Restaurants
London
Clerkenwell
30-31 Clerkenwell Green,
Many of the things a review would normally focus on are rendered arbitrary the moment you enter the dining room in Dans le Noir. As the name suggests, at this restaurant, diners experience their meal in total darkness. What was the décor like? Who knows! The walls could have been tartan. We spoke to the manager, Dominique, before going into the dining room. He explained to us that the concept of Dans le Noir was to create a new power balance.
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SW6 1AX
London
Fulham
24 Vanston Place,
As Maria from The Sound of Music says: “Let’s start at the very beginning, it’s a very good place to start.” I am compelled, however, to throw caution to Maria’s sound guidance and begin with the end of the meal: the coconut ice-cream. My greatest regret was that I did not order the coconut ice-cream. My greatest pleasure was that my guest (a more shrewd decision-maker when it comes to desserts) was too full to finish hers, allowing me not one, not two, but three blissful spoonfuls of this tropical snowball, that could have been scooped from the centre of some otherworldly Arctic-coconut.
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SE1 3UN
London
Bermondsey Square
11
This fifth branch of the growing restaurant chain Del Aziz, brings a colourful and tasty slice of the Mediterranean to an obscure area of Bermondsey.
The venue is seamlessly divided into restaurant, bar, delicatessen, bakery and gift shop. Chunky wooden tables, dark orange walls and pink velvet curtains help to create an exotic, semi-boudoir ambiance that lures you away from the lackluster buildings of Bermondsey.
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If you can fight your way through the All Bar Ones and city boozers in this area, you will find an oasis of taste of calm in the form of Devonshire Square. A huge atrium gives the impression of being outside without any of the typical disadvantages of the great British outdoors.
As you come past the ubiquitous city Fitness First, Devonshire Terrace sits on the corner of the square. It’s a trendy looking place which has a terrace at the front and a walk round balcony at the back, which accommodates those few smokers left.
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SW10 0AJ
London
9 Park Walk
Dish Dash serves up its Persian fare on a tiny but glamorous side street off Fulham Road. Even if you've never heard of the place and happen to be ambling along Park Walk of an evening, your nose may find that it cannot allow you to walk past without your mouth getting a chance of sampling the food that is providing your nasal cavities with sensory overload.
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WC12 9FB
London
12 Upper St Martins Lane,
Dishoom successfully combines all the friendliness and charm of a local family run gem, with the size and efficiency of a slick restaurant you’d expect to find in this very central Covent Garden location. The walls are adorned from floor to ceiling (a high ceiling at that) with brightly coloured old Bollywood movie posters, and old sepia photos. The sheer amount of photos is impressive, and we wondered as we sat looking at a photo of a cordial-looking Indian couple hanging beside our table-top cutlery pot, whether some of the pictures were of the owner's family.
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W11 1LR
London
Notting Hill
269 Portobello Road
“We are all agreed that your theory is crazy,” stated Niels Bohr “but is it crazy enough?”
The great scientist may well have had the same to say about the Drawing Room. Located at the scrappy end of Portobello Road, within spitting distance of the Westway flyover and slotted in between a bakery and toy shop, I was expecting something unassuming and homely.
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BN1 2FN
Brighton Beach
139 King’s Road Arches
There’s something very special about watching your cabbage being delivered, its leaves waving in the sea air as the kitchen assistant brings it along the seafront to the restaurant. When it appears half an hour later, sautéed to perfection, as the bed for your moist pork roulade (stuffed with truffles), home-made black pudding tagliatelle and crackling, there is a certain sublime symmetry.
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EC1M 4AY
London
40 St. John Street
Eastside Inn
The theatre of the chefs at work, in their tall white hats gliding around the central open kitchen is the first sight that greets us as we walk into Eastside Inn. Instantly we feel at ease and ready to delve into Bjorn Van der Horst’s French cuisine. Situated moments away from the legendary St John Restaurant, proprietors Bjorn Van der Horst (former chef patron of Gordon Ramsay’s La Noisette) and his wife Justine have created a dining venue of two tales.
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