The Bank in Nottingham is a pub in the Old Market Square area that used to be a bank. For a time it was my bank, a branch of Barclays. This pub often tends to be our last port of call on a Friday night due to its proximity to the bus stops and prevalence of relatively cheap liquor. Although we have on occasion perused the menu we had thus far resisted any temptation to eat there. I will be honest temptation had not been even flirted with in the past. For some reason this particular Friday we ended up passing by early enough to eat, and with the aim of finding somewhere new to eat we just succumbed and thought what the “heck lets just give it a chance.” with the thought “How bad could it be?” hovering above our heads in slightly inebriated speech bubbles we walked in to take that chance.

The Question on the menu asked “Have you tried this?” (Tried what we wondered?)

“All Day Breakfast £4.69 – two grilled Cumberland sausages, three rashers of grilled back bacon, two fried eggs, two hash browns, half a grilled tomato, a flat mushroom and baked beans with a slice of toasted farmhouse bread and butter“.

Well we had not and given the scarcity of anything else believable on the menu we ordered two.

It was a mixed plateful, the sausages were not what I expect a Cumberland sausage to be, you know a big wheel of circular coiled sausages, these might have had Cumberland flavours but these had too little meat and too much soggy breadcrumb to be worthy of the name. The hash browns would have been better off left in the freezer packet, if they didn’t come from a packet then an excellent job had been made during the cooking process to mimic the texture and quality of said. I didn’t mind the eggs, and the bacon although it was a bit too salty and unnecessarily charred just about got away with it. The toast was OK, but the beans, tomato, and mushroom looked and tasted a bit sad.

I will be honest and say that for the price it was good value, it did fill us both up, but did I enjoy it? well it is hard to really love the plateful when you are questioning everything provenance and quality in the back of your mind. For a meal to mop up the beers it works, but I doubt that I would be ordering one early one morning as my first meal of the day with all my faculties intact.

Of course that is all just my take on the meal, my companion thought I was being a bit harsh as I moaned whilst pretending to begrudgingly stuff every last bite into my mouth. All I will say is that I got what I paid for and that was only £4.69

The Bank Pub is at 8-9 Beastmarket Hill in the Old Market Square. It faces the Council House and looks out across Slab Square. The nearest tram stop is at the Old Market Square, but it is also just a short walk down the hill from the Royal Centre Stop.