Ajimura
51 Shelton Street, WC2. Phone: 240 0178. Fax: 497 2240. Hours: Closed Saturday lunch & Sunday. Price: £60 ($91) for two. All major cards. (E2).
A cheap and casual eatery with one of the best Japanese cooking in town, where you can sit at the kitchen bar to watch the proceedings.
The menu explains itself. A good choice is to order two of the four set meals of the day, chalked on a blackboard. The result comes in colorful arrangements on the plate. Set lunches and pre-theater dinners are good value.
• Deep-fried pork with aubergines, salad and rice.
• Shrimps, raw salmon and clear fish soup.
• Shrimps, deep-fried fish, egg salad and clear fish soup.
• Sashimi = raw fish.
• Tempura = deep-fried fish.
• Sukiyaki = thin slices of beef, pan-fried.
Japanese cuisine is the second most important cuisine in the world next to French cuisine. It is usually very light and easy on the stomach, in most cases either raw or boiled. The appearance of the food is of great importance. Rice and vegetables are the basics, mainly supported by seafood, rather than meat. It is now helping to make Western cuisine lighter.
Arirang
31 Poland Street, W1. Phone: 437 6633. Hours: Closed Sunday. Price: £50 ($76) for two. All major cards. (D2).
The best Korean place in London is at the northern end of Soho, just a few steps off Oxford Street. Korean cooking is little known in the West, but the courses are exciting and enjoyable. Try beef soup, beef pancakes, marinated beef, sour bean sprouts and rice.
It is unusually decorated, cozy but not harmonious. Prettily clad and civilized young ladies serve the food with the help of host Wee. It is easiest for beginners to order a set meal. Fruit and tea is included. Evade kim chee, badly smelling fermented cabbage, said to be military grub in the homeland.
• Bul-kal-bee = spareribs.
• Hong cho = deep-fried sweet-and-sour fish.
• Thah thoree tang = chicken.
• Slobal chun = deep-fried marrow.
• Chop che = mixed salad.
• Pahb = rice.
Korean cooking is midway between Chinese and Japanese cooking as stands to geographical reason. It does not have the delicacy of Japanese cooking and the variety of Chinese cooking. It evokes images of East Asia countryside cooking.
Bentley‘s
11 Swallow Street, W1. Phone: 734 4756. Fax: 287 2972. Hours: Closed Sunday. Price: £70 ($106) for two. All major cards. (D2).
In a narrow street that runs between Regent Street and Piccadilly there is an oyster bar with atmosphere on the ground floor and a proper restaurant without one on the first floor. It has its own oyster grounds at Colchester and offers solid products. The bar downstairs is convenient for single persons.
In addition there is fresh fish of many varieties, sole, turbot, plaice, haddock, trout, also crabs, shrimp and lobster. Take care to choose grilled, poached or meuniere; and evade the names Thermidor, Newburg, Dugléré and Florentine, all standing for complex cookery spoiling the delicate raw material.
• Colchester oysters.
• Mussels poached in white wine.
• Poached scallops.
• Baked crab.
• Fresh strawberries.
Brasserie St Quentin
243 Brompton Road, SW3. Phone: 581 5131. Fax: 584 6064. Price: £50 ($76) for two. All major cards. (B4).
A belle-epoche brasserie of bourgeois cooking from the southwest of France by chef Nigel Davis, right on the major Knightsbridge avenue, near the Egerton Terrace sidestreet, just before the avenue splits into Cromwell Road and Brompton Road.
Elegant and civilized, bright and open, well insulated from the outside traffic, with red-brown banquettes lining the walls, mirrors and pillars, brass and dark wood. A bar with wine racks dominates one of the walls. The place becomes lively when it fills up. Service in black and white is French and efficient.
• Tarte aux cêpes et confit de canard = a tart of boletus mushrooms and preseved duck.
• Oeufs en cocotte au foie gras et mouillettes = baked eggs with goose liver and toast.
• Brochette de coquilles Saint-Jacques et jambon de Bayonne = scallops with Bayonne ham.
• Filet de boeuf au Roquefort = fillet of beef with Roquefort cheese and walnut butter.
• Pavé de chocolat amer á l’ecorce d’oranges = St Quentin’s bitter chocolate and orange dessert.
• Figues rôties et glace aux amandes = baked figs and almond ice cream.
Café Royal Brasserie
68 Regent Street, W1. Phone: 437 9090. Fax: 439 7672. Hours: Closed Sunday dinner. Price: £50 ($76) for two. All major cards. (D2).
