address: 336 Coldharbour Lane, London SW9 8QH

telephone: 020 7326 0643

info@shrubandshutter.co.uk

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We have visited Shrub and Shutter [see here, here and HERE] but it has been a year so again, we visited to inspect the cocktail menu and we were impressed. The service is great, no hassle about choosing a drink – it takes a while to read through all the lists and the waiters and bartenders are very knowledgeable. if you don’t like the look of the list then they will make you something bespoke. It is easy to overlook as it doesn’t have a big sign. It lies between Camberwell and Brixton on Coldharbour Lane. Keep going after Brixton Village and it is on the left hand side near a Fish and Chip shop and Okan Ramen.

We arrived at 7.00 pm on a Saturday for cocktail hour and this is when it does get crowded at the front but there is a huge area at the back to sit and eat. We squeezed into the front so we could watch passers by. The menu is ordered into decades and there is always a new list on a blackboard and wine as well. The blackboard highlighted Bastille Day with french additions to the longish menu. They don’t keep up to date with their menu so I have no idea what was in our two longish drinks that we ordered first on this hot day. But they were both refreshing and had different levels of sweetness. Ask the waiters for their view of how sweet they can be so you don’t end up drinking sherbet if you don’t like it.

Sitting at the front gives you a view of the bar and of the other customers. We were starting to think about what we should order next, when we saw a particularly attractive set of cocktails – one with a smoke hood and the other a lovely martini shaped icy number. We went for this which turned out to be a spiced margarita. Ours came with a little green vegetable perched on top which wasn’t a chili but a padron pepper.