 2025 Estella Top 50 gastropub list (within which it is in very good company – must get to the sole Welsh entrant at no.24 in the form of the Black Bear Inn in Usk)

Normally I am not one for hyped up places, usually because they are expensive and full of txssers (and even fuller when I arrive), but a day trip to London for a rioja tasting with a mate offered the opportunity of a lunch before the tasting and the mean bugger in me (with the cost of the tasting and train to factor in – both actually a bit of a bargain) spied a surprising reasonable set lunch menu at this place.

I mean this would be regarded as pretty good value in Cardiff,

let alone for lunch at one of the hottest (hyped) dining spots in the Big Smoke.

Even taking into account the “optional (my arse)” 12.5% service charge, you are talking about a smidgen over £28 for 2 courses include seafood and beef steak and under £33 for 3 courses sans drinks.

The fact that we were about to sample potentially up to 100 plus different riojas meant we shied away from the wine list, which brought the price even more into reasonable territory.

As we pursued the menu a pleasingly warm roll and nicely salty butter arrived.

Good bread this, with a nice crisp crust and a fluffy light interior.

Having gone for the fixe prix menu, first up was the 70s classic prawn (here juzzed up with a slightly bulimic langostine, which seemed to have misplaced its claws) cocktail.

Lilliputian langostine aside this was a good size, with a plentiful amount of tasty, non watery, sweet prawns (verging on the shrimp size for non American readers) that had not been overcooked. These were bound together in a nicely acidic and well balanced rose marie sauce, which did not operate to drown out the flavour of the prawns/shrimp. It all sat on a bed of crisp shredded lettuce, which actually added a pleasing touch of freshness to the mix. Whilst rather dinky, the langostine was nicely sweet and had been partly peeled for ease of access. There was even a bit of brain juice to suck out of the head.

I thought this a fine example of a 70s classic, with a surprising level of generosity (portion wise) for a set lunch item.

My only (very minor) negative was the rather superfluous to requirements lettuce flags that were there for no discernible reason.

An impressive start, I thought.

Next up was the skirt steak and chips main and again I couldn’t really fault the portion size.

Cooked as requested, this has a nice char to the exterior, which brought a pleasing bit of smokiness, and a deep ruby red interior (properly rested) with that almost buttery  nuttiness you can get from grass fed beef.

Skirt is a very flavoursome cut of beef, but the quid pro quo is it tends to be a touch on the chewy side. If not treated right you may as well eat your shoe, but here it was full on flavour with just a touch of chew too it. I actually like to chew my food a bit rather than the melt in your mouth “baby food”  bollocks, so this was not an issue.

Very good quality bit of meat this, which was cooked just to my liking, and properly seasoned to boot. Can’t ask for much more, especially at this price point, than that really.

Chips were cooked in duck fat and had that sort after dynamic duo of a crisp exterior and a soft yielding interior.

Proper chips these and properly seasoned. Decent portion size too, with me hating it when places are mingy with the chips.

You get a small pot of bearnaise sauce (a little of this stuff went a long way) as part of the deal and very good it was, too.

I tend to eat my steaks unadorned with sauces (J will undoubtedly accuse me of being a “bloody hypocrite” on seeing this as I often decry her for having sauce with her steak – guilty as charged m’lud, but in my defence it was part of the all in package, so….), but this stuff combined buttery richness, with tempering acidity (some may argue a touch too much, but I love a bit of sour) and a really nice thwack of herbal anis. Worked very well with the steak and was superb for dipping the chips in. I even resorted to using my finger to get the last bits of it out of the pot (without fear of the death stare from Mrs. SF).

In hindsight, I rather wish we had ordered a side of veggies or salad  (would have been a fiver) off of the main menu,

but there is always next time.

As we had a bit of time to kill and it was only £4 extra I decided to go the whole hog and have a dessert, with the only option being sticky toffee pudding (although there was the option of cream, custard or ice cream with it).

I had feared this might have been too heavy, but it had a nice light sponge, with a really good caramel sauce. The latter was dark, rich and sweet but not cloyingly so. Ice-cream was nicely vanillary, but in hindsight I regretted not going with the custard option.