A well-designed restaurant with a comfortable atmosphere on a busy shopping street a few steps from Piccadilly Circus. It uses the same kitchen as the adjoining and more expensive Café Royal Grill.
The setting is beautiful and the cuisine is light and modern. Service is efficient as befits a brasserie.
• Smoked rabbit salad with asparagus and mustard dressing.
• Mixed calf’s liver with bacon and onions.
• Grilled fillet of salmon with red pepper sauce.
Café Royal Grill Room
68 Regent Street, W1. Phone: 439 9090. Hours: Closed Saturday lunch & Sunday. Price: £100 ($152) for two. All major cards. (D2).
Neither a café nor a grill, but a stunning restaurant of baroque grandeur, recently and surprisingly also offering excellent, traditional French cuisine on the bend of Regent Street just before it joins Piccadilly Circus.
The carpets are red and the comfortable chairs and banquettes are red. The walls have heavily ornate windows and paintings. The ceiling and pillars also have ornate carvings and paintings. The food arrives under cupolas in polished silver serving wagons. Service is formal and generally competent. The ancient and tipsy customers are the only discordant note.
• Escalopes of fresh foie gras with a ragoût of celeriae and truffle sauce.
• Red mullet with orange zest, basil and black olives.
• Seared fillet of sea bass with fennel, sundried tomatoes and saffron.
• Crown of lamb filled with Provençale vegetables, pesto and balsamic vinegar sauce.
• Pyramid of walnut ganache with vanilla sauce.
• Caramel mousseline with mango compote and lime.
Calabash
The Africa Centre, 38 King Street, WC2. Phone: 836 1976. Hours: Closed Saturday lunch & Sunday. Price: £20 ($30) for two. No cards. (E2).
The authentic representative of the African continent. (Shortlisted for evaluation and inclusion)
Caprice
Arlington House, Arlington Street, SW1. Phone: 629 2239. Fax: 493 9040. Price: £65 ($98) for two. (D3).
A French place much in fashion, just behind the Ritz hotel, run by well-known restaurateurs Chris Corbin and Jeremy King.
It is regally furnished in a pre-war functional style, with mirrors on columns and walls, flowers on tables and champagne buckets at every table. It is a venue for lively business lunches and after-theater dinners. The service is perfect.
• Crab soup.
• Gravad laks = marinated salmon.
• Partridge with asparagus salad.
• Lamb filet with feta cheese.
• Venison steak.
Caravan Serai
50 Paddington Street, W1. Phone: 935 1208. Fax: 431 4969. Hours: Closed Sunday lunch. Price: £45 ($68) for two. All major cards. (C1).
In the Marylebone district, reasonably priced if you are careful in choosing from the menu, the single acceptable representative of Afghan cooking, which is almost unknown in the West.
Chez Nico at 90
90 Park Lane, W1. Phone: 409 1290. Fax: 355 4877. Hours: Closed Saturday lunch & Sunday. Price: £135 ($205) for two. All major cards. (C2).
The newest location of moveable chef Nico, in the Grosvenor House hotel opposite Hyde Park. (Shortlisted for evaluation and inclusion)
Chuen Chen Ku
17 Wardour Street, W1. Phone: 734 3281. Price: £35 ($53) for two. All major cards. (E2).
Between Leicester Square and Piccadilly Circus, offering the best Chinese lunch appetizers for small change. You can understand why every other Chinese family with children lunches here on Sunday. The restaurant is on several floors in the narrow building. This is not an elegant eatery by Western standards. It is noisy and authentic, as most of the customers are Chinese.
The starters are called dim sum. They are wheeled around the salons in warm trolleys and the customers point to the dishes they desire. Most of the dim sum are priced at £1. Most dim sums are cooked in steam in small, round sauce-pans, covered with balsam and stapled up in towers. If many are feasting together it is fun to order all the dim sums and share them.
Most Chinese restaurants in the West are derived from Hong Kong, which is a Canton type of cuisine. Cantonese food is usually steamed. Dim sum appetizers are a perfect example of steamed Cantonese food. They are usually consumed at lunch in the West, but at home they are used as snacks. Rice is the mainstay of Cantonese cuisine.
Connaught
Carlos Place, W1. Phone: 499 7070. Fax: 495 3262. Price: £100 ($152) for two. All major cards. (D2).
This busy hotel restaurant is a gastronomic temple with classic French cooking in the middle of exclusive Mayfair. Male guests must wear a tie, not to lessen the impression when they enter the dining room with a court of headwaiters around. The chef is the renowned Michel Bourdin, specializing in game.
