Restaurants in London
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Tsunami
The food at this celebrated restaurant exhibits the style and taste you'd expect from an ex-Nobu chef. The sushi is exquisite, but it's the more unusual dishes, like ebi prawns wrapped in Greek pastry and butternut squash, and especially the mint-tea duck with pear and sweet honey miso, that will really bowl you over.
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Gordon Ramsay
One of Britain’s finest restaurants and London’s longest-running with three Michelin stars, this is hallowed turf for those who worship at the altar of the stove. It’s true that it’s a treat right from the taster to the truffles, but you won’t get much time to savour it all. Bookings are made in specific sittings and you dare not linger; book as late as you can to avoid that rushed feeling. The blowout tasting Menu Prestige (£120) is seven courses of absolute perfection.
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Gordon Ramsay at Claridge’s
This match made in heaven – London’s most celebrated chef in arguably its grandest hotel – will make you weak at the knees. A meal in the gorgeous art deco dining room is a special occasion indeed; the Ramsay flavours will have you reeling, from the Thai-spiced lobster ravioli with lemongrass and coconut to the chorizo-studded John Dory with Jersey Royals and asparagus and morel velouté, all the way to the cheese trolley, whether you choose from the French or British selections. Consider the six-course tasting menu (£80).
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Afghan Kitchen
This minute two-floor eatery serves up some of Islington’s best-value and most interesting cuisine. It features traditional Afghan dishes such as qurma suhzi gosht (lamb cooked with spinach) and qurma e mahi (fish stew) alongside a generous vegetarian selection, including borani kado (pumpkin with yoghurt) and moong dall (lentil dhal). In the evenings, there is freshly baked bread to go with the dishes instead of rice.
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Fishworks
This Bath-based chain was London’s first truly French poissonnerie (fishmonger) with a restaurant attached, its entranceway counters piled high with shaved ice, crustaceans and fish. We return regularly, especially for the sublime Dartmouth crab eaten cold and the incomparable zuppa del pescatore (fisherman’s soup; £19), a symphony of delights from the deep. There is also a Marylebone branch.
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Rules
Established in 1798, this very posh and very British establishment is London’s oldest restaurant. The menu is inevitably meat-oriented – Rules specialises in classic game cookery, serving up tens of thousands of birds between mid-August and January from its own estate – but fish dishes are also available. Puddings are traditional: trifles, treacles and lashings of custard.
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Mildreds
Central London’s most inventive vegie restaurant, Mildred’s heaves at lunchtime so don’t be shy about sharing a table in the sky-lit dining room. Expect the likes of roasted fennel and chickpea terrine and puy lentil casserole, Ethiopian stews, wonderfully exotic (and filling) salads as well as delicious stir-fries. There are also vegan and gluten-free options, and a large range of organic wines.
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Brick Lane Beigel Bake
You won’t find fresher (or cheaper) bagels anywhere in London than at this bakery and delicatessen; just ask any taxi driver (it’s their favourite nosherie). It’s always busy: with market shoppers on Sunday and Shoreditch clubbers by night.
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Boxwood Cafe
An accessible entry point into Gordon Ramsay's eating empire, Boxwood offers set-price lunch and pre-7pm menus (two/three courses £21/25). It's intended as an informal option – although you wouldn't guess it from the attentive staff, faultless food and staid decor.
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Kennington Tandoori
This local curry house is a favourite of MPs from across the river.
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Fifteen
It would be easy to dismiss Jamie Oliver’s nonprofit training restaurant as a gimmick, but on our latest visit the kitchen was in fine fettle. Here young chefs from disadvantaged backgrounds train with experienced professionals, creating an ambitious and interesting Italian menu. The ground-floor trattoria is a relaxed venue, while the underground dining room is more formal. Reservations are usually essential.
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Momo
This wonderfully atmospheric Moroccan restaurant is stuffed with cushions and lamps, and staffed by all-dancing, tambourine-playing waiters. It’s a funny old place that manages to be all things to all diners, who range from romantic couples to raucous office-party ravers. Service is very friendly and the dishes are as exciting as you dare to be, so after the meze eschew the traditional and ordinary tajine (stew cooked in a traditional clay pot) and tuck into the splendid Moroccan speciality pastilla, a scrumptious nutmeg and pigeon pie. There’s outside seating in this quiet backstreet in the warmer months.
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Ottolenghi
This is the pick of Upper Street’s many eating options – a brilliantly bright, white space that’s worth a trip to see the eye-poppingly beautiful cakes and bread in the front deli alone. But get a table at this temple to good food and you’ll really appreciate it. At lunch you choose between the dishes spread out on the counter, while in the evening there’s á la carte dining, too, though so fanatical about ingredient quality are the chefs that the menu is not confirmed until 5pm. Weekend brunch here is fabulous, though you’ll usually have to wait for a table. Reservations are essential in the evenings.
