In a hugely handy St James’s location, a Gallic brasserie where the cooking – if not, necessarily, the service – seems to be flourishing under the new independent ownership. Our lunchtime visit to this St James’s brasserie – recently bought out by the on-site management – offered an interesting opportunity for a comparison with a […]
In the heart of Soho, a clubby Soho House group dining room serving simple English food realised to a consistently high standard; a first-day visit found an establishment already remarkably well into its swing. How does Richard Caring do it? As restaurant groups get bigger, there is – nearly two decades of Harden’s research suggests […]
An Italian successor to Fitzrovia’s Passione (RIP), offering interesting dishes – often with a Sicilian twist – in unadorned surroundings; charming service makes this an establishment it’s very hard not to like, but the realisation of dishes on our visit was a little up-and-down. Drawn by a rave review elsewhere, we hastened along to the […]
A top-quality Galvin brothers ‘bistro de luxe’-style operation, in a wonderful Shoreditch building whose scale and location arguably call for something a little less traditional; for City suits, though, it looks set to be a ‘wow’. Chris and Jeff Galvin are heroes of the restaurant scene. The quality and value of the Gallic bistro fare […]
On a Kensington site that’s had a somewhat chequered history of late, a smart but somewhat subdued bistro offering food English dishes of very high quality, under the auspices of Square chef Philip Howard. Philip Howard is one of those blameless chefs who beavers away doing what chefs are supposed to do – for younger […]
A smart and pleasant – if not hugely atmospheric – Italian, offering a good all-round formula, at prices which fully reflect its Mayfair location; the establishment seems most evidently suitable as a lunchtime destination. We’ve lost count of the number of times we tried – unsuccessfully – to to get into Babbo. Not this new […]
A worthy offshoot of the Thos. Cubitt, this large Pimlico/Belgravia fringe newcomer is a similarly smart and useful bistro-cum-boozer; a first-week inspection found it already doing good business. Belgravia was long a pretty deadbeat place to eat, but it’s improved a lot in recent years, in part thanks to the young team that first established […]
No image yet available At last, a good, reasonably-priced all-rounder, in the heart of Westminster – this new oriental (a relaunch of Atami, which was Japanese) may well become the linchpin of what’s still a very under-powered local dining scene. Like its buzzier neighbour Pimlico, Westminster – not the City thereof, but the smaller area […]
From a major Oriental operator, a competent but, on our visit, almost deserted Japanese restaurant, decorated in nightclub style, five floors above Regent Street. Intrigued by our recent visit to the neighbouring Spanish restaurant, aqua nueva, we felt the need to hot-foot back across town to see how the neighbouring Japanese restaurant had turned out. […]
