The Alice House – West Hampstead

We went here after dinner at around 10 pm for drinks. They have a good selection of beer. We had a local stout and a really nice beer called Gentleman’s wit, which might just be my new favorite beer. It’s from the Camden town brewery. There was a DJ spinning some pop music and the bartenders were really friendly. It was a decent place overall. We just got some fresh beers at 12.30 and at 12.40 one of the bouncers came over and told us we had 20 minutes to finish and leave and he was really rude. Our group of people just said sure, we will try. At 1 we still had a few sips left and this time another guy who was way worse than the first one came and said, we asked you to leave by 1. I have been to my fair share of pubs and I don’t think this is the way to run things. Don’t serve alcohol half an hour before closing if you want people to just leave. Never coming back here again.

I was meeting a friend in west hampstead for drinks and a catch up. We both weren’t sure where to go so I had a look on Unilocal and came across this place. This is such a good find. It’s in a great location on the high street. Has a lively atmosphere upstairs but if there on a Friday evening then you need to come earlier get a table or you can try your luck downstairs. I was not aware of downstairs till one of the bar staff mentioned it to me. They don’t always have the bar downstairs open so sometimes you need to go upstairs to get drinks then downstairs to your seats again. The downstairs is my fav part of this bar. It is comfortable, it has quite a few sofas, it is cosy, it isn’t loud so great for a quiet catch up. Didn’t have any food so can’t comment on that. The drinks were good and the cocktails seemed ok but personally wasn’t too impressed with them. The bar staff are friendly but didn’t seem that knowledgeable about cocktails even the well known/​classic cocktails such as espresso martini, mojito, to name a few. Good to come in for a catch up but don’t expect to be wowed by the drinks. Would come in again for a quiet catch up if in the area but wouldn’t go out of my way to come here.

Visited for lunch and was surprised how good it was! The service was slightly slow but the drinks and food very pleasant. The staff is friendly, maybe a few more would help over peak times. The restaurant/​bar is edgy and a fairly young crowd frequent it. They have a interesting drinks menu which will cater for all tastes!
I will definitely be back…

This is a lovely place to have a few drinks and food.
I highly recommend the burger, probably the best in West Hampstead. As for their drinks, they don’t only serve draft beers, they also have amazing cocktails that you can get in a pitch to share. My favourite is definitely the one with gin, lemonade and plum jam.
The only problem if you go there on a weekend evening is that it gets very loud, the music is a little too high and it can get difficult to have a conversation.
But It is also a great place for brunch– try their stack of pancakes ! They’re incredible !

After visiting The Alice House for mid week drinks, Friday night drinks, Saturday night drinks, Sunday brunch, Sunday lunch and just dinner in general — think I’ve safely completed enough ‘research’ to write a review…
I love this place. It always has a nice buzz to it, the staff are friendly, the crowd lacks pretence and is usually just a group of happy people enjoying a few drinks and having a jolly good time. The food is highly recommended, the chilli avocado on toast that I had last weekend was a personal favourite, and i’ve also devoured their lamb roast on a number of occasions.
Special mention has to go to their espresso martini’s (although no on the menu) as a bit of a connesieur of the ‘middle class vodka redbull’ i know my espresso martini’s…and The Alice House definitely ranks in my top 5.
Definitely worth a visit, just a lovely place in general!

We love their fish & chips, they come with the perfect natural fries and a mash and the best thing is that they have camden hell’s beer that is perfect! But the service is a bit slow sometimes and the prices might be too expensive :-/​but we’re still keep going there ;-)

A lovely space, with some great lightbulbs, the Alice House is definitely somewhere I’d like to go back to.
The lattes, orange juice and full english breakfasts were all excellent. The service was timely and polite, and it’s not stupidly expensive. I’d be interested to see what it’s like on a busy Friday evening, but during the daytime it’s lush, and highly recommended.

Premier soir à Londres et nous cherchons un bar ou un pub pour boire notre traditionnelle «grosse bière du vendredi soir».
Le serveur du restaurant où nous avions dîné (tooMai), nous recommande une section de la West end lane et nous poussons un peu par hasard la porte de The Alice House: il y a une terrasse avec du mon de, mais le bar n’a pas l’air trop rempli.
En fait il est plutôt rempli et nous devons faire tout le tour de l’îlot central pour finalement trouver une carte et un espace vide pour nous adresser au serveur. Petit problème que nous rencontrerons ensuite dans presque tous les bars /​pubs: l liste des bières à la pression n’est quasiment jamais indiquée sur la carte ! Il faut donc demander ou se pencher pour lire sur les tireuses.
Nous finissons par trouver notre bonheur avec une bière Lager du coin. Autre point appréciable en Angleterre, vous trouverez presque toujours une bière locale au fût.
Coup de chance, une table se libère peu après ce qui nous permet de nous installer plus tranquillement pour déguster notre fameuse bière du vendredi soir.
A noter, la déco très sympa du bar avec des ampoules suspendues dans toute la pièce comme un immense chandelier !