The main dining room is a solid and wealthy looking room of club tones, furnished in mahogany and crowned with crystal chandeliers. The grill-room is smaller and less stylish. The service is absolutely perfect, almost like mind-reading, even though unobtrusive. There are many starters, main courses and desserts, and the price is determined by the choice of the main course.
• Surprise ecosse = smoked salmon.
• Croustade d’oeufs de caille Maintenon = quail eggs.
• Koulebiac de saumon = salmon encased in paté.
• Grouse rotie a l’Anglaise = grouse.
• Rendez-vous du pêcheur, sauce légere au parfum exotique = seafood plate.
• Mousse glacée aux framboises = raspberry mousse.
• Bread and butter pudding.
• Brunello di Montalcino 1976.
Crank’s
11 The Market, Covent Garden, WC2. Phone: 379 6508. Price: £20 ($30) for two. No cards. (E2).
A vegetarian restaurant in the Covent Garden market building. (Shortlisted for evaluation and inclusion)
Dell’Ugo
56 Frith Street, W1. Phone: 734 8300. Fax: 734 8784. Hours: Closed Sunday. Price: £40 ($61) for two. All major cards. (E2).
A trendy mass feeding station of moderate prices with an interesting menu in the Hollywood style and acceptable service on three floors on the main restaurant street in Soho, near the corner of Bateman Street, always full of young people who like to be in an “in” place.
There is a café downstairs, a bistro on the first floor and a proper restaurant on the second floor. The luxury increases up the floors and there is white and multicolor linen on the top floor tables, hard-wood walls and deluxe chairs. The menu also gets more luxurious on the upper floors. The service is slightly unprofessional and slow.
• Irish black pudding with caramelized crisp bacon and potato pancake.
• Braised squid, salt cod and scallops, potato rosti.
• Roast venison, baby beetroot and Jerusalem artichokes.
• Chargrilled breast of cornfed chicken, warm borloti bean salad.
• Fig and armanac parfaît.
• Poached pears with gorgonzola.
Dorchester Grill
Park Lane, W1. Phone: 629 8888. Fax: 495 7351. Price: £100 ($152) for two. All major cards. (C3).
A gastronomic temple in the grand saloon of a distinguished hotel alongside Hyde Park on the Mayfair side, with the well-known Willi Elsener at the helm. His kitchen also serves the Terrace restaurant in the same hotel. His specialty is an English version of Nouvelle Cuisine with emphasis on game.
The grill-room is very solid and heavy with decorations in Spanish style. There are big chandeliers in the ceiling and on the walls and a thick carpet on the floor. The tables are old and dignified and the arm-chairs are of leather. The service is exemplary.
• Cold cucumber and dill soup.
• Celery pancakes with wild mushrooms and Stilton cheese.
• Steamed brill on coquilles St-Jacques.
• Poached trout with leek sauce.
• Partridge with wild mushrooms.
• Pear and cognac profiteroles.
English House
3 Milner Street, SW3. Phone: 584 3002. Fax: 581 2848. Price: £80 ($121) for two. All major cards. (C4).
Midway between the South Kensington underground station and Sloane Square, an attractive, snug and cozy town house, which is a fort of traditional English cooking. The historian and television cook, Michael Smith, and Malcolm Livingston, founded this place to offer English court and country cooking from the 18th C. He should know the métier, as he has written books on it.
The dining rooms are old-fashioned and dainty with chandeliers, dried flowers and silver decorations, also silver cutlery, especially heavy. The atmosphere is British 19th C. and the customers seem to be British gentry and would-like-to-be British gentry.
• Cold stilton soup with pears.
• Galantine of rabbit with sage and apple jelly.
• Venison with juniper berries.
• Steak, kidney and mushroom pie.
• Créme brulée.
Preserves and pies have always been the hallmarks of English cooking.
Food for Thought
31 Neal Street, WC2. Phone: 836 0239. Hours: Closed Sunday dinner. Price: £30 ($45) for two. All major cards. (E2).
A famous vegetarian basement eatery on Neal Street, usually crowded at lunch.
The dining area resembles a small corridor where 40 lean guests can sit on wood benches and stools at tiny tables. The short and imaginative menu, chalked on a blackboard, changes daily.
• Couscous.
• Salads.
• Stir-fry vegetables.
• Cauliflower quiche.
• Tom Yam soup.
• Apple crumble.
• Orange and coconut scones with whipped cream.
Fung Shing
15 Lisle Street, Wc2. Phone: 437 1539. Price: £50 ($76) for two. All major cards. (E2).
A bright and airy upscale Chinese restaurant with superior Cantonese cooking in Chinatown on the northern side of this street of Chinese restaurants near its western end.
