I'm meeting my parents in London next weekend. Hwere should I go to get a good beef wellington? Real ale?

Alright *rolls up sleeves*. First off, welcome to the greatest city in the world, the weather is ****e. Now, where are you gonna be? City centre, 'Burbs? How long are you here for and what kind of time do you want to have? Fun-time Charlie or chilled?

When it comes to eats, you looking for somewhere classy and pricy or just good food? You could go somewhere like Claridges, Nobu, Rhodes, Frankies or Corrigans for great food, but it will probably cost you an arm and a leg. For the best steak in London, go to Hawksmoor on Commercial Street. It is guaranteed to be unbe-lievable!

Now, lets get into the real stuff. Real Ale? You've come to the right city.

The problem with reccommending a good pub in London is that there are literaly thousands of them! Wherever you are staying theres guaranteed to be 2 or 3 dotted around. My advice would be to go to somewhere like Covent Garden, Leicester Square or Soho, start before you get to the middle and do a pub crawl. You're pretty knowledgeble when it comes to real ale and each pub's gonna have different stuff, so just keep going until you run out of pub's!!

This is a great site for recommendations http://www.beerintheevening.com/pubs/guide/london.shtml and it even has a pub crawl generator.

Dont forget, the most important part to remember when on a pub crawl in London is that at some stage, you must switch exclusively to draft Guinness. The best buzz is always Irish.

Considering the vast array of places to drink in the West End, I would try to go to slightly more upmarket joints, as you then have a solid chance of being someones out-of-town strange for the night. Happy Days!!!

Let me know when youre gonna be here and if you need anything else and we'll see if we cant meet up.

Off topic but my kids listen to this damn music all day and I can't get it off my head.

I'll be looking to get sauced with my dad. Probably a Belian styled wine house with mom and dad. But some heavy ale/scotch dirnking witha cigar when she goes to bed. Preferably somewhere with a decent billiard. He has yet to tell me where accommodations are, but I think it's because of business and what not and we're both planning on using points for the trip.So likely City Centre but hi strip is so impromptu and needs to be balanced with both our schedules everything is being paid for with points (like plane ticket, which is booked, but I don't know if I'll actuallys use that flight... but it is easy to change with points).

I will go to Hawksmoor because you said so. I want one unbelievable steak. You ask for a cut of meat in Libya and they hack with a machete. For one meal, money is no object, because I would pay $1,000, right now, for a t-bone. Figured I'd rock a beef wellington on the island though.

Good pub advice... I like it. In the states I live at microbrews... so if you cna think of a place that brews its own and has monthly brews/tappings (and makes a big deal out of it), I want to give it a shot!

I will be in London from the 28-31, so if you wanted to get sauced, say, that Friday or Saturday we can hook it up. Pops is a huge Knicks fan too--so maybe we could meet up for the LAkers game if you know a place.

Good location and very upmarket so safe late at night as you stagger home. Go to The Campaign For Real Ale's website at www.camra.org.uk for pubs near you for the good stuff. They also have a pretty cool system where they tell you about nearby pubs on your cell. See http://www.camra.org.uk/page.aspx?o=283782 for details. One thing I can guarantee is that Hawksmoor will not let you down when it comes to steaks. I will have to see my plans for that weekend. I usually watch the games at home on Slingbox but the resolution isn't good enough for a crowd so I will do some research into places to watch the Knicks game, but the cigar isn't gonna happen cuz there's no smoking in London anymore. Sorry about that.

I'm on my cell now, so will update if I think of anything else. Would be a pleasure to meet up, if only to salute the troops.

Oh and if you want the best single malt scotch, your best bet is meeting up with me. Bars don't sell the quality of stuff I keep for friends. p