The Aldgate Exchange

Monopoly Pub Crawl — Stop #3 — Whitechapel Road (Brown)
For Whitechapel, we selected the Aldgate Exchange on Whitechapel High St. This place always seems to be open and is one of my preferred pubs on a crawl for several reasons.
1) It’s large, open, warm, and inviting.
2) The staff are very friendly and bloody quick to serve
3) The bathrooms are fairly clean and spacious which makes it an excellent time to break the seal
For non-​crawl outings, I probably wouldn’t choose to come here as it lacks much character and is far too brightly lit for my tastes. It does have numerous TVs showing the games on at the time and the standard selection of beers, ales, and harder stuff. Overall, I’d say it’s good for groups which is its major selling point.
I do recall trading one of the barmaids (on the a previous crawl) my Coca-​cola McDonald’s glass (the collector edition one) for several bags of crisps which I found highly entertaining. So extra points for having good staff on hand!

Cool place for a drink. Went there on a Friday night seemed full of city workers, was impressed that it wasn’t too hard to get a table. Drinks are reasonably priced. Good supply of ale as well as lager. Staff are pleasant.
Toilets a bit rough.

I think this place is the absolute definition of middle of the road. Located midway between Aldgate and Aldgate East tube stations, The Aldgate exchange looks and feels like every other pub you’ve ever been to. The exterior makes it look like a Whetherspoons and the interior doesn’t exactly get your heart racing with lots of Ikea-​esque tables and chairs and neutral colours. It’s trying hard to be a gastropub but ends up just looking a bit cheap.
On the positive side it is an excellent location to watch some sport with several large screens and a projector.
Drinks-​wise were talking a pretty standard assortment of lagers, ales and spirits all coming in at a little under average price. Though I have yet to try the food they appear to offer a range of Thai cuisine in keeping with the Great British gastropub tradition.
Really really really average.