The Bear

I use this restaurant/pub perhaps twice a week and on many Sundays. I am never hassled out and can
sit and read the Sunday papers and frankly just enjoy the atmosphere and other customers. The pub is
large and airy and full of interesting object and period pictures, the music seems to be in tune with the age and type of customers at the time. How do they do that ? I take my
dog sometimes – the staff hurry over with a bowl and biscuits, it really is like going to friends in the country
and hard to remember I am in Camberwell. Families come and go and birthdays seem to happen every
Sunday, whilst the charming staff seem genuinely keen to please. On to the food: The food is long slow cooked and French in feeling. The chef/owner is apparently a local lad, though never seen. He clearly has a passion and everything is seasonal and fresh. The menu changes slightly with deletions and additions each day. There is confit of duck and pigeon with lentils and plenty of comfort food. There are flashes of brilliance, clams with chorizo, a salad of peach, mozzarella and mint and innovative gratins with fennel and salsify and decent French cheese, a champagne jelly with gooseberry fool and a margarita ice cream with meringues. I am told this is a family run pub and my worry is they sell up and move on up to higher climes, and leave us bereft in South London.

This is an excellent neighbourhood gastropub, a handsome interior with very friendly service and reasonably priced food.
Highly recommended for weekend brunch on bright, clear afternoons with the sun streaming through the large windows.

Having eaten there several times, this pub is consistently excellent. It's the place locals are talking about in terms of being the best food in the area (better than the excellent Dark Horse). The food is quite typical of gastropubs, but being in Camberwell they have to try that bit harder. So portion sizes are generous because people around here are quite sensitive about getting value for money too. Having eaten in pubs which are more celebrated on these pages – such as in East Dulwich – I can honestly say The Bear goes toe-to-toe with the best of them.