A venue without either a formal entrance or a menu might not be everyone’s idea of a fun experience. But this is precisely the point. Create a mystery and you make things kind of cool. There’s a cachet value – you’re either in on it, or you’re not. Such is the zeitgeist of 2025 London. Overcome your prejudices and visit the Fat Badger. You will not be disappointed.
Every neighbourhood needs a venue like the Seymour Kitchen. Walk in and it’s hard not to fall in love. The place works as a grocery, a deli and a restaurant. It’s full of colour and charm and if you haven’t yet fallen for the flavours of the Middle East, then you will after visiting.
The Brighton dining scene seems to go from strength to strength. Kindling, open now for just over a year, is a worthy addition. Its frontage leaves nothing to the imagination, with the words ‘simply steak’ written just below the venue’s name. This, however, does Kindling a disservice. There’s more than meat on the menu and execution elevates the restaurant.
If you want to lunch with Lucien or dine with Damian (Freud and Hirst respectively), then Mount Street Restaurant might be the place for you. Rumour has it that £50m worth of art hang on its walls. If only the kitchen produced food that was sufficiently exulted to match the quality of the paintings. Mount Street might look impressive, but the food felt to us like posh pub grub – at Mayfair prices.
It would be easy enough to live in London and never know of the existence of Violet Hill. Once in this small district nestled between Maida Vale and St John’s Wood with a cute park, it would equally be quite possible to walk past Kotta Sushi without appreciating it. Your reviewer has lived in the area for over 25 years and yet a recent visit was his first. It won’t be his last.
It is a rare and beautiful thing when you and your dining comrade can leave a restaurant with absolutely no complaints. This is what Clare Smyth’s Core achieves – and does so seemingly effortlessly. This was your reviewer’s first visit since the venue had gained its third Michelin Star, but nothing has changed. Clare is still hard at work in the kitchen, smiling and greeting guests as they arrive.
Hopes were high for dining in Chantelle Nicholson’s latest restaurant, Apricity. The chef had built a prior strong reputation for pioneering hyper-seasonal, local and sustainable approaches in her previous ventures in Earl’s Court and Hackney. Critics have mostly lauded her newest restaurant and its whole circular economy angle captures wonderfully the current zeitgeist. Despite such a backdrop, your reviewer and his dining comrade left somewhat underwhelmed.
Diners in search of good food when visiting Brighton are not short of options. However, the Coal Shed should feature as a must-visit. Such has been its success that the venue’s backers have opened a second outlet in London which has been similarly praised. The Coal Shed represents a textbook study in simplicity combined with super execution.
The British have always had a love affair with beef. Think of William Hogarth’s famous painting in the Tate, “The Gate of Calais”, also known as “The Roast Beef of Old England.” It shows a man valiantly defending a side of beef from the perfidious French. In more recent years, the likes of Hawksmoor and Goodman have raised the stakes (no pun intended) in terms of what diners can expect from a good cut of meat. Into the fray has sprung Flat Iron, a mini-chain on a distinct mission – to bring steak to the masses. It mostly succeeds.
Every neighbourhood needs one. The eponymous Vins has created a gem of a community restaurant, which – appropriately enough – has a superbly composed wine list as well as a kitchen that serves up solid grub. One thing the pandemic has taught us all to value is our local area. Why bother going in to central London if you live in Canonbury, when you can simply visit Vins?
When visiting a part of England not known to your reviewer, the natural response is to do some research beforehand. On this occasion, it involved asking several friends and colleagues who hailed from/ had visited the area. All were unequivocal in their approbation of the Gunton Arms, a view echoed by the local taxi driver who drove us to this destination. Fortunately, the advice paid off. If on the north Norfolk coast near Cromer, then this is the place to go.
Fallow take-one was a pop in Heddon Street. Such was its success, that take-two saw the restaurant move to a larger (and more bling) premises just off Haymarket in the very centre of London. While it may have lost some of its original intimacy and vibe, none of the ethos underpinning the restaurant nor the quality of the offering has changed. If it’s modern (and sustainable) British food you’re after, then Fallow is the place.