What a lovely place to sit down on a sunny weekend morning for a delicious brunch!
The food is good, the atmosphere is good, it has outdoor seating where you can watch the world go by (and being on a high street you really can watch the world go by)… I am not really sure what else to say!
It can be tricky getting a table at times, and they stop serving brunch earlier than I’d like, but it’s certainly one of the nicest places in an area where there are plenty of nice places :)

It was busy on a Saturday evening and lucky that I reserved a table in advance, with the view of a tv to watch the world cup.
The food for both starters and mains took a long time to be served. The food was okay although some of us found the steak tough. We found the cucumber crisp interested and to my surprise, tasted better then I thought it would do.

They are having best bloody marys i have ever tried! So refreshing and delicious with a little kick of spiciness !! Yaaam. Service is great although when it gets busy and packed you have to wait quite a while for your drinks but chilling on the sunny patio makes it easier ;)))
Unfortunately i dont know the name of the waitress who was serving me and recognising me a week after — she is lovely women with long blondish hair in a ponny tail — if you know her, let her know she is great ;)))
Will definitely be back four one or two bloody marrys ;))))

As I hunt for study spots around london, I’ll be reviewing based on these types of aspects.
Caffeine: Yes, coffee was good and reasonable, they also brought nice a carafe of free tap water with cucumber
Can sit and stay: Yes I came around 3 pm and got a great table in the back to spread out. Ended up staying until 8 pm and no one said a word even when it got busy for the bar crowd around 6:30 pm. Staff was lovely
Environment: Rustic but cute, lots of tables, fireplace, calm during the day but lively bar at night. Awesome music selection that was not too loud to study during the day but really cool electronic jazzy mood stuff.
Food: Didn’t eat there but on the plus after you’ve had enough of studying you can always grab a adult beverage to relax after a hard day’s study!
People: Met some lovely girls who I shared my table with after I was done studying and it started getting crowded at nighttime. Fun crowd there, will be back to study and after exams back with friends for a night out!

Great location and décor. Food is fab but that doesn’t help that by the time u get it, it’s an hour later and your coffee is cold. Hire some more staff during peek times. Convert the den into a bigger kitchen? Otherwise super !!

The first place in London where I had good sausage and a lovey glass of Pimms. Local flavor with care about the food and drinks.

Yeah, have been here twice and neither experience was good. First time was for a quick beer before we were jumping on the train to head out to the suburbs to visit a friend. Rude bartenders and the crowd in here, were wanna be someones. Second time, a couple of friends were in West Hampstead in the afternoon just having a coffee so we popped down to see them. First off, the waitress ignored them. Nice. Then after finally getting served coffee and cake (she forgot the cake the first time around) we asked for the bill. We got charged three times the price. When we politely mentioned the error she looked at us as if we were lying. So we spoke to the manager who corrected the bill, no apology. If you have to go through West Hampstead, visit The Gallery on a side street or even just go to The Lion pub down the street.

Einfach sehr nette Personal. gute Preise. Nette Ambiente, Ausrichtung her sehr nett. Bisschen zu einfach.

I was left fairly baffled after my experience at The Alice House. I arrived with a friend to be told that I couldn’t possibly have reserved a table as they had no record of my name (I booked online). They were fairly unmoved when I showed them my confirmation email. I managed to coax the hostess into letting me sit down at one of the various available tables after assuring her that I hadn’t actually booked at Queen’s Park.
After such a great start, it wasn’t a surprise that the service was as unfriendly as it was infuriating. The place appears to have plenty of staff but none wanted to preoccupy themselves with the relentless drudgery of taking orders or, for that matter, responding to eye contact, waving or (by the end of the lunch) my own brand of semaphore. At one stage, I had to literally chase the only cognisant waitress around the bar to get a new fork.
Positioned as it is on West End Lane, the experience of eating on the terrace is akin to lunch at The LittleChef, without the sense of community and change for a tenner. That said the venue inside is nicely decorated if quite tightly packed together.
The only saving grace for this place is the food. When it arrived, it wasn’t half bad. Obviously I qualify that with the fact that much of the advertised roast options weren’t available (this was a Sunday) and my friend received a different dessert from the one I ordered.
Otherwise, it was fine.

