Why The Camberwell Arms is the Perfect Local Recipe

Quail with Caesar salad at The Camberwell Arms

I once wrote that there was no such thing as the perfect local. I lamented the lack of ‘proper boozers’ left in London – the scrotty kind with Fosters ashtrays, pickled eggs, a juke box and a pub cat. While I still have much affection for those establishments and many fond memories of the years I pissed away in them, the fact remains that times have moved on and so have I. Maturing happened within me and so here we are with a different set of criteria which have been met in their entirety by The Camberwell Arms. I am insufferably smug that this is my local. It’s not the case that TCA doesn’t provide the same warm huggy feelings as those old boozers of yester-decade, because it does,…