Chelsea, French Restaurant Guide

“Just like being in Paris” – this “classic French brasserie” in a Chelsea backstreet is “a perennial favourite”, run by “a strong core team who have been here for ages”, with patron “Didier Garnier keeping a close eye on things”. It’s “always full with many locals”, and is also a “great place to dine with business colleagues – good food and service guarantee you can concentrate on the business at hand”. A key feature is “possibly the best-value wine list in London, especially if you are a fan of Rhone and/or Claret” (and with “a good selection of half bottles”).

The ‘f-word’ is increasingly applied to the bills here, as well as the famous TV show that created the celebrity of the world’s most famous chef, of which this “unassuming door in a quaint little Chelsea street” is the original flagship. “You might mistake the venue itself for a townhouse: the dining room is actually quite small and intimate”: nitpickers would also say “the decor is a bit dull” and “looking a bit dated”; and with “an ambience bordering on stilted”. Feedback on service likewise ran the whole gamut this year – from “impeccable”… to “perfect, but without displaying any personality”… to “ice-cold and robotic”. Perceptions of the cooking are also very varied, and hard to isolate from both the expectations raised by three Michelin stars and the “eye-watering prices”. Fans say it’s “the treat of the year” with “fabulous” cuisine: be it from the three-course à la carte for £180 per person, the longer ‘Menu Prestige’ for £210 per person; or the ‘Carte Blanche’ surprise menu for £260 per person. But dishes can also seem “pretty but over-engineered”; and even some who think the food here is “enjoyable” sometimes acknowledge “it doesn’t merit three Michelin stars”. Real doomsters just find the restaurant’s ongoing renown “baffling – if this was a new restaurant I don’t think it would even get one star”. And then there is the cost. Even diehard fans say “the pricing is the top end of the top end” (and that “you do get stung on the drinks”). And those who consider it “the most overrated place ever” just say: “don’t waste your money!”

In Old Church Street, Chelsea, the first pub from the Gladwin brothers opened in mid 2024 – the latest addition to their ‘Local & Wild’ stable of restaurants supplied by the family farm in West Sussex (which includes Rabbit just up the King’s Road). The grand late-Victorian tavern on a corner site was lavishly renovated as recently as 2021, when it was known as ‘The Chelsea Pig’.

“A superb location in the temple of Michelin House” – this famous destination occupies a space originally created by the late Sir Terence Conran in 1987 and was, in its time, an icon of London’s restaurant renaissance. As a design classic, it can have an “amazing ambience” – particularly at lunch when it is lovely and light-filled – but strike unlucky and the space can also seem oddly characterless. Chef Claude Bosi has staged his own culinary renaissance here since 2017 and his intricate (some would say “over fussy”) modern French cuisine has won the place an impressive two Michelin stars. But buoyed by such acclaim, prices have risen to a level that a very high proportion of reporters in our annual diners’ poll now consider excessive, and – though its ratings are solid – enthusiasm for the place was muted in the commentary we received this year.