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Garrison Public House
The Garrison’s traditional green-tiled exterior and rather distressed, beach-shack interior are both appealing. It boasts an actual cinema (free films every Sunday 7pm, intermissions for drinks provided) in its basement, but it’s the food – razor clams, black face lamb gigot with roast squash, and pumpkin, chickpea and courgette cake – that lures punters to this evergreen Bermondsey gastropub. If you don’t fancy nearly bashing your neighbour’s elbow every time you lift your fork, though, come for breakfast (8am to 11.30am weekdays, 9am to 11.30am weekends).
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1 Lombard St
Cassoulet goes head-to-head with bangers-and-mash in the brasserie, under the domes of a heritage-listed bank building, and both the French and the Brits come out winners.
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Asadal
If you fancy Korean but want a bit more style thrown into the act, head for this spacious basement restaurant next to the Holborn tube station. The kimchi (pickled Chinese cabbage with chillies) is searing, the barbecues (£7 to £11.50) are done on your table and the bibimbab – rice served in a sizzling pot topped with thinly sliced beef, preserved vegetables and chilli-laced soybean paste – are the best in town.
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Inn the Park
This stunning wooden cafe and restaurant in St James’s Park is run by the Irish wonder that is Oliver Peyton and offers cakes and tea as well as substantial and quality British food. The recent addition of extra seating under the trees for the cafe part and the new roof terrace are perfect, but if you’re up for a special dining experience, come here for dinner, when the park is quiet and slightly illuminated. One of London’s most gorgeous structures and locations.
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Oxo Tower Restaurant & Brasserie
The conversion of the old Oxo Tower on the South Bank into housing with this restaurant on the 8th floor helped spur much of the dining renaissance south of the river. In the stunning glassed-in terrace you have a front-row seat for the best view in London, and you pay for this (not the fusion food) handsomely in the brasserie and stratospherically in the restaurant. Fish dishes – confit sea bass with truffle gnocchi, black bream escabèche – usually comprise half the menu.
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Electric Brasserie
Whether it’s for breakfast (£5 to £10) or brunch over the weekend, a hearty lunch or a full dinner, the Electric draws a trendy and wealthy Notting Hill crowd with its Modern British/European cuisine. If you’re feeling decadent, lobster and chips (£36) is the way forward.
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Busaba Eathai
The Store St premises of this hugely popular mini-chain is slightly less hectic than some of the other West End outlets, but it retains all the signature features that have made it a roaring success: uberstyled Asian interior, large communal wooden tables, and heavenly cheap and tasty Thai food. You’ll find perfectly executed big hitters such as Pad Thai, green and red curry as well as fragrant noodle soups, exquisite calamari and other delights such as jungle curry. This isn’t the place to come for a long and intimate dinner, but it’s a superb option for an excellent and speedy meal.
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Barrafina
Tapas are always better value in Spain but the quality of the food here and the fact that its popularity just seems to rise may justify the price of what are essentially appetisers to go with your drink. Along with gambas al ajillo(prawns in garlic; £7.50), there are more unusual things such as tuna tartare and grilled quails with aioli. Because customers sit along the bar, it’s not a good place for groups.
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Back to Basics
There are two or three other options on the menu (see 'Fish not Your Dish'), but seafood is the focus at this superb corner restaurant run by a bevy of affable young Poles in what's become know as Titchfield Village. A dozen varieties of exceedingly fresh fish, and a dozen original, mouth-watering ways to cook them, are chalked up on a blackboard every day. Two-course set lunch is around £10. There's outside seating in summer.
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Mirch Masala
‘Chilli and Spice’, part of a small chain based in the epicentre of London subcontinental food, Southall, is a less hectic alternative to Tayyabs and the food is almost up to the same level. Order the prawn tikka (£9) as a ‘warmer’ followed by the masala karella (£5), a curry-like dish made from bitter gourd, and a karahi (stewed) meat dish.
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Fish House
This combination seafood restaurant and chippy is just the sort of place you wish you had in your own neighbourhood. The freshest of fresh fish and crustaceans are dispensed from both a busy takeaway section (where a blackboard tells you from where your fish has come) and a cheerful sit-down restaurant. The lobster bisque and Colchester oysters are always good, while the generous fish pie bursting with goodies from the briny deep is exceptional.
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Le Café Anglais
This bustling restaurant has a very eclectic menu (from gigantic roasts to Thai curries) that means to please everybody and usually does.
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