Name: Dorian
Item: Dorian
Rating: 3
Author: Harden's editor

Harden's says

Proper restaurant pedigree at this bistro in Notting Hill, which opened in October 2022: founder Chris D’Sylva, the owner of two high-profile local food shops, Notting Hill Fish + Meat and Supermarket of Dreams, has brought together a team including chefs Max Coen, formerly of Frantzén, Kitchen Table and most recently Ikoyi; George Williams, formerly of River Café; and Kai Menneken, of Phil Howard’s Church Road in Barnes. Ben Whitfield, a former general manager of Brasserie Zédel, runs the front of house, while the drinks come under Ale Villa, most recently of Clare Smyth’s nearby Core.

Summary

Price*

£125

£££££

Food

Good

Service

Average

Ambience

Good

* Based on a three course dinner, half a bottle of wine, coffee, cover charge, service and VAT.

“Justifiably winning its first Michelin star this year, this gem of a ‘neighbourhood’ restaurant is another sublime addition to the booming Notting Hill foodie scene” – that’s still the most popular take on Chris D’Sylva’s in-crowd sidestreet haunt. “The ambience is hectic as the restaurant is always full and the tables quite tight”, but fans say “this only adds to the sensation that you are eating in a real destination”. Overseen by chef Max Coen, “excellent fish and delicious roasts” are perhaps to be expected given D’Sylva’s connection to the nearby Notting Hill Fish Shop and Supermarket of Dreams; and “sitting at the bar watching fire-grilled meats and sampling deliciously creative little bites” can be “one of the absolute gastronomic pleasures of the year”. Even its supporters, though, acknowledge that “it’s absolutely not a dinner that will be easy on the wallet” and – given the “crowded and loud” setting – sceptics increasingly conclude the place is “overhyped” and “far too much of a scene”: “Well, it is in Notting Hill, a territory of the super-rich, but surely even they consider VFM?”

Summary

Price*

£51

££

Food

Very Good

Service

Very Good

Ambience

Exceptional

* Based on a three course dinner, half a bottle of wine, coffee, cover charge, service and VAT.

With Chris D’Sylva’s background (Notting Hill Fish Shop and Supermarket of Dreams) “the ingredient quality was always going to be superb” at this “constantly buzzing” new ‘bistro for locals’, which has instantly become something of a “modern classic” for the Notting Hillbilly in-crowd. Chef Max Coen “manages to make decadent dishes seem simple” (“steak is to die for”; or “feast on the most melting buttery liver pâté”) and “counter seats are excellent for kitchen watching” – “you get the cooking show and a fantastic atmosphere with lots of interesting fellow diners”.

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Have you eaten at Dorian?

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105-107 Talbot Road, London, W11 2AT

Restaurant details

Recommended For Business Yes

Dorian Restaurant Diner Reviews

Reviews of Dorian Restaurant in W11, London by users of Hardens.com. Also see the editors review of Dorian restaurant.

andrew d

Excellent food not a bad dish ...

Reviewed 1 months, 12 days ago

"Excellent food not a bad dish "

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Ant G

Spectacular ... every plate was a total del...

Reviewed 5 months, 18 days ago

"Spectacular ... every plate was a total delight. The partridge was rarer than i would have prepared myself but how wrong was i. The chicken liver parfait may be the best dish in London. superbly looked after by a young dinamic team, can't wait to get back"

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What the Newspaper Critics are saying

The Times

Charlotte Ivers was mightily impressed by the bistro food “done impeccably well” by 28-year-old Max Coen at this high-profile and much-praised restaurant. He is, she said, a “remarkably talented” young chef who has worked at Frantzen in Stockholm and Ikoyi in central London.

She was less impressed by Dorian’s profile as “young and cool” and its pitch as “a bistro for locals”. “This, quite obviously, is untrue. The guests here are rich — £4,000 jackets on teenagers. Investment rich, not salary rich.”

“In this sense,” she lamented, “the whole of London is becoming like New York. I hate it.”

Charlotte Ivers - 2025-04-06

The Observer

Miquita Oliver became the latest TV presenter to guest-review for The Observer (is she perhaps a permanent appointment? She named the recently departed Jay Rayner as “my predecessor”). Her target was the fashionable restaurant that now occupies the site of her first ever employer, Coins Coffee Store, around the corner from where she grew up in pre-gentrified Notting Hill with her mother, TV chef Andi Oliver.

“For three months in 1996 I washed dishes and made scrambled eggs in the very same kitchen where Max Coen and his exquisite team today present a menu of truly refined decadence.”

Dorian, she says, has that special atmosphere – that “quasi holy feeling” – which “as we all know is what makes a great restaurant a truly great restaurant”, the only negative being the “relentless thrum of mediocre dance music” that is endemic to restaurants.

Miquita Oliver - 2025-04-13

Daily Mail

Tom Parker Bowles admitted rather shamefacedly that he had been “a little over-refreshed” when he visited this high-profile restaurant soon after it opened two-and-a-half years ago, so a review had slipped his mind. So he put that right now with a belated but breathless rave.

Even Tom could only snag a table at 2.30 on a Wednesday afternoon, but he feasted happily on rösti and white crab – “hot potato, cool crustacean” – followed by a grilled skewer of rabbit and squid – “exalted surf and turf” – and a main dish of “a vast bone-in ribeye, cooked rare, hewn from a special crossbreed of cattle, born and raised in Yorkshire, and aged on site”.

“Head chef Max Coen is one hell of a talent, ably supported by one hell of a brigade… It’s not cheap by any stretch, but this is precise, grown-up cooking, with a total mastery of both technique and flavour. The whole place pulses with pure, unfettered delight and service is as warm as it is slick.”

Tom Parker Bowles - 2025-04-13