Food
‘The food is as good as you will find in London’: Saison at Raffles London, reviewed
The Old War Office (bad acronym OWO) on Whitehall is now a Raffles hotel: you can stay in Winston Churchill’s…
‘They do better spaghetti bolognese in Hampstead for a tenner’: The Lobby at The Peninsula, reviewed
The Peninsula is a new hotel at Hyde Park Corner. It is part of the trend for absurd expense: rooms…
‘Well-priced and skilful’: Masala Zone, reviewed
There are cursed restaurants and cursed women, and this makes them no less interesting. One is Maxim’s in Paris, which…
Fine food in a fine restaurant: Origin City reviewed
Origin City is a good name for this restaurant, whether it knows it or not. It is at West Smithfield,…
As gaudy as Versailles: The Duchess of Cornwall in Poundbury reviewed
Poundbury is the King’s idealised town in Dorchester, built on his land to his specifications: the town that sprung out…
Bruton is suddenly the place to be – and I have a theory why: At the Chapel reviewed
At the Chapel, Bruton, is a restaurant and hotel in a former chapel in Bruton. This was once an ordinary…
A Margherita in Tolkien’s Middle-earth: Pizza in the Courtyard at Sarehole Mill reviewed
Sarehole Mill is four miles south of the centre of Birmingham. If this were a fairy tale, and it should…
‘Thinks of the diner, not the chef’: Claridge’s Restaurant, reviewed
The BBC made a very odd documentary about the renovation of Claridge’s: The Mayfair Hotel Megabuild. They filmed, agog, as…
Big Little Bavaria on Thames: Bierschenke bierkeller reviewed
I am not sure the vast Bierschenke bierkeller in Covent Garden is successful, even if it is skilful: I worry…
A taste of 1997: Pizza Express reviewed
As the government withers this column falls to ennui and visits Pizza Express. As David Cameron, who left the world…
As good as pub food gets: The Red Lion, East Chisenbury, reviewed
The Red Lion, East Chisenbury, is in the Pewsey Vale on the edge of Salisbury Plain. Wiltshire’s strangeness surpasses even…
Home cooking, but idealised: 2 Fore Street reviewed
The restaurant 2 Fore Street lives on Mousehole harbour, near gift shops: the post office and general store have closed,…
Wuthering Heights in Devon: the Pilchard Inn, Burgh Island, reviewed
The Pilchard Inn sits at the entrance to Burgh Island, a minute tidal island off the coast of south Devon.…
A themed restaurant done right: The Alice, Oxford, reviewed
The Alice lives in a ground-floor room of the Randolph Hotel in Oxford, which venerates the fantastical and the savage,…
Faultless food with the promise of vengeance: The Trough, reviewed
Lady Bamford’s Cotswold fairy-land Daylesford Farm has sprouted leaves. It is no longer a farm shop, which should be a…
Serious about its whimsy: Sessions Arts Club reviewed
The Sessions Arts Club is a restaurant inside the Old Session House in Clerkenwell, a pale George III building where…
Eat here now: Darjeeling Express reviewed
Darjeeling Express lives at the top of Kingly Court, just off Carnaby Street, which was once the world-famous embodiment of…
All mirrors and monochrome: Mister Nice reviewed
Mister Nice is not so much a restaurant as a pre-dawn thought flung into the drag between Piccadilly Circus and…
Too perfect for Instagram: Cédric Grolet at the Berkeley reviewed
The Cédric Grolet at the Berkeley lives in the shiniest hotel in Knightsbridge, though I prefer the Mandarin Oriental, because…
An innate contradiction: Mount St Restaurant reviewed
The Mount St Restaurant lives above the Audley Public House on Mount Street, ‘a traditional neighbourhood pub, carefully restored, and…
Still thrilling: the Wolseley reviewed
Restaurant and dog years are similar, and so the Wolseley, which is 20 this year, seems as if it has…
Better than the original: Scott’s Richmond reviewed
Scott’s, Richmond, is a fish, champagne and oyster bar, and a new branch of Scott’s, Mayfair. The original Scott’s was…