Occasional modern and traditional paints decorate the cream colored walls. Comfortable cane chairs surround round tables with light blue linen. Service is efficient and almost Italian in style, hurrying with the ordering and slowing down with the coffee.
• Sesame prawn toast.
• Stir fried abalon with vegetable.
• Roasted crispy chicken.
• Singapore fried noodles.
• Fried rice with egg.
Gavroche
43 Upper Brook Street, W1. Phone: 408 0881. Fax: 409 0939. Hours: Closed Saturday & Sunday. Price: £160 ($242) for two. All major cards. (C2).
Considered to be one of the top three restaurants in London, in the western part of Mayfair. (Shortlisted for evaluation and inclusion)
Gay Hussar
2 Greek Street, W1. Phone: 437 0973. Fax: 437 4631. Hours: Closed Sunday. Price: £55 ($83) for two. All major cards. (E2).
An Hungarian gourmet temple in the north of Soho, 200 meters from Oxford Street and 100 meters from Charing Cross Road. In gastronomy Hungary is the center of central Europe, and this restaurant is its top representative in the West. The émigré Victor Sassie is in charge of a paneled and upholstered restaurant, receiving politicians and journalists for lunch.
This is the place where to hold forth on politics for hours over red cabbage, pressed wild boar heads, goulash and Tokay wine. The Hungarian names on the menu are not suitable for easy understanding and choosing. Most customers therefore stick to the three course set lunch menu which should keep a cavalry of Hussars from starving.
• Cherry soup.
• Pressed wild boar heads.
• Chicken paprika.
• Veal pancakes.
• Cherry tart.
• Palascinta pancakes.
• Badascony white whine and sweet Tokay, 5 puttenoy.
Hungary has traditionally provided the best cooks in central Europe. Their cuisine is more flamboyant than the cooking of their neighbors. It combines delicacy with abundance and is usually heavy on the stomach. Due to Hungarian influence in the Austrian empire this cuisine spread around central Europe, competing with French cuisine emanating from Western Europe.
Gaylord
79 Mortimer Street. Phone: 580 3615. Price: £30 ($45) for two. All major cards. (D1).
An unusually decorative Indian restaurant, 200 meters north from Oxford Street, specializing in food from Northern India.
It is a little more expensive than ordinary Indian restaurants, but in turn you get more agreeable surroundings and more thoughtful cooking. There are loud and red decorations on the walls and service is as good as you can expect in the best Western places.
• Tandoori = yogurt coated chicken, baked in a clay oven.
• Tikka = chicken grilled on skewers.
• Curries.
• Spiced lamb.
• Butter cakes.
• Pan-fried chicken in yogurt.
Indian cuisine is in fact many cuisines. The Mogul cuisine in the north is influenced by invading nomads, speaking first Indo-Aryan and later Mongolian languages. It is a lavish cuisine based on meat, mainly lamb. Stewing is the most popular cooking method. Clay ovens are also used. Wheat is more important than rice.
Gopal’s
12 Bateman Street, W1. Phone: 434 0840. Price: £40 ($61) for two. All major cards. (E2).
One of the top Indian restaurants in London is in a small street crossing Frith Street in Soho, a tasteful and delicate place.
Guests sit on comfortable wicker chairs at tightly spaced tables with pink linen. Large Indian paintings decorate the creamy walls. Mirrors and greenery are wisely used to add space. Service is efficient. Ingredients are first rate and herbs are used and combined in imaginative ways.
• Mangalorean crab = freshly flaked crab meat cooked with coconut and several rare spices, served on a red cabbage leaf.
• Mashed potato cake stuffed with lentils, onions, green chillies and coriander leaves, served with sour sauce.
• Meenu curry = cooked fish in karnatah curry, with a strong sauce of cocunut and several rare spices.
• Multa Zacutti = hot lamb cooked with coconut, vinegar and rarte spices.
• Mushroom bhaji = mushrooms cooked with mild spices.
• Fried pulau = fried Basmati rice with peas.
• Nan and Papad bread.
Green’s
36 Duke Street, St James’s, SW1. Phone: 930 4566. Fax: 930 1383. Hours: Closed Sunday dinner. Price: £60 ($91) for two. All major cards. (D3).
A St James’s clubby restaurant of good and traditional British food in bright and traditional surroundings near the Jermyn Street end of the King and Jermyn Streets stretch of the street.
The atmosphere is old-fashined and tradtitional and mainly friendly and solid. There are good paintings on wood-paneled walls and light brown linen on the tables. The comfortable chairs have red upholstery. Singles prefer to dine at the bar. Service is exceptionally nice by any standards. The place is always full and alway easy-going and congenial.
