Our round-up of what the nation’s restaurant critics were writing about in the week up to 11th January 2026
The Guardian
Grace Dent hailed the “beautiful bedlam” of restaurateur Martin (‘The Dover’) Kuczmarski’s “glitzy, sexy, mock-Italian trattoria” in Sloane Square – a place so superbly designed and operated, at once so cool and so laidback, that it “makes ordinary people feel temporarily like movie stars”.
The “rather old-school notion that restaurants should be pure, glamorous, fragrant escapism” rather overshadows the food here in Grace’s telling. With its margherita pizzas and tricolore chicken salads, the menu “veers at times into the realms of a Zizzi or a Spaghetti House”.
But the cooking, she concedes, is “actually pretty good”. Grace recommends the tonno tonnato, the tortellini in brood, and for the hungry a breaded veal Milanese on the bone which resembles “something Thor, God of Thunder, might have as a snack”.
*****
Daily Mail
Tom Parker Bowles was equally enthusiastic about this “sumptuous, Milanese-style trattoria, all gleaming wood, butter-soft leather and barmen clad in white tuxedos”, which has “warmth, heart and soul” – and at prices that are “eminently civilised”.
And he was more impressed than Grace was by the cooking. If there were no real surprises on the menu, the zucchini fritti were not only “immaculately fried, gloriously crisp and light, but they’re finished with a spritz of vinegar. Genius.” “Equally exalted are the tortellini in brood… that broth is as fine as I’ve tasted anywhere, intense but not over salty…. I’d come back for these two dishes alone.”
To cap it all, “Martino’s already feels as if it’s been here for years, despite being open for just a few weeks”.
*****
Daily Telegraph
William Sitwell completed a January trifecta of rave reviews for Martino’s, whose “dazzling glamour” and traditional hospitality expertise (including an old-school booking system) made it “all you might dream of from an upmarket Italian joint”.
Like Tom, he noted that it seemed to arrive fully formed, “like it’s been there for decades”, and he likewise praised the cooking – including a “sublime” fettuccine Alfredo.
*****
The Times & Sunday Times
Giles Coren was mostly impressed by a new restaurant inspired by the south of France, while pointing out that on a foggy mid-winter day, the menu offered Lucques olives, panisse with anchoïade, beignets de brandade, sea bass crudo, clams with wine and parsley … Summer food! Because, you see, Marylebone is now the home of the international super-rich, the Dubai of W1. And for them, it is always summer.”
That said, he enjoyed some beignets de brandade, “fried crisp like bubble and squeak”; panisses served with a triumphant anchoïade, heavy on the capers; clams with white wine, parsley and samphire that were “terrific: rich and garlicky, salty, big flavour”; and spinach and basil linguine that was a “very special dish indeed. A small tangle of bright green pasta. So green. Green as goblins.”
Less impressive were a dull sea bass crudo with fennel and yuzu; bouillabaisse croquettes that were “gluey balls. Like fishy Copydex”; and an ibérico chop that needed “a bit of a char on it. A bit of crisping on the fat”.
***
The Bower House, Shipston on Stour
Charlotte Ivers headed beyond the northern boundary of the Cotswolds to a “Middle England market town” full of pubs, where chef Leo Kattou – who trained under West Midlands kingpin Andreas Antona – cooks in “the one you’d travel for”.
For a supposedly positive review (four out of five stars), however, Charlotte was surprisingly luke warm about a lunch of “ups and downs”. It started badly with a glass of fizz served in a thick-rimmed flute, which meant her “2021 Gusbourne Brut Reserve from Kent, which is a very good vineyard, tasted cheap. It shouldn’t”.
A starter of unusually subtle beef tartare was “lovely”, while a fillet of bream was merely “nice”, but only an apple crumble soufflé generated any real enthusiasm, earning the accolades “excellent” and “magic”. Another starter, salt-baked kohlrabi with apple and almond cream, “was not anything to write home about”, while spiced cauliflower was “rather uninspiring”. Hmmm.
*****
London Standard
David Ellis felt disconcertingly like he was “dining in an immersive imagining of Hopper’s Nighthawks, refashioned for the East End”, at Chinese-Vietnamese chef Eric Wan’s ‘new wave Asian eatery and wine bar’ set under a railway arch.
A “crisp, thoughtfully succinct menu” of three snacks, four starters, three mains and one pudding, all of them carefully and sometimes brilliantly cooked, is served on what David called “granny plates”. “The hungry should wave a hand and blithely order it all,” he advised.
Stand-out dishes included giant king prawns that “leapt from their shells, masterfully barbecued over a konro grill and finished with [a] blowtorch”, with a beautiful sauce fragrant with lemongrass, “the kind to keep spooning over and over while insisting the other person finishes it off.” Onglet salad, meanwhile, saw a French comfort dish transformed into something beyond Asian.
*****
Financial Times
2210 by NattyCanCook and RapChar, South London
Jay Rayner appreciated a pair restaurants on either side of Brixton’s Brockwell Park, each with a compelling backstory. Both are advancing the conversation around Caribbean food, showing it can be more than basic take-away. And, he said, “they’re serving terrific food while doing so.”
Those backstories: NattyCanCook is the first restaurant from Nathaniel Mortley, of Guyanese and German-Jewish heritage, whose career as a chef was interrupted by a two-year jail sentence for dealing drugs. RapChar is from Raymond Fowler, who grew up in a Jamaican orphanage.
Both chefs “can indeed cook”, Jay reports, with the high-end-trained Natty’s cuisine sounding the more refined while Raymond’s is notably generous. Where their menus intersect, with jerk chicken, Jay reckoned that RapChar edges ahead by using “a bone-heavy cut that can take more of a spanking” (although Natty’s version comes accompanied by a “superb croquette of the leg, sultry with allspice”).
