Banstead, Filipino Restaurant Guide

“Loving the BBQ meats!” On the main drag a few minutes’ walk from Tooting Broadway station, Filipino chef Rex De Guzman (ex-Maze) brings his former market stall to its first permanent address. You’ll find traditional Filipino grills and desserts – and larger groups can share a ‘Boodle Fight’ feast, served on banana leaves without crockery or cutlery. Too limited feedback for a rating, but all good so far.

2023 Review: This July 2022 newcomer at Deptford Arches promises an interesting culinary mashup reflecting the founders’ roots in the Philippines and Colombia. It opened too late for survey feedback, but The Evening Standard’s Jimi Famurewa found it: “occasionally inspired and enormously likeable but also prone, here and there, to a kind of erratic overreach”.

“Food from the Philippines” – “something different and very well done” – makes this venue on the top floor of Kingly Court off Carnaby Street “well worth searching out”: “London isn’t exactly awash with such places, so this is a great addition to the capital”.

2024 Review: “Worth a visit for the mural alone!” – this brightly decorated two-year-old, just off Regent Street, has “raised the bar for consistently good Filipino food in the West End”. Admittedly that’s not from a high base, but all reports on its BBQ-focused menu are enthusiastic: “you get little fuss, no hype, just great nosh and cocktails too”.