• Crab cocktail.
• Crab cake with Pommery mustard sauce.
• Pan fried scallops with potao cake and tomato and basil sauce.
• Roast grouse with traditional accompaniments.
• Roast guinea fowl with cabbage and bacon.
• Honey, brandy and raisin ice cream.
• Iced chocolate parfait with toffee cream.
Hard Rock Cafe
150 Old Park Lane, W1. Phone: 629 0382. Price: £35 ($53) for two. All major cards. (D3).
The best hamburgers in London are served in this place near the southwest end of Piccadilly. It is big and noisy, and so popular that a waiting line is on the pavement at meal times.
It is a haven for homesick Americans.
• Voluminous salads.
• Chips in blue cheese sauce.
• T-bone steaks with baked potatoes.
• Milk shakes.
• Giant ice-creams.
• Devil food cakes.
America has in the latest decades influenced European cooking very much, and not only n fast food. Salads as a major part of a meal come from America. The emphasis on beef is also an American influence in Europe.
India Club
143 Strand, WC2. Phone: 836 0650. Price: £20 ($30) for two. No cards. (F2).
An inexpensive Indian restaurant. (Shortlisted for evaluation and inclusion)
Joe Allen
13 Exeter Street, WC2. Phone: 836 0651. Fax: 497 2148. Price: £45 ($68) for two. All major cards. (E2).
Hiding in a back street between Covent Garden and Strand, difficult to find, as the restaurant sign is very small. It is the main fortress of American-Italian cooking in London, often crowded with celebrities, sprinkled with journalists and actors. The majority, though, consists of homesick Americans.
The atmosphere is animated and charming between the brick walls. The menu is chalked on a blackboard.
• Spinach salad.
• Spareribs.
• Black bean soup.
• Baked John Dory with tomato, capers and olives.
• Pecan pie.
• Angel food cake.
America has in the latest decades influenced European cooking very much, and not only n fast food. Salads as a major part of a meal come from America. The emphasis on beef is also an American influence in Europe.
Joe’s
Fenwick of Bond Street, 63 New Bond Street, W1. Phone: 629 9161. Hours: Closed Sunday. Price: £20 ($30) for two. No cards. (D2).
A fashionable and inexpensive restaurant in the middle of expensive Mayfair. (Shortlisted for evaluation and inclusion)
Ken Lo‘s Memories of China
67-69 Ebury Street, SW1. Phone: 730 7734. Fax: 730 2992. Hours: Closed Sunday lunch. Price: £55 ($83) for two. (D4).
The best Chinese restaurant is near Victoria Station. It is a civilized and a simple place, popular with the upper classes. The owners, Kenneth and Anne Lo, are both cooking.
The menu shows examples of cooking from several part of China.
• Chicken in lotus leaves.
• Steamed turbot.
• Steamed scallops in the shell, with hot black bean sauce.
• Lamb in cabbage on skewer.
• Peking duck.
There are several cooking traditions in China. Best known is Cantonese cooking, light and sweet, usually steamed, based on rice. Next comes Peking cooking with stronger tastes, often deep-fried and crispy. Lesser known is Shanghai cooking which is fatter, based on oil and noodles. Finally there is Szechuan cooking which is the strongest of the lot.
Langan‘s Brassiere
Stratton Street, W1. Phone: 491 8822. Hours: Closed Saturday lunch & Sunday. Price: £60 ($91) for two. All major cards. (D3).
A class in itself, a big and crowded meeting place of the beautiful and important people and still being able to serve excellent food at mild prices. It is owned by notorious imbiber Peter Langan from Ireland, popular comedian Michael Caine and respectable cook Richard Shepherd, attracting people from entertainment and information, actors and models, lords and ladies.
Outside paparazzi are waiting. Inside there is pandemonium, waiters running back and forth while the in-people shout greetings between tables. Take care not to be relegated to the Venetian saloon for tourists on the first floor. Get a table on the ground floor, dominated by huge air condition propellers and a rag-tag collection of paintings and posters, Casablanca movie style.
• Salade d’avocat aux crevettes = avocado salad with crayfish.
• Escargots a l’ail = snails in garlic.
• Langue de boeuf braise sauce madere = tongue in Madeira sauce.
• Soufflé aux épinards sauce anchois = spinach soufflé with anchovy sauce.
• Entrecote grillé, sauce béarnaise = steak with Béarnaise sauce.
• Creme brulée = caramel cream.
• Milles feuilles brassiere = flaky Napoleon pastry.