Most visitors are drawn to the Lake District for its hiking paths and bucolic views. Don’t shout it too loudly though, but there is also an exciting gastronomic scene afoot in the region. Cumbria boasts seven restaurants with Michelin stars. Among them, Simon Rogan’s L’Enclume (in Cartmel) is arguably the most famous. While we were not quite lucky enough to pay it a visit, we did the next best thing and spent a highly enjoyable recent evening at Henrock, the chef’s latest restaurant venture in the region.
Say foodie to many Londoners and they may respond ‘Borough Market.’ Say on-trend districts to the same audience and many might reply ‘Hackney.’ Surprise, surprise then that the two venues operating as Elliot’s appear within the confines of… Borough Market and Hackney. Food is all sourced from the former with a strong emphasis on the fashions du jour: local and seasonal. Visit the Borough venue (as we did) and you will be confronted with exposed brickwork, mismatched fittings and a sassy kind of New York vibe. There’s natural wine too. It’s almost all too achingly cool.
Look up the word parlour in the dictionary and you will get two definitions: first, as a sitting room in a private house; next, as a room in a public building for receiving guests. It is perhaps not accidental then that Parlour, an on-trend British restaurant in central north west London, fulfils both these terms. Diners are made to feel very welcome; spending time at this venue is a bit like being in a good friend’s house.
A weekend break in August to a luxury hotel in the Surrey Hills ought to be the stuff of dreams. Barnett Hill, an impressive Queen Anne-style property near Wonersh, is a beautiful building with lovely grounds and excellent walking options nearby. While it was not the fault of the property that the British weather impeded full enjoyment of the outdoor facilities, blame certainly must lie with the hotel for the underwhelming dining experiences that characterised our stay.
The shoes of the Gay Hussar are big ones in which to step. Noble Rot’s second venture, located on the same site as this former London establishment, nonetheless do the job admirably. Homage to the Hussar is evident, from the artistic triptych of Soho life that adorns one wall on the first floor dining room through to a few original menu items that remain, albeit somewhat reinterpreted. After the success of their original Fitzrovia venture, the Noble Rot team have imposed their clear stamp in Soho.
What could be more quintessentially English than fish and chips by the seaside? A recent work jaunt saw Gourmand Gunno make the one-hour train journey down from London to see seafood done properly in one of the oldest restaurants in Brighton. There’s far more to English’s though than just the humble battered plaice…
The dictionary says that the term ‘fallow’ means farmland that has been ploughed and harrowed but is then left for a period without being sown in order to restore its fertility and avoid surplus production. Although an ancient concept, it also has a wonderfully modern resonance, according well with all things sustainable. Fallow, one of the hottest new openings of 2020, takes this idea as its guiding principle and successfully pulls off the act of being both a right-on and very cool venue.
With outside dining being the norm for now, Skylon is worth considering. Expect a confident but far from ground-breaking demonstration of modern British cooking with a few European twists. Given we are still in the early era of returning to normality, food and wine lists have a greater than usual level of brevity. At least it makes choosing easier. To complain though is to miss the point: what we have been missing is not chef-cooked food per se, but atmosphere – this is what venues such as Skylon are selling….
It has become almost de rigeur for every tall building in the City of London to provide a dining experience on one of its higher floors. The claim of 14 Hills, that it offers “unapparelled” views of London, is perhaps hyperbole. Fortuitously, there is more to enjoy at this venue than just the views. 14 Hills delivers very solid if not quite ground-breaking cuisine at a reasonable price point.
Visit the homepage of the Ivy and the word that stands out most strongly is ‘modern’, which prefixes the perhaps less glamorous ‘British restaurant’ descriptor. Sceptics might suggest a case of trying too hard, whereas a more generous interpretation would highlight that the success of this stalwart restaurant brand lies in its ongoing relevance. concept. A large group of us recently descended on the Soho branch of the ever-expanding empire and came away impressed by the execution if not outright wowed. ..
