6. Save room for something sweet.
Desserts aren’t really the point of a pub, per se, but it feels right to end a meal at Dean’s with something indulgent. “Every British restaurant should have a steamed pudding on it, and so we have a very sticky syrup and ginger pudding with cold custard, which is really traditional and comforting,” Shadbolt says. “We have a really beautiful light lemon and elderflower posset, which is almost like a very delicate set cream.”
The posset, an ethereal dessert dating back to Shakespearean times, makes for the perfect foil for yet another whimsically named treat: petticoat tails. “I just love the name,” Shadbolt says. These buttery Scottish shortbreads are sliced into wedges and pricked with the tines of a fork. Here, they’re optimal for dunking.
Pub menus are meant to accommodate the liminal spaces between meals, the pre- and post-dinner chips and bites. To that end, there are desserts that lend themselves well to snacking, like the plate of brandy snaps, rolled, wafer-thin cookies with the faint caramel tinge of golden syrup. “They’re going to be piped with some softly whipped cream and a chocolate crémeux,” Shadbolt says. “Sometimes you don’t want a full-blown dessert, but just a little offering of something sweet at the end.”
Dean’s is open for dinner from 4 p.m. to midnight Tuesday to Saturdays, with service on Sundays and Mondays to follow.
Diana Hubbell is a James Beard Award-winning food and travel journalist whose work has appeared in The Washington Post, The Guardian, Atlas Obscura, VICE, Eater, Condé Nast Traveler, Esquire, WIRED, and Travel + Leisure, among other places. Previously based in Berlin and Bangkok, she currently lives in Greenpoint, Brooklyn. Follow her on Instagram. Follow Resy, too.