Manzi‘s
1-2 Leicester Street, WC2. Phone: 734 0224. Fax: 437 4864. Hours: Closed Sunday lunch. Price: £60 ($91) for two. All major cards. (E2).
A seafood place just off central Leicester Square, for decades one of the most popular feasting places in town, with an Italian atmosphere. There is no meat on the menu.
The waiters are experienced and informative. The atmosphere is zestful and lively on both floors. Upstairs in the Cabin Room the tone is more relaxed than in the noisy bistro downstairs. The golden rule is to order nothing complicated, just poached or grilled seafood. The raw material is always first class, but the chefs tend to overdo complex courses.
• Avocado and scallops in the shells.
• Fish soup.
• Grilled halibut.
• Poached turbot.
• Strawberry tart.
• Cherry sorbet.
• Trout or skate in black butter.
Maroush I
21 Edgeware Road, W2. Phone: 723 0773. Price: £60 ($91) for two. (C2).
200 meters along on the main street north from Marble Arch, the best Arabian restaurant in town, often crowded with Libyan expatriates.
• Felafel = minced bean and onion balls, deep-fried.
• Shawarma = slices of marinated lamb shaved off a rotating skewer.
• Lebanese salad.
• Stuffed lamb.
• Sweet cakes.
Lebanese and Egyptian cooking are the high points of Arab cooking. Lebanese cooking combines many centuries of commerce and contact with the outside world and the flavor of local produce and spices.
Mijanou
143 Ebury Street, SW1. Phone: 730 4099. Fax: 823 6402. Hours: Closed Saturday & Sunday. Price: £80 ($121) for two. All major cards. (D4).
A perennial London winner in Belgravia, 500 meters from Victoria Station. It is on two floors, one for non-smokers, ruled by Neville Blech. The kitchen is on the split-level between, the domain of Sonia Blech. The restaurant is small, seats 30, but spacious and invites to linger over the cognac at the red and black table linen.
Mr. Blech receives guests as cordially as ever and describes at length the contents of the courses and the methods in the kitchen. The cooking is semi-classic French, with elements of Nouvelle Cuisine and Far Eastern Cuisine. There is a list of about 100 well chosen wines, many are not expensive.
• Terrine de fromage blanc aux fines herbes et legumes avec son coulis de tomates = white cheese, herb and vegetable terrine with fresh tomato coulis.
• Mousseline de coquilles St-Jacques sauce gingembre et citron vert = mousse of scallop with a sauce of ginger and green lemons.
• Mousseline chaude de foies de caille au porto = mousse of quail livers in port.
• Noisettes d’agneau gratinée béarnaise = lamb cutlets gratinated in béarnaise sauce.
• Mousseline de loup de mer au Ricard = sea bass mousse.
• Medaillons de chevreuil au sureau et a l’eau de vie de genievre = saddle of venison with elderberry and juniper gin sauce.
• Panaché de sorbets = three sorbets.
• Fromage glacé aux pruneaux et a l’armagnac = ice cream of white cheese, cream and prunes marinated in armagnac.
• Plateau de fromages = cheese board.
Neal Street Restaurant
26 Neal Street, WC2. Phone: 836 8368. Fax: 497 1361. Hours: Closed Sunday. Price: £80 ($121) for two. All major cards. (E2).
The wild mushroom restaurant of London is in the theater district of Covent Garden, always overflowing with fresh mushrooms. It is an Italian restaurant, appearing to be full of sunshine all the time.
It is a bright and modern place with lots of mirrors and bright flowers. Guests sit bistro-style on sofas along the wall or on chairs opposite. Large windows enlargen the dining room. Geometric abstract painting decorate the creamy walls. The Italian service is very good. Black olives
• Mixed sauté funghi of the day.
• Wild mushroom soup.
• Sweetbreads with mixed funghi.
• Roast grouse and Scottish chanterelles.
• Fillet of beef with poricini sauce.
• Tiramisù.
O’Keefe’s
19 Dering Street, W1. Phone: 495 0878. Hours: Closed Sunday & dinner, except Thursday. Price: £20 ($30) for two. No cards.
Inexpensive and conveniently located near Oxford Street. (Shortlisted for evaluation and inclusion)
Orso
27 Wellington Street, WC2. Phone: 240 5269. Fax: 497 2148. Price: £60 ($91) for two. No cards. (F2).
A simple and popular Italian restaurant with a rustically modern menu that changes daily, hidden in a cellar on a street leading off Strand, just south of Tavistock Street.
The decorative theme of the simple dining room consists of lots of small, black & white photos of movie stars on the pale red wood paneled walls. Quaint wine racks are behind an iron grill. A beutiful parquet graces the floor. The kitchen operations are visible from the dining room.
