The Black Boy
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Change of management Autumn08: Chris and Abi moved from The High Table to run a gastropub. Jazz/blues night every Thursday and Kids Kitchen ( cookery school) every Sunday. For complete history of the pub see here! |
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91 Old High St Useful links: Oxford Restaurants Oxford Hotels Oxford Pubs & Bars Oxford Gig venues Oxford Concert venues Ads by Daily Info:
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Just been to the Black Boy - the new owners have got it absolutely spot on. The food was excellent, perfect steak and chips for under £10, and plenty more appetising stuff on the menu, a bargain. Great service, much improved decor, the only blemish was only one choice of ale (old speckled hen) although another draft was promised soon. I'll definitely be going back, and hopefully it will be a bit busier, as it certainly deserves to be.
rd, 08/10/08 The Black Boy is still open with an interim management company. I, Abigail Rose, and my business partner, Chris Bentham will be taking over at the end of September. We have both just finished working at The High Table Brasserie in Oxford as General manager and Head Chef and will be moving onto The Black Boy. We're both ex Raymond Blanc trained staff and very much look forward to bringing a reasonable priced menu (under £10) and offering a good pub atmosphere aswell. We hope to see you there, and in the meanwhile, the interim managers are doing a very good job! 06/09/08 I think you will find that the pub is very much still open! (see second review below this one...) JimJam, 30/08/08 I personally don't favour the interior decor - I'd like to see it go the way of the skip. The drinks selection is too restricted and the food too expensive currently, but if I ran the pub things would change. I would like to see the Aunt Sally team brought back, along with the darts team, and a return of the visits by the Morris Dancers. I would institute a real beer week under CAMRA. The facade and forecourt needs a lot of work doing to it to bring it up to scratch as a truly respectable pub. the publican, 14/07/08 I visited the previous incarnation of The Black Boy around 18 months ago and found it to be a run-of-the-mill going-nowehere locals' pub with a pool table as its main feature and a plethora of lads and lasses drinking weak lager loading coins into the fruitie... ....So it came as a blessed relief when I found The Black Boy (temporarily - sadly) has now been turned into one of the classiest pubs in not just Headington but indeed Oxford. I say temporarily because the place in its current guise is due to shut down in 2 weeks due to lack of custom! It may be in the smartest part of Headington but they must have mis-judged the local market and its off the beaten track location. This is a crying shame as the place is really classy but still in a non-pretentious laid-back pubby way feeling as it does like some of central Oxford's premier gastropubby/bars such as Sahara or The Oxford Retreat with thick, woody furniture with unmatching chairs, a smattering of leather easy chairs and a striking bar with lighted spirit shelves and bottles of wine stacked in huge racks. This all wouldn't look out of place in some over-priced Cotswold village pub or in the centre of some leafy commuter town in Surrey or Kent but in the back streets of Headington it feels a little strange. They do serve food both from the bar and to a small restaurant situated at the far end of the bar in a small annex but this was shut when we visited one late weekday night. All-in-all, go and visit while you still can as there's no telling what will arrive next. Joe B, 29/06/08
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