Not too many reviews in critics’ corner this week with Marina O’Laughlin’s and Fay Maschler’s columns absent from the Guardian and Evening Standard respectively. We shall have to muddle through without their pronouncements and hope for a return next week. Among the reviews that caught our eye were three for D&D London’s latest dining behemoth, […]
We kick off this week’s review of the reviews with a corker. Everyone should read Marina O’Laughlin’s scathing dissection of NYC interloper Hotel Chantelle in the Guardian, if only to hear the phrase ‘le wanquerie’, from the woman who brought us ‘Mayfair Wankpits’. From the food, to the service, to the very reason behind the […]
AA Gill is back at the Sunday Times’s Table Talk column with a bang as he reviews London’s hottest new opening – Richard Caring’s improbably named Sexy Fish. He finds its a tale of two restaurants; the ostentatious room itself which ‘comes on like one of Ron Burgundy’s pick-up lines’, and then there’s the food […]
This week saw a double helping of reviews for Richard Caring’s latest Mayfair venture, the lavishly appointed and ludicrously (yet somehow brilliantly) named Sexy Fish. Both the Evening Standard’s Grace Dent and the Telegraph’s Joseph Connolly paid the Berkeley Square newcomer a visit, and opinion was very much divided. Grace, being the meeja dahling that […]
Alan Pickett’s (sort-of) eponymous solo venture Piquet in Fitzrovia gets a double dose of restaurant reviews as both the Standard’s Fay Maschler and Tracey MacLeod of the Independent pop by to try the chef’s Gallic-influenced British dishes. The Indy’s critic finds the service surprisingly stiff and the venue strangely deserted. Fortunately the food also receives […]
AA Gill’s Table Talk column in the Sunday Times is back after a summer hiatus and we discover he’s been in Italy all this time – lucky him. Perhaps the holiday has brought out his softer side as he gifts the reborn Locanda Locatelli at the Hyatt Regency hotel a rare five out of five […]
If the hipster-driven dude food revolution was prompted by the 2008 recession then, according to Giles Coren at The Times, the arrival of Sackville’s in Mayfair (an opulently expensive ode to beef and truffles) is a sure sign the hard times are well and truly over… “There would be exposed brick, bespoke cocktails and an […]
No egg puns were used in the writing of AA Gill’s review of Egg Break in the Sunday Times, but no punches were pulled either. He hated the place, from the bottom of its ‘Fritzl memorial lounge’ basement to the top of its ‘counter-cultural, recycled, reclaimed, ironic’ name sign. And is this the least appetising […]
The Observer’s critic-in-chief Jay Rayner heads to Levanter Fine Foods in Ramsbottom in search of thick-cut Galician beef steaks. Unfortunately they hadn’t arrived yet, but that didn’t stop him enjoying everything else that Joe Botham’s Spanish restaurant had to offer. “We run up a bill of £60 without any booze, but with the lobster, which […]
These days sustainability doesn’t mean sacrificing quality as great produce can be found locally or through fair trade importers. Partake of some fantastic food as you do your bit for the environment by choosing your dining destination with a little help from our friends at the Sustainable Restaurant Association, who’ve assessed all of these restaurants across the […]