My 10 Favourite London Restaurants

I've been blogging about my dining experiences in London for just under 5 and a half years now and I've seen both the types of food on offer in the city and the quality of the average meal go from from strength to strength.  I've been introduced to so many new cuisines, it's been quite mind boggling at times. Trends of note during this time include:-

The burger invasion
Tapas
Aussie breakfasts and coffee
Ramen
Rotisserie chicken

Along the lines of Krista's farewell post, here are some of the things I'll miss about the place.  (I'll be back in June for the wedding of the year, and regularly after that no doubt).  It's so telling about the standard of food in this amazing city that my list of places soon to open that I'd like to visit when I'm back is already out of control. 

Prêt (I know, it's pathetic) in particular the mozzarella and tomato croissants and the egg and tomato breakfast baguettes - saved me on many hungover days
Waitrose (and Ocado, nothing like this in Montreal, apparently)
Hampstead Heath
Borough Market
La Fromagerie
Liberty
Green Tomato cars
Curzon Cinemas
Kerb
Boots
London buses (love and hate one, this)
Pierre Hermes
Cider (apparently not widely available in Canada)
& Other Stories
Soho
Pubs
Whistles
Clarence Court eggs
Marmite (god help them if I can't find this)
OFM
Whole Foods
NW5
Truffles Deli

And obviously all of my wonderful friends and family.

I've met some amazing people and made great new friends through my love of food, long may that continue.  London, it's been better than I ever dreamed.  Canada, be awesome, please.

As a parting gift, here's an update of my top 10 places to eat in London, in no particular order.

1) Berners Tavern

Here's a post recounting my first visit.  Bel and I went for Bel's recent birthday celebration and will return for mine when I'm back in June.  The dining room, the food, the punch room, the doorman welcoming you back, everything about the place is A-M-A-Z-I-N-G.  It's my absolute London favourite. 

2) Koya

Here's my recent post on Koya Bar the newer opening.  Love them both.  I find myself drawn to whatever the special Udon is on most visits, this one was haddock and leek.  So so good.

3) The Quality Chop House

Here's my post after my first visit.  Revisit was every bit as good.  I drank a wine made from grapes that were picked in 1936 (the Château Sisqueille 'Rivesaltes' no less).  This dish was one of my favourites last time (though it's impossible to choose just one) broccoli, bagna cauda and summer truffle.  The restaurant offers one of the best value dinners available in London.  Love everything, every time.

4) Kitchen Table

Here's my post following dinner on their opening night.  I remember liking the savoury dishes far more on early visits, this roasted pork for example, was exquisite.  THE best crackling I've ever had.  Last time though, dessert was the highlight.  Still love the place.

5) MEATmission/ MEATmarket/ MEATliquor

Here's my account of eating all the food at MEATmission.  To be honest, since monkey fingers were born, I've probably thought about them daily.  They are the sole reason that MEATmission is my fave of the 3, but they're all great and I visited them all regularly over the last few years. 

6) Bone Daddies

Here's my Bone Daddies post, shortly after they opened.  This spot needs no explanation, best ramen in London, full stop.  I tended to go tantanmen with extra egg and corn.

7) Mishkin's

Here are my initial thoughts on Mishkin's.  Revisited recently and, thanks to Bel's love for whitebait, had the above which was just brilliant.  It's my favourite of Russell Norman's restaurants, but they're all excellent, Polpetto, Spuntino, Ape & Bird, they all deliver and he's contributed so much to the London dining scene, it's quite remarkable. 

8) Burger & Lobster

Here is how I felt about the place after my first visit to the Soho branch.  It's a genius formula, offer only 3 food options + open multiple restaurants = £££.  Great cocktails, don't queue though, be smart, go at lunchtime and make sure you ask for that garlic butter. 

9) Barrafina

Here is an old old post about Barrafina, almost 5 years ago.  This must be my most frequented London restaurant, I adore the place, Fino too.  Can't wait to visit Barrafina Covent Garden when I'm back, due to open shortly.  It still is, and always has been, about the ham croquettas, they are the best thing in the world, ever.   The daily specials too are worth trying without exception, this one, pictured, was the pencas, a sort of Spanish scotch egg containing cecina (air dried beef), chard and tetilla cheese.

10) Brasserie Zédel

Here is a recap of a wonderful blogger dinner I attended at Zedel.  I've said it before, I'll say it again, this Ile Flottante is one of the finest and best value for money desserts I've ever had.  I do not know how they can keep prices so consistently low.  Corbin & King are opening more venues in the coming year, which can only mean great things for the London dining scene. 

