Tiki-tastic? Not quite.

Tony Bourdain in Hawaii at a tiki Bar? What can be better than that? My culinary hero, in my favorite place, drowning in delicious killer cocktails. Sounds like a pretty damn good time to me. This was my fantasy for an hour the other night as I watched No Reservations: Hawaii while cooking dinner. In the show, Tony indulges in a achingly expensive (but gorgeous) Hawaiian shirt, more than a few drinks at a tiki bar and even a luau. Little did I know that I'd find my way to a tiki bar later in the week...

Welcome to Trailer Happiness (http://www.trailerhappiness.com/) a London attempt at capturing the kitschy goodness of tikis and trailers. Despite the name, it doesn't feel like a trailer - it feels like your great uncle's basement which has a wet bar and hasn't been redecorated since 1973. And that's not a bad thing. I loved it. Absolutely amazing job. And the drinks? Damn, that bartender knows what he's doing. My favorite of the evening was the Up River Saint Lawrence, a devilish medley of Bourbon, bitters, maple syrup, apple juice and lime. Serve up with a rim dusted in cinnamon. When this is handed to you by a tall, blond, handsome bartender in a kickass Hawaiian shirt, it's hard to go wrong.

But somehow they manage, and therein lies the mystery. My parents have a saying that Neil Diamond is almost good. Trailer Happiness is almost cool. It suffers, however, from the surprisingly weak gastro food , the throbbing hipster music and especially the clientele. First the food. It is - unexceptional, a slightly jazzier version of the pub food served all over London. Skewers of meat and duck pancakes. I will admit that their fries were absolutely delicious, tasted like McDonalds of old. But surely this is the place to serve sliders? Cocktail sausages? Olives? Crudité? If you're going old school, do it properly, please.

Now, the music. This was perhaps the most disheartening failing of the bar. Play ANYTHING but hipster lounge music. Seriously, anything. Johnny Cash, The Beach Boys, Motown, Stax - all of these would have made the place leap alive with ambience. Instead, I felt as if I was in a Di Saronno advertisement.

And with that soulless image in mind, the clientele. Never, with the exception of walking through Portobello Market on a Saturday afternoon, have I wanted to punch so many people in all my life. After 8pm, Trailer suddenly filled with people desperate to be cool. I make no pretension to be cool. I'm not cool. I'm sitting here in a hoody and soccer shorts, writing a blog. It doesn't get less cool than that. But these people were frantic for an iota of cool, for the essence of cool, leading to an sickeningly insincere atmosphere.

So the verdict is that Trailer of Happiness wins points for originality and drinks, but loses all gains by catering the the hipster crowds of Notting Hill. What a pity.