Brook Green Restaurant Guide

“It’s hard to be ‘special’ with pizza these days with so much competition, but the eye-catching options give an edge” to this popular nine-strong chain, whose calling card is a choice of four different 48-hour fermented pizza bases, including the distinctive black vegetable charcoal. Their latest opening is in Canary Wharf.

A “perfect neighbourhood spot” near Brook Green – “Michele and Heidi’s wonderful home from home” thrives on their “warm welcome”, “honest” and “reasonably priced” Italian food and “lovely wine list”. Most fans are local, but one or two cross London to visit.

2021 Review: “Grotty-looking, but serving top steak!” – that’s been the trade-off for over two decades at this “intimate and special”, but simultaneously “fairly basic” little quirk of a bistro, in the backstreets near Olympia. “If you like good steak then this is as good a place to start as any: its excellent meat, cooked perfectly, takes some beating”, and is supplemented by an intriguing wine selection of well-chosen bin ends. The N19 branch is no more.

This “dependable neighbourhood bistro”, on a busy stretch linking Hammersmith and Shepherd’s Bush, combines classic gingham tablecloths with a menu inspired by Provence – favoured holiday destination for proprietors Lawrence & Emily Hartley, who previously operated the site as Mustard.

This “lovely local pub with decent food” behind Olympia has been a significant presence on the West London gastropub scene for almost 30 years, with its distinctive blue-tiled facade and elevated menu. Long-time regulars feel “it’s not like it was in the old days” (when folks flocked from miles around), but they still feel it’s “good all round”.

“Great food and drink, especially pizza” makes it worth remembering this stylish (if sometimes noisy) Olympia pub-conversion, a few minutes’ walk from Brook Green (part of the Oak group).

This West London pair of Indian street-food canteens, in Ealing and Hammersmith, elicits little in the way of commentary this year but wins its usual solid ratings for food and service.

Need somewhere civilised to meet for an informal business lunch or catch-up with a pal in Hammersmith? Then it’s well worth remembering this convivial haunt, improbably located in the cellars of a large Grade II mansion (Bradmore House – nowadays a coworking space) marooned in the middle of trafficky Hammersmith Broadway, right by the tube. A short menu of simple fare is well-prepared and service is friendly. Top Tip – nice terrace on a sunny day too.

This “cheerful” and “enjoyable” Hammersmith haunt carries a good selection of wines and its kitchen offers modern bistro food – but ‘La Cave’, its coffee house, generates the most feedback this year, for its “friendly staff”, “superb coffee” and “the best chocolate brownies”.

2021 Review: “Just around the corner from Olympia”, it’s worth knowing about this well-rated pub, in the not-particularly-auspicious northerly reaches of the North End Road. In the same stable as Earl’s Court’s excellent Atlas, it delivers “a very enjoyable meal, with a good quality menu and a lovely atmosphere”.

“This unassuming pub tucked around the back of Hammersmith’s one-way system serves good and hearty Mediterranean food”, in particular some “lovely pasta dishes” – “don’t miss the penne with Italian sausage ragu”. It’s also a “top sun trap for early-evening drinks on the patio”.

This tasteful backstreet 1980s Italian, with interesting art on the walls, sits in the no-man’s-land between Kensington and Olympia; and has become less well-known since the death of Michael Winner ten years ago (who used to plug it remorselessly in The Sunday Times as his favourite restaurant). Its quiet virtues as a high quality and authentic venture have changed little over the years: “still love this venue, but best to go in the week when the kitchen isn’t too busy”. Top Menu Tip – go for fish and seafood here.

2021 Review: “I started eating at Alounak when it was in a container in a car park round the corner” over twenty-five years ago, and this Iranian café over the tracks from Olympia remains a “favourite BYO” to this day, with its “consistently good Persian comfort food”: in particular “superb kebabs”. (A Bayswater ‘Alounak’ is still in operation, but seems now to operate independently of W14.)

2021 Review: “In the heart of Walthamstow Village”, this “great neighbourhood spot” – a Spar supermarket with kitchen attached – wins praise for its “quality” cooking (“the 2019 Harden’s description of pub-type grub underplays its standard and originality”). “Very relaxed and welcoming for young children”, the venture’s best-known innovation is bacon jam, which you can buy by the jar in various flavours. Other branches have opened in Hackney and, most recently, Hammersmith (somewhat better-served areas, so these respective branches are somewhat less of a local lifeline).

“A go-to favourite vegetarian… they have been going for 30 years” – this small group “still maintains high standards” with “very imaginative dishes that will even please your meat-eating friends”. The W6 original – a characterful space, above a church behind Hammersmith’s Eventim Apollo – is the most popular, but its spin-offs near Sadlers Wells and in Seymour Village are also well-regarded.

All spent out at Westfield? Head for this large first-floor eatery within the much-less-glam’-looking West 12 Shopping Centre on the other side of Shepherd’s Bush Green. Reports on the all-you-can-eat £15 pan-Asian buffet are few, but The Guardian’s Grace Dent in late 2022 was a fan, describing a “vast” array of “feisty flavours” (with diverse dishes from as far afield as Canton and West Sumatra) whose “pleasing” prices spark “joy through dark times and ransacked wallets”.