Hardens Guide to the Best Restaurants in London City
Hardens guides have spent 33 years compiling reviews of the best City restaurants. On Hardens.com you'll find details and reviews of 2,480 restaurants in City and our unique survey based approach to rating and reviewing City restaurants gives you the best insight into the top restaurants in every area and of every type of cuisine.
Featured City Restaurants
1. Piazza Italiana
Italian restaurant in
38 Threadneedle Street - EC2R
Near the Bank of England, this Italian three-year-old occupies a particularly fine Edwardian banking hall (built in 1902). Had it not opened around the time of the pandemic, it might be better known – “it’s not too noisy for a City restaurant and with good service and a reasonably priced lunch deal”.
2. Le Garrick
French restaurant in Covent Garden
10-12 Garrick Street - WC2
Looking for that “great, little, traditional French bistro in the heart of theatreland”? For many in our annual diners’ poll, this “family-run” venue where much of the seating is in an atmospheric brick-arched cellar is “a firm favourite”, helped by its “reasonable prices”: “we have been visiting for 20 years, celebrating birthdays and engagements as well as their Bastille day and Beaujolais special events – it feels like a home from home”. Don’t expect culinary fireworks, though – sometimes the food is “underwhelming” (“still, despite it being below par, because of the staff we enjoyed ourselves!)”
3. Opera Tavern
Spanish restaurant in Covent Garden
23 Catherine Street - WC2
“Keeping up its standards” – this “sweet” and stylish converted pub near the Royal Opera House operates over two floors. It’s part of the Salt Yard chain, and serves the Spanish and Italian tapas for which the group is known: “good food”, but some feel it’s “expensive” for what it is.
4. Cinnamon Bazaar
Indian restaurant in
28 Maiden Lane - WC2E
“A tasty offshoot of the great Cinnamon Club” – Vivek Singh’s “prettily decorated” cafés (“resembling a tropical garden centre cafe!”) offer a “good-value”, “Indian-with-a-twist” menu: “hot curry staples” plus options “reminiscent of street food”. Practically all comments refer to the original – “a go-to in Covent Garden” for its very many fans – but he also opened in Richmond this year, taking over the former Carluccio’s venue diagonally opposite the station. One caution in reports – it looks time to pep up the decor in WC2 – it risks looking a bit “shabby”.
5. The Melusine
Fish & seafood restaurant in St. Katharine Dock
Unit K, Ivory House, St. Katharine Dock - E1W
This “relaxed” and “rather good” seafood specialist is “one of the best offerings in St Katharine Dock”, offering a “delightful menu” – “we had cod cheeks and ravioli, oysters, brill and octopus followed by different and interesting ice creams” – alongside a “decent selection of Greek white wine”. Co-founder Theodore Kyriakou was behind Livebait and The Real Greek in the ’90s.
6. Paladar
South American restaurant in Southwark
4-5 London Road - SE1
“It’s like a big party!”, say fans of this “fun” Latino haunt – a hidden gem off the beaten track near Elephant & Castle (on St George’s Circus). “I never expected such a lively place to have such high-quality cuisine, superb cocktails and an extraordinary South American wine list”: chef Jose Rubio-Guevara’s menus ‘mix-and-match’ culinary ideas from Colombia, Ecuador, Mexico and Peru.
7. Frog by Adam Handling
British, Modern restaurant in Covent Garden
35 Southampton Street - WC2E
“The stories behind the dishes are so lovely” at Adam Handling’s Covent Garden HQ, where diners face the open kitchen to enjoy an eight-course menu presented by the chef and his team for £195 per person. “The wow-factor of the beautiful presentation really adds to the overall pleasure of the meal” and “you will seldom see such intricately and delicately plated dishes”. For most diners, “there’s substance to match all the theatrics” too, with the resulting tastes on the plate being “absolutely superb”. But there are also those who – while acknowledging “flashes of brilliance” – still feel that “‘we’re-trying-so-hard’ screams from every dish” to the extent of seeming “pointless” or “pretentious”. “And then there’s the bill…” which even fans concede is “daftly expensive”. The main verdict though? “can’t wait to return!”. Top Tip – corkage free lunchtimes: BYO at no extra cost!
8. Smokoloko
BBQ restaurant in Tower Hamlets
Old Spitalfields Market, Bethnal Green Road - E1
“Still top street food IMO” – this oven shaped like an old steam locomotive is an eye-catching fixture in Spitalfield Market and delivers “amazing meats that melt in the mouth”.
9. Cabotte
French restaurant in Bank
48 Gresham St - EC2V
“In the culinary void that seems to exist in the City”, Xavier Rousset & Gearoid Devaney’s venue is one of the few places that “rarely fails to deliver” when it comes to a high-quality meal and – “especially for this location – provides a great blend of decent food, wine, and particularly service” (“amicable and timely without being overpowering”). “Excellent food in the French style” is overseen by executive head chef Edward Boardland and ownership by two master sommeliers results in a “superb, heavily Burgundy-facing wine list” that’s also “reasonably priced”. Top Tip – “very knowledgeable sommelier as you’d expect, but the team are equally accepting if you BYO” and “corkage is reasonable too!”
