According to its mission statement, this Covent Garden basement has recently been re-launched by some ‘friends’ – all with backgrounds in bars and booze – as a place where customers can enjoy ‘interesting and exciting’ wines in a ‘relaxed and convivial atmosphere’. Hard to argue with that (or, indeed, with their reasonably-priced selection of less […]
London’s ethnic mix is endlessly confusing. Everyone knows that Southwark has large Black African and Black Caribbean populations. But did you know it’s one of the city’s top Chinese hot-spots? (London’s only ward in to have more than 5% Chinese population, is turns out, is nearby Millwall in Tower Hamlets.) The lunchtime population at this […]
Summer. A time for lazy weekend lunches out of town, enjoyed from a vantage point with lush views, balmy breezes and somewhere for a post-prandial stroll. Do you have a favourite? If so, we’d like to hear your suggestions, at mail@hardens. (Hey, we need some excuse to get out of town.) If you don’t have […]
Erstwhile Goldman Sachs banker, Soren Jessen is nowadays a restaurateur with a track record. He is the man behind one of the City’s top gaffs – One Lombard Street – which successfully combines a fine dining room with a popular bar/brasserie. His name is also a bit of a magnet for hipsters. (This reputation has […]
Like many ‘tapas bars’, this Isle of Dogs newcomer can seem worryingly ambiguous to the non-Hispanic mind. Is it a bar or a restaurant? Well, however you describe it, this place emerges as one of the few places in the vicinity of Canary Wharf to which one might positively recommend a trip. It does not […]
We’ve recently noted something of a ‘back to basics’ tendency in the London restaurant market, and the recent re-formatting of this Soho restaurant initially looks like a classic example. Out went the mid-’90s minimalism, and in – or so the word had it – came an outfit in classic brasserie-style. Well, up to a point. […]
Vietnamese cuisine has never been part of London’s mainstream: its only upmarket exponents (Bam-Bou and Nam Long) are both as famous for their cocktail bars as for their cooking. A recent wind of change, though, has seen a few good canteens blow in from the East, and settle around the City. The Clerkenwell newcomer we […]
Are the media – heaven forbid – sometimes prone to exaggeration? Are merely interesting restaurant sometimes hailed as great? Is there sometimes an element of group-think among leading critics? These, and many more, thoughts were inspired by our visit to this new Soho Chinese – a restaurant which has provoked an almost unprecedented Halleluiah Chorus […]
Sometimes we just don’t get it. This Dulwich venture has clearly needed a lot of investment, and its backer (also involved in L’Etranger in South Kensington) is experienced. Why then is the new incarnation of this leafily-located Georgian mansion (previously called Belair House) so wide of the mark. For starters, why would anyone take such […]
As chef at Putney Bridge restaurant, Anthony Demetre proved that he could do the Michelin thing. He also worked out that it was not necessarily any sort of route to riches. (Nowadays those same premises trade as a branch of Thai Square). In conjunction with Putney Bridge’s former maitre d’, Demetre is now back in […]
