Presided over by the executive chef of the usually good (but always pricey) Hakkasan group, a business-friendly City-fringe restaurant offering prettified, notionally Cantonese dishes – some of very high quality – in a Western ‘dégustation’ format. We can’t say we went to HKK with the highest hopes. It’s owned by the Hakkasan people, whose most […]
Near Piccadilly Circus, a warm, welcoming and slightly chaotic Japanese noodle parlour, serving warming dishes in generous portions – ideal for West End refuelling! Looking for a quick, cheap and tasty West End meal? We have a feeling that the main streets of our metropolis have been lagging when it comes to mid-market dining a […]
Just off Carnaby Street, an amiable bistro (on the former site of Benja, RIP), offering a top-value steak/frites formula in a tightly-packed communal setting surprisingly evocative of Old Soho. The name nearly put us off checking out this new bistro, just off Carnaby Street. Yet another hommage à Downtown NYC? And, to make it worse, […]
On the eastern fringe of Covent Garden, a smart basement Japanese restaurant with a rather corporate atmosphere and quite high prices (especially on the wine front); for business entertainment, though, it has its attractions, and the lunch menu is a value-proposition well worth seeking out. Notably friendly staff are one of the attractions of this […]
From Alan Yau/the Busaba Eathai team, a striking prototype, by Angel tube, for a contemporary-style Thai chain; on our early-days visit, we found we could add to the chorus of approval that has greeted its arrival. Someone explained to us recently that a lot of what we at Harden’s do is not reviewing at all. […]
Farringdon’s famous ‘working class caterer’ rises yet again, offering a direct English menu in a tightly packed ‘pew-seating’ dining room – an early days visit found a simple but effective formula, offered at very reasonable prices. Let’s start by getting the benches out of the way. This Victorian ‘working class caterer’ has always been most […]
Get thee to the Tower! – if you’re looking for a sunny day lunch destination, you could do very much worse than this surprisingly low-kew ‘tourist’ lunch spot, by the Thames. The very idea of tourist-catering chills the blood, so we approached this appallingly-named newcomer – which overlooks the walkway ‘twixt Thames and Tower – […]
The former Oriel (RIP) site on Sloane Square, relaunched by ‘the Wolseley boys’ as an immediately-successful Gallic brasserie of a high standard; service, though, was decidedly slow, on our visit a few weeks after opening. Earl Cadogan does not believe in ‘absentee’ landlord-ism. Oriel, the former occupant of this prominent Sloane Square site, had the […]
Near Notting Hill Gate, on the site long known as The Ark (RIP), an unpretentious bistro offering a small-plates formula, and already exerting a wide-ranging appeal. Since 1962, this funny little building near Notting Hill Gate – for most of that period called ‘The Ark’ – has been well-known as a restaurant destination and, especially […]
