Lord Foster of Thames Bank, no less, is responsible for the Shoreditch building now occupied by the latest outpost of one of London’s best-known pâtisserie chains. Quite a step from the group’s humble Soho origins in 1926, when Madame Valerie, a Belgian, first began to educate the English in the delights of le croissant. It’s […]
What are hotel restaurants for? It’s a question that many hotels struggle with, especially in cities with vibrant restaurant scenes. A haven of gastronomy is one obvious answer, so recruiting a ‘name’ chef is step one. For many years, Theo Randall headed up the kitchen at the River Café, so putting his name up in […]
Funny place Sloane Square. Shoppers and the local residents sashay by, resplendent in the choicest fabrics and beautiful shoes and immaculate hair-dos. And that’s just the men. It all makes for good people-watching, which helps explain the perennial success of the Square’s lacklustre Oriel brasserie. Seeing as it calls itself a brasserie, this newcomer opposite […]
This new restaurant and private member’s bar has been likened to “a gothic Claridges”. But aside from a quirky line in animal skulls (which make up a chandelier, wall lights, and just sit around on the bar), its airy décor fits firmly into the vaguely Manhattanite style that’s so familiar in the area. With its […]
New ventures by established restaurateurs almost invariably exhibit the latters’ ‘DNA’: starting from your knowledge of an operator’s previous ventures, you can usually make a pretty shrewd guess what new offerings are going to be like. The new incarnation of the Chelsea townhouse long known as Dan’s, however, seems to be an exception to this […]
As a general rule, heritage-themed restaurants (especially ones in hotels) are best given a miss. So whoever decided to use the name ‘Langtry’s’ for the new dining room of the Cadogan Hotel (after Lillie Langtry, who once lived here) needs a good talking to. It’s not a name that inspires confidence, especially for a dining […]
The signs were not good. From Tamarai’s web site I learnt that “Like the lotus flower’ the venue transforms into magical moods and multiple modes at different times. Designed as a hybrid hub it ‘ re-invents itself seamlessly”. When somewhere’s home page reads like an entry in Private Eye’s ‘Pseud’s Corner’, the cooking is seldom […]
It has not always proved a recipe for long-term success, but even Oliver Peyton’s most vociferous critics would concede he is one of our most progressive restaurateurs. All the more interesting, then, that, for his latest cultural-centre dining destination, his concept is the old-fashioned, no-nonsense Gallic brasserie. Certain physical constraints arise from locating the brasserie […]
Just over a year ago, we reviewed Nababbo, the Italian restaurant which then occupied this handily-located basement site, below Leadenhall Market. The upshot of our review was that it wasn’t a bad restaurant, but overpriced to the point that no one would rationally ever spend their own money there. Fairly soon afterwards, Nababbo was history […]
Not everyone loves celeb chef Antony Worral Thompson. Gordon Ramsay, for example, once branded him a Teletubby, as distinct from a serious chef (such as himself). But it’s hard not to have some sneaking admiration for someone who combines seemingly limitless energy for self-promotion with evident talent. For example, before his Ready Steady Cook days, […]
