The steaks are high

Wansteadium reader Ego generously supplies the much-awaited report on the Queen’s British Steakhouse and Grill, writing:

Arriving a little under dressed and definitely punk completely failed to faze our head waiter. He seated us under a reproduction of the ‘God Save The Queen’ album cover, thus turning us into a feature of the very British theme.

The food can’t be recommended highly enough. Meat all sourced from the same farm in Yorkshire and brought to the table on a platter (with waiter’s patter) for your selection. Returning cooked just right, cutting like butter and certainly the best tasting I’ve had in recent memory. Buying British isn’t taken to silly extremes though, the wine list is international and covers all tastes.

The American Brat Pack background music didn’t work for me personally but that’s subjective and crooners are, at least, inoffensive. My own real disappointment was that the coffee did not meet the standard of the rest of the meal.

Slightly insipid coffee can be forgiven when the staff are as charming and the food such good value. The experience overall is well worth repeating.

Choice tweets about Wanstead, XX; Countryside on the Central Line

In Wanstead. It’s like a bit of Wiltshire in East London.less than a minute ago via HTC Peep

Volunteers still needed for Wanstead’s new bookshop

With the opening of Wanstead’s Oxfam bookshop imminent, work is proceeding apace to get the former travel agents ready. A shop manager has been appointed, and 30 people have volunteered to help run the shop. Oxfam area manager Mark Appiah told Wansteadium they still needed another 10 people to join the rota; anyone interested can call him on 07717 541321.

Wanted: Wanstead steakhouse reports…


Wansteadium was over-eager in expecting the new Queen’s British Steak House and Grill on New Wanstead to open last week – but it WAS due to welcome its first customers on Thursday night. As previously reported, it’s a venture which comes with some high expectations. Wansteadium reader Pete Smith said: “Very much looking forward to it. Wanstead already has some fine restaurants so a quality steak house will fit right in.”
So any first hand experiences (menus, pricing, service, atmosphere) welcome.

Shock! Wanstead’s iconic ‘tree with a postcode’ removed

The remains of a chestnut tree on Wanstead Green – celebrated as a ‘tree with a postcode’ when it was the centre of the protest against the building of the M11 link road in the early 1990s – has been removed, Wansteadium can report.

The 300-year-old tree was pulled down during the building work, and the fallen trunk has been lying on Wanstead Green since 1993, gradually rotting. Conservationists warned in early 2009 that the trunk would be lost unless someone took over caring for it.

The tree became a symbol of the protest against the road, and even became the subject of legal argument over whether it constituted a dwelling, since it had protesters living in it who received letters there. Despite its nickname it is not thought that it ever did actually have its own postcode.

It is not known what has happened to the trunk. Wansteadium reader Caroline Barkus said: “It was there on Sunday. I want to know what has happened to this historic tree trunk.”

More history on the tree here.

UPDATE 1200 BST: The Wanstead Guardian has now followed up on this story.

UPDATE 1730 BST: Wanstead Guardian now reporting that the City of London Corporation has taken the stump into protective custody ‘care’. A spokesman told the paper:

“This much loved tree has been deteriorating rapidly so we took it into protective care on Monday. I’m sorry we did not tell more people but the tree is safely in store with us while we preserve the wood. We’ll definitely let local residents know through the press once we have found a solution and can bring it back, after treatment.”

Earlier, Wanstead Society stalwart Jack Figg had raised the prospect that someone might have taken the wood to use it. Legally minded Wansteadium readers are invited to discuss what legal recourse there might have been against anyone who had taken it, bearing in mind it was a rotting tree trunk, seemingly abandoned, with no indication that it was there as an unofficial monument.