From a modest café that opened over a hundred years ago, to a Michelin-starred celebrity hang-out, the history of the Ivy has been both varied and colourful. The brand remains an enduring one in the culinary world despite having opened Ivy spin-offs across the country, in towns such as Guildford. Its most recent venture has been to create an Asian sub-brand. Trading partly on its name, the ethos at Ivy Asia is full-on decadence with decent enough food to match.
A visit to Horma Ondo is an experience. Take in the views, enjoy the food and wine. This is the sort of place where one could comfortably spend a whole day. It’s located in the hills outside Bilbao and easy to miss if one does not know the way. Fortunately my host was a local to the area and successfully navigated the winding road up to the venue. Once there, we relaxed and enjoyed the restaurant to the full.
Reviewers that see any restaurant describe itself as “eclectic” have good reason – often through bitter prior experience – to be sceptical. When your venue has an absurdly pretentious name and is located on an expensive street in Mayfair, then the trepidation should mount further. MiMi, named with yet more absurdity in homage to a fictional empress who travels across China, is however worth a visit. There is substance behind the show.
Kapara is big and bold, full of joy and exuberance. It serves as a wonderful reminder of the many good things about Israeli culture and constitutes a welcome addition to the London restaurant scene.
Legend, simply, would be the word to describe Dominque Crenn, the eponym behind this venue and its neighbouring Atelier Crenn. For those unfamiliar, she was the first female chef in the US to gain three Michelin Stars and currently commands a total of four. For those without the reservation skills or budget for her main restaurant, Bar Crenn – the one Star holder – is far from shabby.
The Ledbury has become a byword for fine dining in London, perhaps no surprise given that its doors have been open for 15 years and that it has held two Michelin stars for more than half this time. However, the world has moved on. While the Ledbury was once, arguably, in a class of its own, others can now match and even beat the venue at its game. …
Want an antidote to power dining in Mayfair, but still an opportunity to enjoy incredibly high-quality food? Try Lucknow 49, the third Indian restaurant to have appeared on Maddox Street in as many years, but by far the most homely. The style of cooking is Awadhi, namely from the region of Lucknow in the north east of India, close to the Nepalese border. 49, more prosaically, refers to the street number
London does not lack for competition when it comes to high-end Indian restaurants, yet there is always room for more. When Indian Accent opened just under a year ago, expectations were certainly high for the venture, given the plaudits accorded to the original in New Delhi and its first offshoot in New York. Choosing to locate yourself on the same street as London’s Gymkhana is also tantamount to laying down a challenge; we can do at least as well, if not better than you. A recent visit saw both my dining comrade and I highly impressed by Indian Accent…
I had formed an instinctive dislike for Serge prior to entering. Located inside the currently uber-cool Mandrake Hotel, the building’s black-clad exterior and imposing bouncer at its front speak of exclusion and exclusivity. Fortunately, once inside the hallowed turf, the experience improved markedly. The waiting staff could not have been friendlier, there was a relaxed vibe in the dining room and the food was first-class.
No guesses either for the street number or for what formerly occupied this site. Yet its reinvention as a restaurant is undoubtedly a good thing. The legacy is all there – one only needs to look at the exposed brickwork and concrete floor – but the main reason for coming is, undoubtedly, the cooking.
A Tenth Wedding Anniversary is a significant event and so choosing a restaurant in which to celebrate is no trivial matter (especially for an amateur food critic). Nonetheless, after little consideration, my comrade and I elected Marianne. This was the third time we have visited it – and we have never been disappointed yet. Arguably, it is the best place to go for an intimate fine dining experience in London...
Southam Street sees the transformation of a formerly grotty pub at the non-fashionable end of Notting Hill into a destination venue offering cocktails, food and a members’ club. Based on a recent visit, the owners are definitely doing something right. My comrade and I liked the vibe, but were perhaps less impressed with the food. In the end, this may not matter – the angle Southam Street seems to be going for is perhaps more style than substance...
It’s a pity that the first thing any diner will think when they encounter this restaurant almost certainly relates to its name. Sure, it’s pretty silly (but surely no worse than Sexy Fish?), but that’s half the point – it gets people talking; they’re curious about the place, maybe intrigued enough to go and discover what the buzz is all about. My comrade and I were impressed during our visit, and sufficiently so that I would return.
Located a stone’s throw away from Chinatown and next door to the ever-popular Palomar, the ambitions of Xu (pronounced ‘shu’) are evident. Given that the team behind this venture also pioneered Gymkhana, Bao and Hoppers, expectations were high, but a recent lunchtime visit undoubtedly impressed. While perhaps somewhat lacking in atmosphere, the level of the food here was superlative.
The prefix, ‘neo’ means new. Any restaurant, therefore, which chooses to put this word in its name comes with a certain set of expectations attached. Fortuitously, Neo Bistro deserves such epithet. A recent lunch visit to the second venture from the team behind Farringdon’s Anglo was highly successful, in terms of concept, food and service.
Tucked down a side street in Soho best known for its guitar shops, Smoking Goat is paving the way for a new era of Thai cuisine. This is about as far removed from curry in a coconut milk sauce or a plate of stir-fried rice noodles as you can imagine. Instead, Smoking Goat is all about a profound explosion of flavours, mostly based around smoke, spice and soy
Go the restaurant’s website and you will be told that “the journey begins.” Diners at Vineet Bhatia will apparently experience “intrigue, surprise and adventure” on their visits to this restaurant. If I were asked for three adjectives to describe what I wanted to get out of a dining experience – and particularly one for which I was paying £175/head (admittedly with paired wines included) – then these would not initially be the first that would come to mind. Overall, our experience was very good, but by no means outstanding.
