The Lion & Eagle English Pub
2401 N. Federal Hwy.
Boca Raton
561-447-7707
Irish pubs, British pubs, German brew houses — many places bill themselves as heirs to some distant, drink-happy culture. Few places deliver the sights, sounds, and tastes of the originals. Lion & Eagle English Pub, however, is the real deal. Forget that it's wedged into a minuscule Boca Raton strip mall. Clear of the front door, that means nothing. It looks, smells, and tastes like one of those old, musty, happy-to-be-sullen pubs that squat in London's alleyways. Model ships, knights, gargoyles, and all sorts of older-than-the-queen trinkets stock the shelves behind the bar, not letting you forget for a second that this is an English pub. They match the Union Jacks proudly displayed on the ceiling, which happens to be plastered and crossed with brown wooden beams to resemble traditional English architecture. The people mark their syllables, they're noisy yet sophisticated, and they drink out of 20-ounce pint glasses. Oh, and it's all beer. They've got Bud and Miller (those taps are kept in the kitchen — and out of sight), but the stars here are Boddingtons Pub Ale, Old Speckled Hen, Magners Irish Cider, Smithwick's, Fuller's ESB, and, of course, Guinness (the foundation for any respectable Half and Half). The communal seating is covered in Victorian-style fabric and haloed by a plasma screen — home of the English Premier League on weekends. It's open from noon to 2 a.m. seven days a week, and happy hour ($1 off pints) is from 4 to 7 p.m. If you're in the service industry, it's always happy hour, and you get two-for-one bottles. It's a small place, so conversations start and stop in every direction, and brothers Simon and Rob Allen are jolly good chaps who'd love nothing more than to soothe your ugly mug by pouring you a nice glass. Cheerio.