• Chicken, white bean and spinach soup.
• Pork chops with mozzarella cheese.
• Thin pasta with crab, courgettes and chopped tomato.
• Roast suckling pig with garlic potatoes.
• Chocolate cake with coffee zabaglione.
• Pecorino cheese with pear.
Pearl of Knightsbridge
22 Brompton Road, SW1. Phone: 225 3888. Price: £75 ($114) for two. All major cards. (C3).
A Cantonese China restaurant of quality in tasteful and comfortable circumstances near the Harrods department store, on the north side of the street where it splits into Knightsbridge and Brompton Road.
A bright place with contemporary paintings on the white walls and a red carpet on the floor. Beautiful high chairs of black wood and red seats dominate the modern style. White linen and flowers cover the tables. Service is unusually smooth and friendly and the Chinese music is relaxed. Set lunches are good value.
• Snow prawn ball = minced prawns with crispy shredded spring roll wrapper.
• Gourmet supreme shark’s fin = shark’s fin served with consommé.
• Shark’s fin and seafood bisque = shark’s fin with prawns, scallops and crabmeat soup.
• Pearl lobster = shelled lobster simmered in spring onions and ginger on a bed of fine noodles.
• Sea bass á la Han Chow = deep fried sea bass with sweet vinegar sauce.
• Toffe of apples and bananas.
• Pancake oriental = pancake stuffed with red bean paste.
Planet Hollywood
13 Coventry Street, The Trocadero, W1. Phone: 287 1000. Price: £50 ($76) for two. All major cards. (E2).
An inferior copy of Hard Rock Café, with accepteble food though, on the short street between Piccadilly Circus and Leicester Squere, suitable for observing moneyed young people being relieved of some of their money.
This hamburger joint is not as decorative as Hard Rock Café, with movies as the theme, showing film trailers on a screen. It is been “in” since its start.
• Blackened shrimp.
• Hollywood bowl salad.
• Mexican shrimp salad.
• Grilled sirloin strip.
• Ranch pork chops.
• Cajun chicken breast sandwich.
• Thai shrimp pasta.
• White chocolate bread pudding.
• Caramel crunch pie.
Poons
4 Leicester Street, WC2. Phone: 437 1528. Fax: 458 0968. Hours: Closed Sunday. Price: £35 ($53) for two. All major cards. (E2).
One of many Poons restaurants in London, offering southern Chinese cooking from Canton, adapted to normal Western taste. For a long time the outlet on Leicester Street, just off Leicester Square, has been one of the best examples, simple and animated. In the window you can see wind-dried fowl and fish, advertising the specialty of the place.
Cooking is serious at this restaurant.
• Steamed scallops.
• Wun Tun soup.
• Wind-dried duck.
• Deep-fried squid with green pepper and salted black beans.
• Fried milk with Mandarin brandy.
Quaglino’s
16 Bury Street, SW1 171 930 6767. Phone: 930 6767. Fax: 836 2866. Price: £60 ($91) for two. All major cards. (D3).
An elegant and spacious St James’s basement restaurant with modern English cooking on the east side of the street, almost at Jermyn Street.
Under the observing look of already arrived guests, arriving ones make their grand entrance down a curving Hollywood staircase with is the main theme in the design of this bright and noisy restaurant with white linen on round tables, black benches, black chairs and red tables. Service is friendly and competent.
• Fish cake with parsley butter.
• Rost chicken, bacon and stuffing.
• Orange cake and vanilla sabayon.
• Pigeon salad, french beans and olive oil.
• Braised lamb, kidney and creamed parsnips.
• Pavlova with mixed berries.
Salloos
62-64 Kinnerton Street, SW1. Phone: 235 4444. Hours: Closed Sunday. Price: £60 ($91) for two. All major cards. (C3).
The best Pakistani restaurant is in a back street just off Hyde Park Corner, 50 meters from the Berkeley hotel. Its prices reflect the good cooking.
Mr. and Mrs. Salahuddin receive guests in this quiet and clean restaurant. The decorations are Pakistani, but otherwise the place looks Western. The cooking is done in a tandoori clay oven.
• Chicken in cheese soufflé.
• Mutton porridge.
• Chicken tikka = spicy chicken.
• Tandoori prawns = oven-baked prawns.
• Chicken korma = braised chicken in youghurt.
Pakistani cuisine is influenced by invading nomads, speaking first Indo-Aryan and later Mongolian languages. It is a lavish cuisine based on meat, mainly lamb. Stewing is the most popular cooking method. Clay ovens are also used. Wheat is more important than rice.