Special mention to these too:-
Cay Tre Soho
Bob Bob Ricard
Green Man and French Horn
The Red Lion & Sun
Le Coq
The Sportsman (not technically allowed as it's not London, but I love it, so it's on here)

So that's that.  Look at what I'll be missing out on!  Here is a blue dog, attempting to mount me, to cheer me up.

Chiltern Firehouse

This will be my last London restaurant review in a while (I guess not strictly true as I'll have the usual end of month round up next weekend) but this is the last post on a single London restaurant until I'm back, and it's a bloody good one to end on. 

Chiltern Firehouse is Nuno Mendes' latest venture (who I keep calling Nuno Gomez, who is - was - a Portuguese footballer).  Anyway, it's obviously not him, we all know Nuno Mendes, he of Viajante fame.  With that and the Corner Room closed, soon to reopen with, who else, but Jason Atherton at the helm, Nuno has moved on, he's now in cahoots with hotelier Andre Balazs.

I'll not lie, I was steaming drunk when I arrived at Chiltern Firehouse, I blame my friends and Mezcal for this mishap in equal parts and can only apologize to Art who patiently listened to me talk a lot of nonsense for 3 hours.  We started things off with the cauliflower florets in truffle paste (£4) and fried chicken (£5), the latter was incredible, bacon bits sitting on top of a dish of bacon aioli, does a dip get better than that?  I think not.

Something that good is hard to outshine, but the crab doughnuts (£5) managed that.  Just look at them.  I might have said I don't like doughnuts but these are one of the best mouthfuls of food I've ever eaten.  The snack menu is spectacular.  As is the open kitchen, such a hive of activity.  Things running impressively smoothly given how little time they've been up and running for.  We sat at the bar, which is great because it's lower than your usual bar seating, made me happy given my woosiness.

Art's starter of steak tartare (£11) fights my main for my favourite actual dish of the night.  Served with chipotle ketchup and the usual accompaniments but with a bit more panaché than your average version.  Loved it.  I had the octopus with aubergine and mushrooms (£14), very good, but incidental compared to the tartare.

My main however, was very impressive, slow roasted shortrib with hazelnut and bone marrow (£28).  The marrow was hiding beneath the meat, little onions and watercress rounded things off and I could not have been happier.  Art was less pleased with the monkfish with barley and fennel (£26).

Onto desserts, in an unfortunate turn of events, I neglected to order the frozen apple pannacotta, it's a sort of baked alaska and I blame my dilapidated state for this oversight.  The poached rhubarb sundae (£8) was a good contender though.   Dessert wine placated me.

I'm so glad I got to try this place before I left, booking before the important gushing reviews poured in, there's now a 2 month wait for a table I'm told.  You should still go obviously, but, if you're reading this, you most likely already are.

Chiltern Firehouse
1 Chiltern St
Marylebone
W1U
9/10

Gauthier Soho

Gauthier restaurant had been on my list for a long time prior to my visit last week.  Not sure what took me so long to get there.  Sold as 'modern French cooking with a twist of kitsch' I was intrigued.  What I find unappealing about the place is seeing the calories listed against each dish on the menu.  Is this really what diners want?  I don't.  I ignored it.

Anyway, we decided quickly to have 5 courses from the a la carte menu at £60.  Welcome cocktails, amaretto sour and negroni (£12.50 each) were excellent and the bread was amazing.  We were offered more bread so many times that we actually turned it down eventually.  These 2 are hazelnut and malted bread. 

 

Amuse bouches were served first, tuna tartare and cheese straws with aioli were the highlights.  First up on the menu proper are the premiere plat dishes.  I had the duck egg and soldiers, lurking beneath the top egg layer was a smoked eel sabayon and parsley jus.  Definitely kitsch presentation!  Really delicious.

My choice of deuxieme plat was the lobster, served in a shell shaped dish, in small pieces with mussels and a crustacean fricassee.

Troisieme plat was the Cornish cod with bass crisps, capers, bone marrow and sea urchin, this was seriously impressive, the bass crisps were incredible and the delicate fish was buttery soft, just lovely.

Of the whoppingly calorific choices for quatrieme plat I opted for the Welsh lamb.  Roasted loin and braised shoulder were served with herb and parmesan crusted celeriac.  Plenty of jus and a few sprigs of thyme added a wonderful aroma to the dish.  Another strong dish, my favourite on the night.

