London Whitechapel Restaurant Guide

2018 Review: Expanding, 17-strong national chain, with recent openings in Whitechapel and in the new riverside development right by Kew Bridge. Fans like the “beautifully crafted thin bases and wide variety of craft ciders and beers”, but there’s some concern “quality is dropping now the roll-out to the capital has begun”.

“Lovely food and fantastic staff” feature in many reports on this – the latest in a series of impressive incumbents at Grade-II listed Whitechapel Gallery, which has (since early 2020), seen Nick Gilkinson (ex-Anglo and Lambeth’s Garden Museum café) and Joe Fox (ex-head chef at Petersham Nurseries) create ‘a modern British dining room’ whose thoughtfully conceived dishes have also won it solid plaudits in the press. It’s a smallish but sympathetic space, whose name references the gallery’s architect, Charles Harrison Townsend.

2021 Review: From the team behind the nearby Culpeper, this new (June 2019) gastroboozer occupies a cleverly rebuilt seven-storey site near the foot of Brick Lane, whose redevelopment has allowed the addition of 15 bedrooms. It opened too late for survey feedback: The Standard’s David Sexton found the ground floor bar a little “cramped” and “not for lingering”, but a good value, if “lonely pioneer of bourgeois taste” in this grungy ’hood.

2021 Review: This three-year-old in the picturesque surroundings of St Katharine Docks is “still serving great, home-made pasta”. It’s had a spin-off nearby in Aldgate since February 2019: “a welcome addition to the original (where you can’t always get a table), with the same fab food”.

A “really beautiful spot, with a great buzz” – this handsome old boozer on a Spitalfields corner has been cleverly refurbished as a multi-storey venue with a spectacular rooftop garden, chic bedrooms, impressive first-floor dining room and “good gastropub food”.

“Like a rip in the fabric of space-time, transplanting a perfect Paris bistro to Brick Lane” – just the job for a quick French onion soup or plate of snails.

2019 Review: At the foot of a new aparthotel near Aldgate East tube, this year-old venture comprises a coffee shop and terrace downstairs, and a restaurant and bar upstairs, which – under seasoned chef George Tannock – tries harder than you might expect in this location: “a welcome, local, go-to business lunch place, with an excellent and varied menu and staff who are efficient but welcoming”.

2019 Review: “Pittas of pleasure” – “Mediterranean/Israeli street food of the best type (vegetarian, fresh and bursting with taste)” – keep office workers healthy and happy at these City-based “pitstops”. “No wonder there’s always a queue at lunchtime.”

“Food just like you get in Thailand” – “the quality and the range of flavours are superb” – can be found at this “amazing and very cool” five-year-old in a former factory near Spitalfields Market. “Zingy and authentic”, “each dish looks and tastes like it’s comprised of ingredients you’d be hard-pressed to source yourself”. “Vegan options are plentiful”, and “one price for ‘eat as much rice as you want’ feels generous”. There’s also a serious list of drinks that can cope with such highly flavoured cooking – including a “great Riesling menu”.

2019 Review: This bright, attractively decorated, new Middle Eastern café opened in Whitechapel in early 2018. No survey feedback yet, but its modern take on Moorish cuisine looks promising.

2021 Review: “Oodles of noodles… and fun, too”: this “bustling, happy-making eatery” – year-old sibling to Highbury’s Xi’an Impression – occupies a canteen-style space in Spitalfields and “specialises in spicy, hand-pulled noodles”; “yum!”.

2021 Review: “Quite stunning food at a consistently high level”, led by “fresher-than-fresh ceviche” and other “flavoursome dishes”, earns improving ratings for Martin Morales’s small Peruvian group, inspired by the cooking of the Andes. “Fabulous to visit” – “the room is permanently sunny – or is that just the pisco sours?”. The Notting Hill venue includes a bakery.

“An institution and rightly so.” “You don’t come to this 500-seat BYO in the East End for the dining experience: you come for the amazing Punjabi food.” “Still up there with the best” – the lamb chops in particular “are to die for”. “Terrible service but great buzz and great food.” “Such a brilliant place to take out-of-towners. Not fussy: fully authentic.”

East London’s oldest Indian (established 1939 in Whitechapel) briefly found fame in late August 2020, when it was reviewed by Marina O’Loughlin for The Sunday Times. Run by four generations of the same family – and with somewhat antediluvian decor – it’s not the place to uncover the latest in food fads; or as Marina eloquently put it: “it tastes like the past, deliciously”. Reports please!

“Tel Aviv café food of gourmet quality and with strong, delicious flavours” is to be had at this Middle Eastern three-year-old, near Spitalfields. Staff are “so welcoming” and it is “a find” in particular for non meat-eaters: “one of the tastiest and best-priced vegan feasting menus I’ve ever had!”.