Macellaio RC Union Street review – the Italian steakhouse that can’t tear itself away from pizza
★★★☆☆ / Italian / Pizza / Steak/chophouse

Macellaio RC Union Street review – the Italian steakhouse that can’t tear itself away from pizza

‘What’s an Italian steakhouse?!’ The answer, of course, is a restaurant that serves steak cut from Italian cows. It’s a revealing response – pasta, pizza and pesto cast such a shadow over the perception of Italian food in our collective imagination, that anything else is literally inconceivable. If goldfish really do have a memory of just three seconds, then our gestalt intelligence is seemingly limited to just three things per subject. Continue reading

Myrtle review – the understated Irish dame of Chelsea
★★★★☆ / Irish / Modern European / Modernist

Myrtle review – the understated Irish dame of Chelsea

Where sirloin steak is almost upstaged by a beef dumpling At the risk of indulging in armchair GCSE-level psychology, Myrtle is one of those restaurants where elements of the personality and background of the chef are clearly evident. Starting with the obvious, there’s the Irish-accented menu – a surprisingly uncommon thing in London – created … Continue reading

Yeni review – this modern Turkish restaurant in Soho deserves your attention
★★★☆☆ / Modern European / Modernist / Turkish

Yeni review – this modern Turkish restaurant in Soho deserves your attention

With brill, octopus and beef ribs on the menu, this isn’t your Dalston mate’s idea of a Turkish restaurant Yeni is the London counterpart of a feted Istanbul restaurant, but you wouldn’t know it from the Soho restaurant’s website. For the casual observer, the only clues to its Turkish origins are its somewhat enigmatic name and … Continue reading

St Leonards review – meat and fish thrills on the backstreets of Shoreditch
★★★★☆ / Eclectic / Seafood

St Leonards review – meat and fish thrills on the backstreets of Shoreditch

This restaurant is my new Vice It takes balls to open a restaurant like St Leonards. Fulsome, dangly ones that sway and jiggle with every sigh and cough. It’s either that or the proprietors’ first choice property was out of reach for whatever reason. Few other reasons can seemingly explain St Leonards, a restaurant located … Continue reading

Sorella review – pivoting from one cuisine to another in hard times
★★★★☆ / Italian

Sorella review – pivoting from one cuisine to another in hard times

The Manor transforms into an Italian It’s tough times for restaurants with household names and independents alike having to close up shop all across the country. Skyrocketing business rates, a continuing staffing shortage, rising wages, intense competition (especially in London) and, in some cases, overaggressive expansion and impatient investors are all playing their part in … Continue reading

Duddell’s review – Chinese cooking in a London Bridge church
★★★☆☆ / Chinese / Chinese Dumplings / Chinese Noodles

Duddell’s review – Chinese cooking in a London Bridge church

Hong Kong in the shadow of the Shard Update 07/01/2020 – this restaurant has now closed It’s very easy to take things for granted and Cantonese food is one of those things. London has been fortunate enough to benefit from some respectable and credible Cantonese cooking for several years now. And yet this venerable style … Continue reading

Magpie review – Modernist food served ‘Dim Sum’-style in Mayfair
★★★☆☆ / Eclectic / Modern European / Modernist

Magpie review – Modernist food served ‘Dim Sum’-style in Mayfair

The Pidgin sequel takes flight but doesn’t quite soar Update 10/04/2019 – this restaurant is now closed I once wrote that it’s rare for a restaurant to relocate inwards from the suburbs to the centre of town, rather than other way around. Recent events are proving me wrong, showing that such a move (or sprouting … Continue reading

Rick Stein Barnes review – celebrity chef serves the only seafood in the village
★★★☆☆ / Seafood

Rick Stein Barnes review – celebrity chef serves the only seafood in the village

TV CV only gets you oh so far I have little time for most TV celebrity chefs, but I’ll usually make an exception for Rick Stein. His genteel avuncular charm, childlike wonder and boundless yet measured enthusiasm make him far more watchable than the majority of his arse-clenchingly irritating peers. The big man naturally doesn’t cook in … Continue reading

Foley’s review – a weird but not necessarily wonderful Fitzrovia restaurant
★★★☆☆ / Eclectic

Foley’s review – a weird but not necessarily wonderful Fitzrovia restaurant

Globe-trotting ex-Palomar chef needs to settle down Fusion food is one of those misguided and blingtastically tacky relics of the 1980s that should’ve died long ago along with shoulder pads, the New Romantics and Thatcherism. Foley’s doesn’t serve fusion food, strictly speaking, but its menu does swagger across the globe pulling in ingredients and techniques from … Continue reading