Scott’s
20 Mount Street, W1. Phone: 629 5248. Fax: 499 8246. Hours: Closed Saturday lunch, Sunday. Price: £100 ($152) for two. All major cards. (C2).
A classic seafood restaurant in Mayfair, heavily decorated and frequented by ancient customers. Plans are for a refurbishment and an enlargement in early 1996.
The dining room is large and the tables are well spaced. Guests sit in comfortable leaher chairs at well laid-out tables. Heavily decorated and mirrored columns and a flower arrangement dominate the scene. The walls are pink and green, hung with modern paintings. The service is uneven, as there is much arguing between the waiters.
• Beetroot soup with horseradish cream.
• Sautéed wild mushroom salad.
• Seared salmon with grilled vegetables and new potatoes.
• Boiled bacon, mash and mushy peas.
• Sticky toffe pudding
• A selection of ice creams.
Tante Claire
68 Royal Hospital Road, SW3. Phone: 352 6045. Fax: 352 3257. Hours: Closed Saturday & Sunday. Price: £125 ($189) for two. All major cards.
In the deep south of Chelsea, almost by the Thames, with Pierre Koffmann in the kitchen and Claire Koffmann in the dining room, seating only 32. It is best to visit it at lunch as then you are offered a set meal of the day at half the a la carte price. Koffmann’s specialty consists in fine nuances rather than violent contrasts. The menu is short and changing all the time.
It is simple and gracious, the air-condition a little weak when cigar smokers come in force. The French waiters are good professionals.
• Coquilles St-Jacques a l’orange = scallops in orange sauce.
• Coquilles St-Jacques au gros sel = scallops on salt.
• Andouillette de la mer au vinaigre de cassis = seafood sausages with vinegar.
• Barbue au sauce moutarde = brill with mustard sauce.
• Ris de veau au gingembre = sweetbreads in ginger sauce.
• Filet de boeuf et sa sauce claire aux huitres = beef with oyster sauce.
• French cheeses from Philippe Olivier.
Tate
Tate Gallery, Millbank, SW1. Phone: 887 8877. Fax: 887 8902. Hours: Closed dinner & Sunday. Price: £50 ($76) for two. (E4).
One of the most important restaurants in London is in the cellar of Tate Gallery, only open for lunch. It is both known for its extensive and well chosen wine list at reasonable prices and for specializing in traditional English cooking.
The kitchen tries to reconstruct old English cooking, based on known recipes which are printed on the menu, including recipes from Oliver Cromwell’s wife.
• Buttered crab.
• Potted salmon.
• Jean Cromwell Grand Sallet.
• Steak, kidney and mushroom pie.
• Profiteroles.
• Blackberry meringue.
Preserves and pies have always been the hallmarks of English cooking.
Wheeler’s
19-21 Old Compton Street, W1. Phone: 437 2706. Price: £70 ($106) for two. All major cards. (E2).
An institution for decades, with offspring in several places in central London, an old-fashioned seafood restaurant for people over 65 years old. The original Wheeler’s is on the border of St James’s and Soho districts.
Guests sit bistro-style on benches along the walls at small tables or on chairs opposite them. Old pictures of fish decorate the yellowish walls. The Italian service is efficient. Green colors dominate.
• King prawns wrapped with courgette and served with a grain mustard sauce.
• Wheeler’s native oysters.
• Grilled whole baby turbot with mustard sauce.
• Cod and chips.
• Smoked haddock poached with spinach and cheese sauce.
• Berries of the season with clogged cream.
Zoe
St Christopher’s Place, W1. Phone: 224 1122. Fax: 935 5444. Hours: Closed Sunday dinner. Price: £55 ($83) for two. All major cards. (C2).
A multi-ethnic and trendy restaurant with good and robust cooking and a Mediterranean atmosphere just above Oxford Street on the corner of Barret Street and St Christopher’s Place.
The smart and lively restaurant of pleasant service is on two floors with a winding staircase between. The circular tables are well spaced. Walls and pillars are multicolored and there is a noisy parquet on the floor.
• Confit of rabbit, leek and Savoy cabbage terrine with bruschetta.
• Lobster carpaccio, sesame and ginger dressing.
• Scallop roe tartlet.
• Venison cutlets, pink peppercorn jus with roast aquid, saffron and parsnip risotto cake.
• Langoustine and scallop mousse canneloni with aquid ink sauce.
• Baked ricotta cheesecake.
• Sticky toffee pudding with brandy sauce and nutmeg butter.
1996
© Jónas Kristjánsson
