INK, Leicester Square

What to think about INK, Professor Green’s funky, kitsch new late-bar/ club? I reckon it would have been right up the 19 year-old me's street. In fact, I'd recommend it to all ages. I'd argue you're never to old to take your hip hop replacement out for a spin on the floor - in this case overseen by a light-up plastic Madonna. That's as in Jesus's old lady, not the put-it-away-love-we've-seen-it-a-million-times-and-we-ain't-interested po-faced pop star, still shaking her auld hoop like her life depends on it.  Word up, laydeez! If you're not flush, spend the £20 cover charge you’ll save by rocking up before 10pm on drinks, then tap some obliging geezer for your next ten. Cocktails are by co-owner Gerry Calabrese of Hoxton Pony renown whose love it/hate it coconut and lemon Hoxton gin appears in a Collins. Otherwise, try Good Times, Doctor Bird and West End Cooler at a party room that’s set to pull a cooler crowd than the West End’s glamma girl/ tea bag tan TOWIE wannabe haunts. If you're peckish, there's a hit'n'miss pick'n'mix selection of 'British tapas' to dribble down the front of your expensive silk frock. Ham hock topped by poached duck egg (£9.50), cod - battered in Professor G’s own-brew ale, Remedy - with chips, and foraged mushroom tortellini are fair. Tarted-up baked beans on toast, steep at £8.50, and over-salted braised beef and gloopy garlic potato puree in a ‘pie and mash’ assembly what I'd expect on an economy class airline tray, only here presented in a tricksy mini copper pot. Music, I'm utterly amazed to say, sounded 75% familiar to my lugholes. Old Heaven/ Hacienda boys can and will still live it large on Leicester Square

1 Leicester Square WC2H 7NA 7287 0151 https://www.facebook.com/INKLDN

image metro.co.uk

Celebrity Juice

Celebrity fragrances are big business. For stars keen to extend their brand, so too, it seems, is having your own beer or spirit. For glampers, this summer’s must-do brew was ale-lovin’ Professor Green’s Remedy, a hit at the singer’s hip new London nightclub, INK. An American-style pale ale (made with 100% British ingredients) it’s available from Signature Brew www.signaturebrew.co.uk who also sell Dark Heart, Ed Harcourt’s ‘Edwardian brown ale’ and folk-punk Frank Turner’s Believe. Mancunian rockers Elbow’s Build A Rocket Boys beer, meanwhile, is available at offies nationwide. Other celebs have jumped on the boozy bandwagon. Fashion victims may fancy Dolce & Gabbana’s Martini Gold, and vodkas by Roberto Cavalli and Ed Hardy. Tequila fans might try Cleo Rocos’ fine new Aqua Riva http://aquariva.co.uk or George Clooney’s super-premium 100% blue agave Casamigos (£68.50). The latter is available at www.urban-drinks.co.uk as are Marilyn Manson’s suitably Gothic absinthe, Mansinthe; Pharrell Williams’ girly liqueur, Qream; Old Whiskey River by country legend Willie Nelson; vodkas by Motörhead and P.Diddy (Ciroc); and, in its cult glass skull bottle, Dan Aykroyd’s Crystal Head which, gauging by his live jam at Shoreditch bar NOLA this summer, is sleb juice to get any joint jumping.

Fantasy Celebrity Brands I’d Love To See

Geordie Shore Trampagne; Poire Will.i.am; Cointreauversy by Prince; Geri Halliwell’s Spiced Ginger Whine; David Beckham’s Golden Bols; Henry Holland’s  - Camp ‘arry; Patsy Palmer’s Martini Bianca; Pete Doherty – Babychambles; David Bowie’s Gin Jeanie; Keith Lemoncello. 

Original article appeared in METRO 24.9.13