Next a little pre dessert of isle flottante.  This has to be my all time favourite pudding, so I'm always extremenly happy when it makes an appearance, particularly when it's an added extra!

We shared desserts, this was the Yorkshire rhubarb with lime mascarpone and lemon pepper.  This was interesting texturally and the fennel seed flecked crisps on top were great.  Ate some more flowers...

The other dessert we selected was the Golden Louis XV which I mistook for something else altogether, but it was great, hazelnut mousse, crunch praline and chocolate ganache topped with gold leaf, it's very decadent and rich, certainly needed something fruity to cut through it.  Very good though.

We drank a white rioja (I'd just flown back from Spain earlier in the day) and a couple of glasses of recommended dessert wines paired with the dishes we chose, I'm really into dessert wines at the moment.  Petit fours of madeleines, marshmallows and these other little sioux pastry creamy things were all fantastic.

Service was sweet, the room was intimate, ideal for a date and the place has plenty of nooks and crannies to explore, it's a townhouse so the restaurant spans 3 floors.  I'm glad to have been, not sure I'll rush back, but the savoury courses in particular really do shine.  Should probably have had the truffle risotto in hindsight, but I'm trying not to eat rice as a starter, things got silly a couple of months ago.

Gauthier Soho
21 Romilly St
Soho
W1
7/10

Restaurant Story

Here's my meal at Restaurant Story, in pictures.  This place has been on my list for some time, since it opened to rave reviews around a year ago.  I just had to try before I leave.  We opted for the 10 course tasting menu for £80. SO_MUCH_FOOD. 

Cod skin with cod emulsion, really crispy and fishy.  Establishing the theme - pretty on a plate.
(Or in some cases, on a napkin on a plate).

Radish with kelp butter, FG.  BG - oreo, smoked eel and vinegar.  

Nicest of the amuses.

Can't for the life of me remember what this one was.  Bad blogger.

Frogs legs!  I got to eat both of these because Art couldn't stomach them.  

Tasted like chicken, obvs.

 Signature beef dripping 'candle' to accompany the bread.  

 Razor clam with puffed rice and some kind of 'snow'.  Excellent. 

Boudin noir bites.  So dark.  Everything is rather beautiful.

Little rabbit sandwiches with carrots and tarragon.

To go with the dripping - bread and cubes of tongue with consomme.

I somehow neglected to photograph what came next.  Onion, apple and old tom. It was, unsurprisingly, very pretty indeed.  The old tom (tomato juice) was my favourite thing about it.

This was great too, scallop, cucumber (the balls), dill ash.

 Foie gras, pear and thyme.  Brulee topped.  A tad sickly, over sweet.

Wild stems, squid and pine honey.  Squid was amazing.  

You can just see it, white bits.

Loved this - heritage potato, turnip and coal oil.  Smoothest mash ever.

My out and out favourite dish was the beef with grains, 

watercress and sloes.  Just lovely.

We had cheese, it was great. £10 supplement from (poor) memory.

Pre dessert - something citrussy.  Crunchy and zesty.  Refreshing.

Pretty levels got ridiculous with the almond and dill dessert. 

Lovage, borage, milk and apple.  This was really interesting,  Crunch, stickiness,

creamy frozen milk, milk wafers and leaf garnishes, bizarrely brilliant.

Porridges on a goldilocks theme.  Sweet, salty and just right.

I liked the salty best.  Really fun.

slightly disappointing end, pear, artichoke and lemon.  

Will savoury desserts go away already.

Then these came and I was happy again.  Rhubarb shakes. 

I was really very full at this point.  You can supplement the 10 courser with extra dishes, beef with truffle and veal sweetbreads for £15 each.  We really didn't need them.  There's also a 6 course option for £60.  At the time, we felt the meal was a touch style over substance, but looking back and reviewing the pictures, I feel like there was a lot of skill demonstrated in these dishes.  Each amuse bouche was fun and there are a lot of them.

I'm glad to have made it at last, but it's not the kind of restaurant I would choose to revisit.  Didn't see anyone else bringing and leaving a book, which was the gimmick when they first opened.  Like the colour organised book shelf lining the far restaurant wall.  And the open kitchen is cute.  We drank martinis, wine and more wine and this was not a cheap meal.  We paid £150 each with booze and tip.  I do have a lot of time for chef Tom Sellers though, the menu is very seasonal and brimming with British produce.  We ate a lot of flowers!

Restaurant Story

201 Tooley St

Bermondsey

SE1

9/10