Color me HIGHLY UNIMPRESSED.
Our reservations were at 8pm, and we arrived on time and were asked to wait at the bar because our table wasn’t ready yet. We’re not unreasonable people and we understand this can happen. so we waited at the bar. For 30 minutes. Then we were seated and given menus. Nobody bothered to come check on us to take our orders and soon we found out why. I actually got up and walked to the bar because every wait staff was ignoring my constant eye contact. When we finally ordered, they started by saying the kitchen was extremely backed up. great. Also, they had already run out of one of the main courses we wanted.
We waited and waited. then waited some more. It hit 9:30pm and we had nothing. 1 and a half hours after our reservation time, we should have been finishing desserts and sorting the bill, but we didn’t even have appetizers. Wow. Finally our very very average quality pub-​like appetizers of oily calamari and chicken skewers arrived. Seriously, I could’ve defrosted it from a tesco frozen pack and would’ve been the same. But whatever, I had eaten lunch at noon so by 9:30 I wasn’t too picky. Then we waited some more and a little past 10pm our main courses arrived. We got the steak sandwich and sea bass. Both were pretty decent, the sea bass was actually good. But honestly. too little too late! It was a Monday night and I had work the next day; I was NOT happy to stay out so late. When we were finally at the dessert stage, they were out of the cheesecake we wanted. Nail in the coffin.
Overall, Alice House was a disappointing experience. Our waitress was nice and apologetic, it wasn’t her fault. But the place is just a glorified pub and definitely doesn’t deserve to be in the category of a nice restaurant worth checking out. I’d never recommend this place. Unless someone I hated had a concert to catch afterwards.

I assume that one can have a nice time there, my experience differs drastically.
Getting a reservation and details required over 5 calls. We arrived on time and waited 15 minutes at the bar. That’s not too bad although I wouldn’t expect it on a Monday evening. After 30 minutes at the table, a waiter informs us that the kitchen being overloaded, he can’t take our orders. First time I have ever heard that. All in all, we started eating 1h30 after we arrived. Main course arrived 30 minutes later. They were out of 2 items I ordered (out of 3).
The food itself is what you can expect from a decent pub. The Sea Bass is nice, but not worth the terrible experience.
The venue is one square room plus appendix with a central bar, orange brick themed with soft lights. The design inspires intimacy. Unfortunately the loud music doesn’t match at all. The vibe of this place is lost somewhere between romantic candle place with my girl and a happy hour bar with my sports.
Given the troubles we had on a Monday, I wouldn’t dare trying the Alice House on a week end. I definitely don’t recommend it.

Went here last weekend and had some very yummy and reasonably priced Belinis, I recommend the pineapple one! Gets very busy and on a hot evening can get stuffy. Also the expresso martini is good too!
They do have an outdoor area but I think they do not allow drinks outside at a certain time. Good for a handful of friends if you can get a table.

Netter Laden mit sehr angenehmer Atmosphäre. Gute Musik und entspanntes Publikum. Solides Essen («Alice House Burger»). Aufgrund der räumlichen Nähe unser «Stammpub».
Besonders empfehlenswert am Wochenende. Jeden Sonntag Abend gibt es Live-​Musik.

I went to this bar recently for an Alice in Wonderland party and left feeling a little disappointed. We’d booked our table in advance and ending up standing around for ten minutes after it transpired that they’d given our table to someone else. Eventually they found us a table, but rather than the table for five that we’d booked we were all huddled around a small table for three, freezing ourselves next to the door. When we’d gone to such trouble buying and creating costumes for the event it definitely felt like a bit of a snub, particularly as our larger table had been given to regular diners without a booking or costumes.
We were served beautiful themed cocktails, I opted for a «Very Important Date» which came garnished with a pansy flower on top of a drink. These gorgeous cocktails could have made up for the oversight with the table, had we not had to wait so long for them. It took my friend almost 45 minutes to get served at the bar, and that wasn’t with making her way through the crowds, but rather the amount of time that she was stood standing at the bar counter. In the four hours that we were there, we managed to sample just three of the cocktails and left stone cold sober.
This was a pity, because it appeared that the bar had gone to lots of effort planning this event and the little touches around the venue from the cupcakes on the table, to the pocket watches given to the guests were all well thought out and really made the night. It’s just a shame that they were let down by their organisation.

This is a nice bar for the West Hampstead area. They serve various kinds of cocktails, so great for a small group or a date. It is lively and is well decorated. Downside is that they close at 11pm but then again don’t most places in London?