All in all, this was 3 pretty darn good courses for the rather diminutive price tag.

On the booze front, the wine list is pretty comprehensive,

with some rather sumptuous (at least  price wise) wines for those with deep pockets (plenty of those in London).

Looking at the prices, on the main list a modest Tempranillo Blanco white rioja (from the Rioja Oriental) will set you back £29 (the wine in question retails at about £11) and a Greek red from the xinomavro grape is on the list at £44 (it retails at about £16.50). Not bad, for London that, to be honest.

For those with the means the 1996 Chateau Margaux is a wallet busting £1920 (Hedonism sells it for £850 and as such seems a rather large mark up of north of a grand) and (for the paupers) the Chateau Talbot 2010 is a mere £275 (retails at £80, which seems an even more egregious mark up of nigh on 3.5 x).

We ecshewed the Chateau Margaux, as we were filling our boots (wine wise) later on in the day (that was the only reason, honest) and therefore defaulted to beer (thus saving ourselves a mere £1900 +).

The Devonshire has a reputation for serving one of the best pints of Guinness in London. No idea if that claim has any validity to be honest, as I have probably drunk Guinness in 4/5 London pubs so any claim of it being the best “eveeeer” in London from me would be uninformed bxllocks, but they sure seem to shift an awful lot of the Black Stuff with barrel loads of kegs of it down stairs (apparently they sell 20,000 pints of the stuff a week – which at £6.80 a pint is £136k just on one drink or 71 ish bottles of Chateau Margaux 1996, if you prefer).

Despite the alleged Guinness drought (due the “Instawankgramy” Split the G craze) this placed seemed to have no trouble getting hold of oodles of the stuff.

Not drunk a Guinness for years, but I rather enjoyed this pint.

My first sip didn’t even get me to the “Harpo Marx“

My fellow diner (who is rather dismissive of Guinness, regarding it as a very inferior stout) had a pint of Timothy Taylor’s Landlord bitter, which he seemed to enjoy.

The verdict

Whilst much has been said (including by me) as to the woes being experienced by hospitality, this place (in central London, with what must be sky high running costs – can’t imagine what the rent here is) was absolutely rammed on a Tuesday afternoon. Not sure how many covers they have, but well north of 120 I would say, with multiple dining areas (all packed, as was the downstairs bar) and the one we were in (right at top, all other areas being full) had all 40 covers occupied. Some were having the set lunch, but many were going al a carte and the boozy long lunch seems to be back in vogue if this place is anything to go by. 

They do pack you in a bit, with our table about 6 inches from the adjacent ones, and I could easily have eaten the neighbouring table’s ribeye without having to lean over much at all. Notwithstanding this, service was very good and deserving of the (all but mandated) service charge.

Place like this often flatter to deceive, but for the money what we got was really rather good.

Lunch here certainly fortified us for an evening of tasting an awful lot of riojas

We tried over 40 different type of (predominately white – majority very good) riojas that night and having filled my belly in advance with a good lunch was definitely the right move!

What this places seems to excel at is simple, no nonsense, fare all at fairly reasonable prices. The fixed price lunch is great value, but the al a carte was far from excessively priced in my view. The beef cheek and guinness suet pudding (£26) and the lamb hotpot (£24) particularly caught the eye

For (tight) people like me, lunch time offers like this makes us happy bunnies.

The phrase “worth the hype” is all to often prefix’d by “ad/invite” and as such tends to require a rather large (Salar de Uyuni sized) pinch of salt to be applied, but if you want a pretty darn fine, good value, lunch in London I think this place rather fits the (very reasonable) bill.

The details

Address: 17 Denman Street, Soho, London, W1D I HW

Website: https://www.devonshiresoho.co.uk/

Nearest tubes: Picadilly Circus – 1 min walk; Oxford Circus – 10 mins walk

Strongly suggest booking well in advance (you can book up to 3 weeks in advance), as rocking up on the day is going to leave you disappointed as you’ll undoubtedly get (politely) turned away.