Foraging in Mayfair We do a lot of things that our ancestors would find regressively, inexplicably primitive. In the past (and right now in the developing world while we’re at it), living in a field without running water, electricity or plumbing would be considered poverty. In the modern West, we call it camping and subject our … Continue reading
An Edgware Road restaurant that isn’t Lebanese Eating at Kurobuta has, if nothing else, confirmed that I’m slowly devolving into a cantankerous old fart. Kurobuta is a modern take on the izakaya, a Japanese food pub, situated on a residential street just off Edgware Road. Originally due to open last Autumn, it was so delayed … Continue reading
Thai mini-chain sprouts again in Soho Restaurants, especially those serving foreign cuisines, have a funny relationship with names. They will often have a cliched name related to the mother country – a disproportionate number of Thai restaurants, for example, will have some combination of ‘Thai’, ‘Siam’, ‘lotus’ or ‘elephant’ in their name. Then there’s the … Continue reading
No sniggering in the back The vast majority of Vietnamese restaurants in London have very traditional menus and tend to be clustered together in Hoxton and Deptford, with smaller concentrations in other places such as Hammersmith. Soho’s House of Ho is a very different affair. The exposed brick walls, moody lighting and odd contemporary art … Continue reading
Octopus and chorizo skewers on Berwick Street Updated 21/6/2020 – added details of 2020 meals and updated the Verdict as well as the formatting. Disclosure: I used a publicly available discount for my 2020 meals. This discount was available to the general public; as ever I did not seek any special treatment just because I’m … Continue reading
Brewer Street gets spicy If you’ve got a hankering for Thai food when you’re out and about in the Soho area, then the obvious choice is Busaba Eathai. I find Alan Yau’s chain to be merely okay though, so the relaunch of Janetira on Soho’s Brewer Street piqued my interest. This small mom and pop … Continue reading
Hotel food with a twist Hotel restaurants are very different from restaurants in hotels. This may seem like a minor semantic difference, but there’s actually a yawning gulf between the two. Hotel restaurants are identikit eateries serving up a large menu of lowest common denominator dishes designed for weary travellers too tired to care and … Continue reading
The best meal of the year and inexcusably overlooked by the Michelin Guide I encountered a fellow travelling Brit with some interesting views on food during my recent jaunt around Jordan. Although he had a broad palate, this didn’t extend to Modernist cuisine, especially multi-course tasting menus. ‘Artsy fartsy’ ‘nouvelle cuisine’ wasn’t ‘proper food’ he contended. Like … Continue reading
Fitzrovia Chinese reaches new highs and lows Restaurants in London’s Chinatown are renowned for their brusque, hurried service, but this culture of surly indifference has no geographical boundaries. Oriental Dragon on Cleveland Street in Fitzrovia is a classic example. Although the service wasn’t completely charmless, overall it was hilariously unhelpful and it reached the apex … Continue reading
Treading water or better than ever? When I first dined at Pizarro shortly after it opened in the autumn/winter of 2011, I noted a few niggling blemishes and hoped they’d be ironed out. After a longer delay than initially planned, I made a return visit on a weekend evening with Templeton Peck, Socialist Worker and … Continue reading
The Picky Glutton 
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