Great Eastern Dining Room, Shoreditch  

This is another Shoreditch fixture we've often visited before, but never got around to reviewing. In truth, we never really liked the place, it was always very, very full of the kind of people whose company we could easily live without, we weren't bothered about the food and the music didn't excite us - we only ever visited at the behest of others. However, as in the rest of Shoreditch, things here have calmed down somewhat and it's a far less unappealing prospect than it once was, hence another visit. As the name suggests, the focus is solidly on the dining and the modern Asian menu has a a broad appeal and didn't disappoint our party. The booze isn't anything remarkable and the prices are what you'd expect - not cheap. With the change in licensing laws, one of the Great Eastern Dining Room's other draws - the late bar with "disco" downstairs - is not quite the attraction it once was, as so many others in the area offer this. We're afraid it still doesn't float our boat, there are too many irksome idiosyncrasies for us - the staff bellow at you to get down stairs (or get out), when the upstairs bar closes, the prices are too high for the quality of the offer and the fact there's a dress code - no ties - is the icing on the cake. We've said it about another pub and what we said about that goes for here too, we don't like any form of discrimination. If you want to keep out estate agents, we can think of other ways of doing that.