Hawksmoor Spitalfields (bar)

Time Out's Food & Drink reviewers can often be heard singing the praises of Hawksmoor's three-strong chain of steakhouses with bars (the other two are in Covent Garden and Guildhall). Over many visits over the years, using different reviewers, for breakfast, lunch, dinner or drinks, we've struggled to find faults in any of them. So here we go again.

The original Hawksmoor, for most of its six-year existence a boisterous one-floor restaurant and bar, has recently fitted out and opened its cellar as a dedicated bar. And it's great.

There's no natural light, but the atmosphere is clubby and intriguingly dusky. It has been decorated in the style seen across all the outposts - its designers have made the space look welcomingly lived in, even though it's only a few weeks old. Everywhere you look is a patina, a scuff, a chip, a spot of artful verdigris or an well-placed ring mark.

The cocktail list is split into familiar sections ('gloom lifters', 'eye openers', 'corpse revivers' etc) and includes a few recognisable drinks from its sibling venues, such as the wonderful Shaky Pete's Ginger Brew, with gin, homemade ginger syrup, lemon juice and London Pride. Hawksmoor's bartenders are notably learned and professional, and every drink we tried was once again special. Beers come from London (Meantime and Kernel breweries).

Equally exciting is the food - a dedicated bar menu is served, and at this branch it has an American bent. There's a burger for £8.50, a hot dog, fried wings, and the French Dip, as seen at Hakwsmoor Guildhall - braised shortrib with cheese, in a slightly sweet roll, with a boat of marrow gravy, and a contender for the best thing in sliced bread London has to offer. A fantastic side dish was the 'Tamworth laab', a Staffordshire-meets-Siam combination of minced pork, coriander, chilli and garlic wrapped in lettuce leaves.

Perfect drinks, genuine service and a perfectly pitched food menu: the revamped Hawksmoor is a winner. Perhaps one day we'll go to a Hawksmoor and they'll put a foot wrong, miss a beat, drop the ball… In the meantime we're more than happy to keep going back to any of the branches to check.