Fun new grits at The Abercrombie

A favourite of university students and workers from neighbouring construction sites, The Abercrombie in Broadway is part of the Drink N Dine group of pubs and boasts a new menu of food to keep any dude happy.

It's an old pub done new, Drink N Dine style, with the slightest Scottish influence within the dark and still dingy main pub bar and the light- and people-filled beer garden with loads of seating.

One kilo of chicken wings at The Abercrombie, Broadway

Group executive chef Jamie Thomas sure has been busy with great specials and new menu items across all the venues - it was The Abercrombie's $10 Friday special from 6-10pm on a one kilogram bucket of chicken wings that got me.

My visions of a large tin bucket were way off though: one kilogram is a lot smaller than I was imagining and I probably could have polished off the basket of crisp, greasy, cornflake-crumbed mid wings and drumettes myself with the mild, orange-tinted 'Red Eye' mayonnaise.

Mac and cheese balls with spiced ketchup

I wasn't really sure what to expect from macaroni and cheese balls, but I suppose if you can make arancini balls from rice, there's no reason pasta can't be used in the same fashion. I was surprised that macaroni can be moulded to such perfectly spherical shapes.

Mac & cheese ball innards 

The pasta balls are best devoured straight-from-the-oil hot and heavily dunked in the accompanying tomato sauce. When hot, the cheese strings from every bite of the soft pasta, invoking immediate carb, cheese and naughtiness overload.

Chicken Caesar salad with bacon, lettuce, queso cheese and ranch dressing

I thought I'd lighten the load with a salad, which ended up being gigantic and having more chicken, bacon strips and corn chips than a 'healthy' dish really should.

Add ranch dressing and grated queso cheese and you can pretty much cancel out any goodness from the cos lettuce or kernels of grilled corn.

Mexican dahl taco with green chilli yoghurt and sweet potato

There was slight redemption in the vegetarian taco option with a Mexican-spiced dry lentil dahl, served in a soft taco with red cabbage, shavings of sweet potato and quite the refreshing, not-spicy chilli yoghurt.

Korean short rib taco with slaw and sesame mayo

The beef short rib taco was a definite winner: tender pulled short rib cooked in Korean chilli bean paste on a bed of red cabbage slaw. Coriander leaves and a flavoured mayonnaise were the icing on the cake of an impressive fusion taco.

Reuben Dog with mustard, sauerkraut and dill pickle relish, served with chips

The Reuben Dog is new to the menu of 'dawgs' and is described as a Reuben sandwich inside a hot dog.

Other than the lack of corned beef - although it's a pretty decent frankfurt encased in the white roll - the tang of both the sauerkraut and lurid green dill pickle relish hinted at a Reuben, while the crinkle cut potato chips were pure nostalgia in a paper cup.

Deep fried Golden Gaytime

There was going to be a dessert order of The Abercrombie's infamous deep fried Golden Gaytime ice cream regardless of how stuffed we were.

As if the original caramel/vanilla ice cream pop with chocolate and biscuit crumb coating isn't already awesome perfection, this version is battered, crumbed and deep fried as a whole, served with a fanned strawberry and drizzled with syrup.

Inside the deep fried Golden Gaytime

Personally, I think perfection can be left well alone, but for those inclined, dig in quick as the ice cream is on a melting path; perhaps made too sweet with the addition of syrup but itwas certainly a novel dessert that had to be ordered and shared.

The Abercrombie beer garden

The beer garden didn't empty much over the course of the night, with happy hour jugs keeping things rolling. There was a lot of food out in the beer garden too, proving that fun food, or grits, go a long way.

Food, booze and shoes dined as a guest of The Abercrombie, with thanks to Folke.