The Chequers

I love The Chequers for dinner, my partner and I eat here all the time. For any Americans in Marlow, the steak in the this place rivals anything you can get back home and is by far the best I’ve found here. Choose your own meat from the counter if you want! Portion size is great, sides are delicious (I like the onion rings, my partner loves the mushrooms). Service is about as good as you get in the UK, and if you want to eat there on a Friday night you’ll definitely have to book a table in advance.

Service:
— Everyone was very nice, friendly and attentive.
Starter:
— Sticky beef: slices of beef were cooked nicely with a pinkish center, but the sticky sauce it came with wasn’t too special, almost tasted like a Chinese tangy sauce. Complimenting the beef with the side salad adds a fresh element to the dish.
Main:
— Rib eye with mushroom sauce and hand cut chips: The beef was cooked to a medium rare finish topped with the house sauce. We could have done without the house sauce because the mushroom sauce was delicious and creamy. The rib eye was a bit on the thin side but decently sized overall. The hand cut chips were pretty good– thick cuts with a slight crunch on the outside and nice and warm inside.
— Pork Belly: exceeded my expectations. It tastes better than it looks. It was flavorful and surprisingly tender (it looked a little dry). Green beans and mashed potatoes were standard. The BBQ type sauce complimented well as it added some acidity to the more fatty pork.

Sunday roast looks to be the popular reason why people flock into this establishment. The roasts look enticing on the carvery table and definitely look more high quality than the roast meats from Toby’s.
The price difference is big and I’m still yet to decide whether it’s worth it. I found my roast beef had a bit of stringy bits which to me became a waste but this is always understandably the case with beef.
Vegetables are very basic and I couldn’t tell them apart from the ones I had at Toby’s Carvery which has more choices. They do not have baked stuffings here at The Chequers which to me is an integral part of a Sunday roast.
Now that I’ve tried this popular feat, I think I’ll be more interested next time to try some of the a la carte items.

The restaurant space is very nice. There is a bar and tasting room at the front of the space and then the restaurant in the back. To find the hostess stand, you must walk through the bar area (which somewhat resembles a restaurant) and back to the TM Steaks restaurant space.
The service was good as good as it can get in England.
We ordered the bread basket as a starter (something I would have expected to be free at a steakhouse) and it came with 4 small rolls and butter, not a ramekin of butter but rather self serve butter packs and small bowls of olive oil and balsamic vinegar. It was odd, however, the bread was good.
I ordered the New York Strip as stated on the menu. I like cheese and I like steak, so I trusted the chef and went with how they recommended the steak… with cheese on top. Bad idea. A steak should ever be topped with cheese. There was so much cheese that I had to pull it all off and was left with a tiny piece of meat. I also was not a huge fan of the peppercorn sauce. The mashed potatoes were excellent as were the onion rings.
I will return and I will again order the New York Strip, however, I will ask that they prepare it without cheese and peppercorn sauce as the combination of those two things completely ruined it for me.
One last thing to note — they are open until 1am on Friday and Saturday nights.

The in-​laws came to visit England and we decided it was a good occasion for steak. A Texas friend who had lived in the area recommended Chequers. The steak was pretty good, above average. I recommend going with the Tailor Made and avoid their steaks topped with cheese. I love English Cheddar but covering a steak with cheddar cheese just screams I am giving you a crappy piece of meat and trying to hide it.
My only real issue was that the steak, paid for in weight, had a huge cap of fat. While I like fate and want marbling I don’t need an inch thick piece of fat surround the steak.

Great busy pub, good vibe for the older crowd. Whiskey bar is cosy if you can get a seat. The food was good but the service staff although enthusiastic were not very knowledgable and inexperienced.

Lovely beer, excellent service. Seating out the front to smoke and/​or watch the world go by. I say the world, I mean Marlow — but still nice.

Recently had a meal here with friends. Staff very attentive and good choice on the menu. They seem to specialise in steak and have a’select your steak and see it being cut’ service, but they don’t push it being happy to let you choose off the menu until you ask «what’s that over there».
Food was good and pretty reasonable — about £30 -£35 a head Inc drinks and coffee. Would go again.

While the food and décor were excellent, the service and number of items not available on the menu bring it down. They were out of the first two bottles of wine we ordered (although they charged us the price of the wine we were going to order for the more expensive replacement) and they were out of one of the desserts we ordered. We usually had to wave down our servers and had to ask for water multiple times before getting some. This place only recently reopened so it deserves some slack, and hopefully it will improve. Regardless, the food is still darn good.
Starters:
–Prawn and avocado stack was absolutely delicious
–Mushrooms on brioche were a bit salty but tasty
–Baked Camambert was delightful, with various rolls and nice cranberry relish
Mains & sides:
–All the steaks were cooked perfectly and full of flavour
–The duck was also really tasty, although a bit over-​cooked
–Butternut squash and onion rings were fantastic
–Beans with onions and bacon were ok
Dessert:
–Banoffee pie was yummmmm
–Eaton Mess had mixed reviews
–Hot chocolate came with M&Ms and was nice

The two faces of the Chequers couldn’t be more at odds; The cosy snug is all old-​school town pub, and the large open chavs-​bar is all about swilling Stella, watching Sky and eating chips.
There are a few tables outside on the High Street which are great for watching the world go by on a Summer’s day.
The beer is generally well kept and reasonably priced. There’s always a big crowd in there and the place really kicks off on weekend nights.
Food (as you may have guessed) is pretty standard pub-​grub. If you can get one of the outside tables in Summer, then you’re probably going to stay for a while. The same applies to the snug in Winter. Find yourself in the chav-​lounge though, and you won’t stay for too long.