Year of Eating Differently (48): All Bar One, Dean Street

The Marie Celeste of food-pubs
A spookily empty bar. I suppose even the reprobates of Soho look askance at going to All Bar One on a Monday lunchtime. Is that because they're in more squalid environs? Is it because the usual clientele are some stuffed-shirt gumpfs from Essex, up for the evening and up for a good time? Such bitchiness and prejudice aside, a pretty good meal today. Annoyingly, the vegetarian burger doesn't come with fries as standard whereas all other burgers do.

Where are my chips?
Then again, it's cheaper, so I guess you don't miss out on too much. Although this does raise the question of why the chips are missing - is this the token healthy option? And why are the menus sheets that you tear off a great big pad attached to one of the pillars? And why if the menu is like that is there a huge blackboard with the daily specials chalked on it? And why are the daily specials exactly the same as what's on the printed menu? Can't they just find a laminating machine and recycle?

One menu is small, the other is far away...
So many questions. But as it is, I've filled up on mushroom and halloumi, and with my newfound addiction to mustard, I'm a little fuzzed out and trying to bluff it out for the rest of the afternoon.