10. Cinnamon Kitchen
Indian restaurant in City
9 Devonshire Sq - EC2
“If you’re in the mood for some delicious Indian cuisine”, this duo from Vivek Singh make a more affordable alternative to his flagship Cinnamon Club, pleasing both vegetarians (“great- tasting paneer butter masala”) and omnivores (“the chicken 65 is a particular favourite”). The cavernous City branch can get “incredibly noisy”, but the newer Battersea Power Station branch earns a lot of positive feedback, and is seen as a “viable competitor to Dishoom”, its near neighbour.
11. Fazenda, Rodizio Bar & Grill
South American restaurant in City
100 Bishopsgate - EC2M
This outpost of the all-you-can-eat, Brazilian-inspired national steakhouse group sits at the foot of the 100 Bishopsgate tower and opened in early autumn 2023. It has yet to spark a huge volume of survey feedback, but the Evening Standard’s Jimi Famurewa gave it a mostly positive report card, particularly its cuts of meat wielded by “skewer-wielding passadors… characterised by luscious, high-grade flavour, careful seasoning, and adroitly applied char”. Veggies and desserts were equally well received, although the ‘salad bar’ and à la carte section wasn’t so successful. Overall he pronounced it “keenly run” and “occasionally fantastic”.
12. Bunga Bunga
restaurant in Covent Garden
167 Drury Lane - WC2B
Five years after the opening of the legendary Battersea bar and pizzeria, Bunga Bunga has come to Covent Garden with an even bigger and bolder version of the original. On the ground floor, discover a family pizzeria and bar, BungaTINI. Below accessed through the meat locker li...
13. Obicà Mozzarella Bar, Pizza e Cucina
Italian restaurant in City
Unit 4 5 - 7 Limeburners Lane, - EC4M
“Surprisingly decent Italian fare… proper (and huge) pizza and pasta and, if you have room, pleasing puddings” carves an ongoing niche for these smartly decorated outposts of an international Italian chain (started in 2004), where – as the name hints – many dishes feature Mozzarella di Bufala.
14. Radio Alice
Pizza restaurant in
16 Hoxton Square - N1
Our mission: make delicious pizza, served with care, in beautiful spaces.In the beginning we were just Matteo and Salvatore, two brothers from Calabria. We moved to Bologna to study economics, and – like all penniless students – ate a lot of...
15. Club Gascon
French restaurant in Clerkenwell
57 West Smithfield - EC1
“An unfailing choice, near Barts” – Pascal Aussignac’s & Vincent Labeyrie’s homage to gutsy Gascon cuisine and wine opened in 1998 in an idiosyncratic and grand marble-walled former Lyons Tea House near Smithfield Market. It’s now one of London‘s longest established temples of French gastronomy, but chef Pascal has lightened and modernised his cuisine over the years (and foie gras – once omnipresent – only makes the odd appearance on menus nowadays). There is a six-course tasting menu for £120, but also a much cheaper three-course version; and you can also eat here à la carte.
16. Chez Antoinette
French restaurant in Covent Garden
Unit 30 The Market Building - WC2
“Excellent for an informal French meal at very affordable prices” – this Gallic pair are the creation of Lyon-born Aurelia Noel-Delclos, who named them after her food-loving grandmother. With its “child-friendly menu” and “well-designed bistro-brasserie ambience”, the newer Victoria branch has overtaken the site in the touristic heart of old Covent Garden market in popularity. Don’t expect the earth – they serve “reasonable, bistro-type fare”.
17. Salt Yard Borough
Spanish restaurant in Southwark
New Hibernia House, Winchester Walk - SE1
“Despite now being part of a rolled-out chain, they have managed to maintain good quality” at these tapas-haunts, whose original branch off Goodge Street was an early pioneer of the capital’s trend to small plates. A minor gripe is of “packed” seating, but most feedback focuses on their “delicious food and well-thought-out wine list”.
18. Cloth
restaurant in City of London
44 Cloth Fair - EC1A
“Reminds me of Noble Rot… and I can give no higher praise” – one very enthusiastic report on this wine-led spring 2024 newcomer, which has a dead cute location down an alleyway by Smithfield Market, in a row of houses that escaped the Great Fire in 1666. (Premises some might still remember as Betjeman’s Wine Bar, long RIP, named for the late poet laureate who used to live on the first floor). Backed by specialist wine importers, Joe Haynes and Ben Butterworth, its stoves are manned by Tom Hurst, former head chef at Lasdun and a graduate of some of London’s best modern kitchens, and initial feedback is very promising. In a May 2024 review, The Financial Times’s Tim Hayward found the creative small plates “mixed but fascinating… I loved the new place… I want creativity and experimentation, and if that’s really happening, I expect as many near misses as palpable hits”.
19. Luce e Limoni
Italian restaurant in LONDON
91-93 Gray's Inn Rd - WC1
“Family-run Italian” that helps add life to a dull stretch of the Gray’s Inn Road. It specialises in Sicilian cuisine presented by Fabrizio Zafarana, an engagingly “well-informed and enthusiastic” host.
20. San Carlo Cicchetti
Italian restaurant in Covent Garden
30 Wellington St - WC2
“For a quick bite” in touristy parts of town, all with a bit of affordable glam thrown in, these “closely packed” Italians with their wide range of Venetian-style Cicchetti have carved a sizeable following: fans say “the small-plates formula works well” and “the whole place buzzes”. Ratings came under more pressure this year, though, with service – generally “swift and charming” – sometimes found “rushed” or “rather random”.
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