Caravan
Marina O'Loughlin, Metro (Rating: 3/5 stars)
“[C]lean, fresh, and staffed by enchanting, helpful and attractive people” - more praise for the Exmouth Market newcomer that has “already found a hugely appreciative audience”. The menu, “crammed with intriguing stuff” generally pleases, although the more “ambitious” dishes, such as blue cheese and peanut wantons, can “struggle a little”. Top marks too for coffee, ground and roasted on site in a “wonderfully bonkers-looking apparatus in the basement”.
Fay Maschler, Evening Standard (Rating: 4/5 stars)
Another critic impressed by the Kiwi-run newcomer, where “New Zealand is a state of mind apparent the minute you walk [in]”. After two visits to the restaurant, which “by no means exhausted appealing choices in the list of small plates”, she finds “dish components are put together tactfully and felicitously, with a rationale that has reference to taste buds and memories”. With “welcoming and clued-up staff” to boot, “Caravan is diverting, relaxing, keen on everyone having a good time and rationally priced”.
Hix at Selfridges
Guy Dimond, Time Out (Rating: 3/5 stars)
The critic visits the latest outlet of Mark Hix's restaurant empire, situated above “the designer-label haven of the Selfridges ground floor”. Despite enjoying impressive aerial views and some successful dishes (special mention to chicken kiev and bergamot posset), he finds service “dizzy, slow and confused”, and prices ranging from “cheeky” to “rapacious”.
Guerilla Burgers
Time Out (Rating: 2/5 stars)
Near Selfridges, this is a burger chain pilot, from the Giraffe people. The critic enjoys its “rather silly, faux-hippy aesthetic - old rock music, pop art, empty platitudes and chummy smiles like a Hard Rock gone soft”, but the burgers are ultimately disappointing –“on the dry side, and simply not as flavoursome as competitors such as Byron or Gourmet Burger Kitchen”. In spite of these shortcomings, however: “we liked Guerilla Burgers for the charming service and for having its tongue firmly in its cheek”.
Liz Hoggard, Evening Standard (Rating: 1/5 stars)
“It's not often you leave a restaurant feeling queasy and overstuffed as if you’d been to a children’s party. But Guerilla Burgers is that place”. With an “unambitious” menu served to “ear-splittingly loud” music, the critic concludes the restaurant is “perfect for 13-year-old girls. It’s fun, safe, just a bit edgy. The gourmet equivalent of Cosmopolitan magazine”. For the grown-ups, though, this is a “one-star” operation.
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