Bald Faced Stag

Yes, it hit the spot! Good Pub Food.
Highlights: Food was delicious, cooked great with ample quantity, Location was easy to find, Staff was friendly with good décor and set up.
Can improve: It gets crowded sometimes but overall a great local pub with good food and drinks.
Dined in June 2015. I have dined here multiple times and it is one of my go to local pubs.

The Bald Faced Stag has a pleasant beer and dining garden — which fills the gap as there’s a definite glut of al fresco spots in East Finchley. The menu is a bit pricey — they could do with a few cheaper eat items — especially for the light lunch grazer. They have positioned them self gastro and fine full on dining. I ordered the smoked mozzarella salad which was pleasing enough, but I have to admit was a bit liquidy for my tastes (there was quite a lot of water at the bottom of my plate). My father ate the smoked haddock fish cakes, with a poached egg and hollandaise, which I looked at rather enviously (his verdict = yum). A happy experience on the whole. The pub itself has a spacious eat indoors area and will definitely return if hungry and in the area.

My experience of this pub was a strange one. We went primarily for the pub quiz on a Sunday night which was very good. Challenging and broad in its scope. They have a wide selection of beers at not outrageous prices. The small car park out the back for customers is also good, especially for us travelling for a quiet Sunday night pub quiz.
However, we also wanted food. The staff told us that they had had a very busy lunch time and had simply run out of food. Huh? How does this happen? This wasn’t a holiday weekend or something, and I can’t see why it would of been particularly busy. Some weird goings on in the kitchen, more likely, we thought. However, as we told the compere for the pub quiz that we would have to leave to get food and miss the quiz, she sorted us out with some menus (which was great of her). We then heard that they would do food for people doing the pub quiz. Strange stuff.
The food itself I thought was expensive for what we got. A side salad consists of some lettuce leaves. The burgers, including rabbit burgers at £16, were fine, but you’d expect more for the price. But who knows, maybe this was just the offerings of some poor KP being ordered to go to Tescos nearby and getting something on a plate.

Always a great atmosphere with a great selection of craft beers and spirits. Premium yet affordable, definitely worth a visit

I really enjoyed my night at the Bald Faced Stag. Off to a bit of a rocky start as we were Bald Faced ignored at the bar but eventually someone sensed my mounting frustration at being deprived of a Bloody Mary and sorted us out.
We went into the dining room where we were fairly early with our booking but were told it was no problem to sit down because they only have one sitting — nice! It’s a big space but for a large part of the evening fairly quiet which meant no shouting i.e. my favourite. Overall I like the way they have redecorated the pub — it’s modern and I guess a bit yuppie but not in a way that I think is totally sacrilegious.
We had some salt cold croquettes to share which I thought were delicious (especially with the aioli nom nom nom). I also had cod cheeks for my main, coated in poppadoms (cool!) but overall I was not particularly keen on the dish — a bit lacklustre and the combination of cod and mangoes overall is too sweet. The menu is a bit strange with dishes varying widely in price, although I think basically the cheaper ones are much smaller. Mains of any substantial size are in the £12 — £16 bracket which is quite pricey for a pub in East Finchley. However the menu is a lot more interesting than standard pub grub so perhaps that’s not a fair comparison.
I don’t like sticky toffee pudding that much but the one I shared for dessert was unbelievably good.
Overall given how much I enjoyed my starter and dessert I would say the food here is well worth a try — just might have to accept you’ll have to pay a bit more for a decent main.

Loved the Sunday roast!
Yes its pricey (£15 over without drinks) but the quality of the roast is worth the money.

Restaurant | pub was refurbished recently. Very tasty Sunday roast! Thought it was pricey but after tasting it you can really understand why! Ingredients are very fresh and the beef was cooked to perfection.
HOWEVER, service was not very good and staff weren’t particularly friendly. and to my surprise .this waitress dropped a plate that was covering a dish and she just picked it back up and put it on the food! It was so gross.
Really need to have some serious staff training !

The Cheeseburger at the Bald Faced Stag is a good sandwich to grab for lunch. While this burger does not stand out amongst the greatest in London it’s got potential. A bakery bun, melted cheese, and a char-​grilled patty make for a satisfying burger. However, the beef and bun were quite a bit too dry when I ordered my burger. The bun was very difficult to bite through and I almost had to tear through it with my teeth. This is contrary to most burger experiences that feature a pillowy soft bun. A luxury pub feel and a hearty serving of chips make this a good bite for those needing a fun lunch.

Altho’ our previous visits have been for dates or special occasions, today we stopped in for a quick lunch: we only had an hour. On the barman’s suggestion we had half a pint of Hackney blonde beer. It wasn’t great. I find white beer so variable. This one was decidedly average. Barman was decidedly average too — not the most friendly of creatures, on a Friday, at the end of the month, in a bar that wasn’t terribly busy, when we were being nice and friendly, and smiled alot at him. And he didn’t bother to smile back or try at all. ’nuff said.
The food: one rump steak. one chicken burger. both with big chunky fries.
I like their little caddy: knives, forks, serviettes, bottle of mustard, bottle of ketchup, s & p, ‘s all you need. Very neat and tidy.
We ate, we were full, we left.
I often find the service here is a bit off. That being said, the food is consistently good. For that reason it’s getting the thumbs up.

Although the BFS certainly know how to price (high), I found the quality of their food excellent. On a normal weekday evening, I don’t think there was any service charge in place — and rightly so — no table service. A little pretentious in the descriptions perhaps, but I think they had the goods to back it up.

my boyfriend and I went here a few times because its near his neighborhood, but we stopped due to the over priced drinks/​menu and the rude unfriendly staff !! and, we even were tipping them well which most people do not do and they were still rude ! I agree with the other guy too about the food sucking and small portions, over priced, etc. The one thing I will say that is good is the outdoor patio on a nice day but we dont even go in there for that anymore. We usually go to Maddens where we are treated FAR better.

Ok so I’ll begin by saying that I really do like this pub it’s much less pretentious than the White Lion and it’s a great place to while away a few hours outside when the weather is good, or indeed indoors when it isn’t. I haven’t tried the restaurant section but if it is the same chef who cooks the bar food I wouldn’t bother. The presentation is poor and the food just not very good. Cold overcooked steak, condiments presented in a dirty galvanized bucket. No thanks. Great for a drink but if you want food I’d go to one of the many other places East Finchley has to offer.

Strange name, nice enough pub.
But ‘A-​OK’ is about right. It’s got the usual… everything. Usual drinks, usual menu, usual sized bar, usual seating area with usual chairs and usual quiz machines.
‘What you having?
The usual.’

The bald faced stag is nicely decorated and has plenty of lounge type comfortable seating. I ventured out to the beer garden as the weather was actually sunny for a winters day. There was smoking in the garden so it did not take me long before I decided to move in to eat my food.
There is a separate restaurant and the food is good but rather pricey at £10-£13 for a main course. I choose hummus from the bar menu which set me back a whopping 5.95.
This place has a lot going for it with some decent ales and beer on tap and is a nice place to chill but expect to pay higher than normal prices.

A quietish pub on the high street in East Finchley, which incidentally has some other nice restaurants and pubs in which to spend an evening. It was refurbished a couple of years ago and (fortunately) lost its old man feel, and now has a slightly more upmarket feel with a pool table to boot. Sadly though, it doesn’t have much character.