Czechoslovak National House, 74 West End Lane

I have been meaning to go here for years. Occasionally when I mention that I live in West Hampstead, someone will say, "Have you been to the Czech place?"

The slight deterrent for me has been the fact that this is a social club. I always think of clubs as places that I visited once when I was a kid for school friends' birthday parties, never to return again, as my parents neither played golf, worked in the local mine nor were expats, and hence I was ineligible to go back.

So I was uncertain how welcome non Czechs would be at the Czech and Slovak national club. I needn't have been. Yes, on a Wednesday night the clientele was largely from mid Europe, but we were made really welcome by an excellent waiter who showed us into the time warp front room/ restaurant.

At the end of the day, this is a house. Like many of the large houses in West Hampstead it has been converted, but you can still see the original features of the house despite the conversion work which presumably was done sometime after 1946 when the club opened (it moved from Holborn as they couldn't serve beer there!).

There is a restaurant in the front room, more relaxed tables and chairs in the back room, a bar in the hallway and the loos are in the back bedroom. Don't let any of this put you off. As I say, our welcome was great. We enjoyed 2 and a half courses, some great Czech beer on tap, coffees and all at less than 20 quid a head.

Two things to note though - they only take cash and the food is exceptionally filling. You feel like you can have your calorie intake for a week in one sitting. That said, the rest of the customers in on Wednesday were very svelte young Czechs. Maybe they also have a gym I don't know about!