Review of Beef & Brew (Duke of York)
The delicious Galician sirloin is worth the trip out to Haggerston
National Steak Day at Beef & Brew
I decided to celebrate the inaugural national steak day with four friends by visiting Beef & Brew, one of the steakhouses I featured on my summary of the best national steak day deals. It was my first time visiting Beef & Brew and the £19.50 Galician sirloin combined with a 25% off steak deal seemed to make the trek out to Haggerston in East London worthwhile.
Beef and Brew is probably best described as a gastro pub that specialises in steak. The star of the menu is the Galician sirloin, a specialty beef from Spain. Galician beef is usually from old dairy cows which have been put out to pasture in the green fields of Northern Western Spain (it can also refer to the rarer and very delicious Spanish Rubia Gallega beef breed). The age of the cow results in succulent steak with a real beefiness to it. If you’d like to know more about old cow beef, you can check out our feature on it here. I prefer this kind of steak to the richness of the famous A5 Kobe and Matsusaka Wagyu or even the fantastic British Longhorn.
Going Galician
All of us ordered the Galician Sirloin (200g) along with a 600g wing rib steak both cooked medium rare. While waiting we tried the jam brisket balls and mini sausage rolls. Both are delicious, but the sausage rolls are overpriced for their tiny portion size.
The steaks were cooked masterfully. The wing rib was sliced while the Galician steaks were served whole. The crust was salty and charred with all the right hints of smokiness. While the Galician sirloin wasn’t particularly tender it fired on all cylinders when it came to juiciness and taste intensity. In contrast, the British wing rib was far more tender and had great taste, just without the depth of beefiness that the Galician had.
One of the other things that stood out at Beef & Brew was the friendliness of our main waiter. Despite serving pretty much the entire restaurant, he was friendly, knowledgeable and made an already friendly environment one I’m already looking forward to going back to. My only complaint with Beef & Brew is that their steaks aren’t big enough – they need a big fucking Galician steak (they should even call it that).
The bottom line
With 14 years of juicy beefiness at £19.50, the Galician sirloin is one of the best steak deals in London. The playing field is Black Cod and Wagyu’s £20 “Wagyu” steak and Flat Iron’s “£11” steak, but Beef & Brew trumps the lot. If you’re after delicious steak with fantastic craft beer in a casual and friendly pub environment then head to Beef & Brew.
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Our order:
- 5x 200g Galician Sirloin steak
- 1x 600g Wing Rib steak
