FOOD & DRINK Food in London can be
dreadful, and can be fantastic (generally if money
is no object.) However, unlike Paris where you're
guaranteed decent food for about £10 a head,
in London be prepared to spend double that - and the
quality varies so much you can't just walk in and
expect to eat well, unless you're from America's
'fly-over states'... Outside London the picture is
bleak indeed. It's not that the Brits can't cook: we
have a fine array of great chefs and some of the
best restaurants in the world (the Fat Duck in Bray
outside London vies with El Bulli in Spain for that
title, and the deputy chefs from both restaurant
have their own establishments now in South East
London) it's just that to eat well costs so much.
Think £50/$90 a head and then some at a good
restaurant, or one that's any way near fashionable.
We think the best strategy is simply to survive
without injuring your wallet or digestive system. If
your visit to London is part of a European tour,
save gastronomy for France, where it's cheaper. That
said there are a number of perfectly good, cheapish
(for Britain) restaurants where we eat regularly -
you'll undoubtedly meet us there if you follow our
advice. A final groan: English social life revolves around
alcohol to a degree we've not seen anywhere east of
Poland. It's difficult if you take alcohol in
moderation. The average Brit likes to get drunk, and
then roar up and down the street in an aggressive
manner, before vomiting and going for a curry. This
is not new and was the chief complaint of 18th
century visitors like de Sassure - his descriptions
of London life ring true even today. Dostoievsky
remarked on the Londoners' rowdy consumption of
alcohol and a leading Moscow journalist told us: "In
Moscow we have a problem with alcohol, it is true,
but in London you have a bigger problem with
drunkenness."
Good Cheap eats For cheap eats the axis that runs along the south
side of Leicester Square (Irving St and Panton
Street) is a magnet: old faithfuls like the Stockpot
& the West End Kitchen serve cheap and cheerful
food, very similar to what a stereotypical English
family would eat at home (Lancashire Hotpot,
Shepherd's Pie, Fish and Chips etc) and the
competition between these neighbours drives the
price down. There's also a Chinese and an Indian
buffet, and a branch of the Singaporean veggie
chain, Woodlands. Wagamamma ( a decent basic
choice if you need a restaurant and rated London's
most popular restaurant, though the prices have gone
up and the quality between restaurants varies a lot,
and it's noisy) have premises in the basement of an
Irving St block. However, the area can be a bit
busy, and you can do better by venturing further
afield. Remember that thie higher the rent the lower
the food quality for any given price...
Tai
Decent quality vegan and vegetarian
food at 10 Greek St in Soho and other central
locations. The buffet is £6 (£5 at
lunchtimes) and the quality of the food is very
acceptable (it's the only vegan place we'd eat at) -
all presided over by a taskmistress of a Hong Kong
owner. There's another very good value buffet
('Buffet V') at 40 New Oxford st St, between the
British Musuem and Holborn tube. Diwana Very interesting cheap and tasty southern Indian food, a world away from the curries of the north that form the basic staple of the average British curry house. Excellent lunch buffet with dishes we'd never seen before, canteen-style, cheap and very good service. In Drummond Street, NW1 a block north of Euston station in a street dominated by South Indian culture, and amazing asian sweet shops Website Highly recommended.
Ecco/Icco
No nonsense pizza, salad, panini,
coffee house at 46 Goodge St, a favourite of the
local television and advertising industry and often
full of bicycle couriers. Pizzas are £3, and
are freshly made before your eyes. Very relaxed - a
good supply of newspapers, sit outside in good
weather. The only cavil we have is with the cheap
aluminium seats. They're expanding over London, and
about to slightly change their name due to a clash
with another company. Called the Italian Coffee
Company or Icco variously. Also at 186 Drury Lane ,
Covent Garden (Ecco) and 40 Strutton Ground in
Victoria near the Cathedral (Ecco)
Wagamamma
trendy canteen-style noodle house, haunt of students
and anyone with an eye for a bargain, full meal can
be had for £10 (including drink). Fresh,
healthy food, with attitude:All over London
including: Wigmore St (behind Selfridges), Bond St,
Streatham St (near British Museum), Lexington St
(between Piccadilly and Oxford Circuses), Camden
Lock, the Royal Festival Hall South Bank, Covent
Garden (south of the Market) and Leicester Square
(Irving St).
All
Bar One & Slug and Lettuce Two
chains that serve decent food. All Bar One is
targeted at women and has the obligatory sofas,
their menu is reasonable - for about £7-8 a
head you can eat quite well in all branches -
however some won't serve children. The Slug and
Lettuce chain is another brand. Both are friendly
and offer good service and are seemingly everywhere
across town, and the UK. Avoid on Friday nights as
get very busy and loud, and on Saturday nights after
2100. At other times they can be very user-friendly
and though they don't have smoke-free zones the
aircon is efficient. Fish
and Chips - we're a great fan of this
fatty, carb-laden snack. Costs about £3 - add
your own salt and vinegar. Less available in the
city centre than it should be. Please avoid cod or
monkfish as they're being overfished. Far more
information than you'll ever need about fish and
chips can be found here
Cheap
Curry: at the Indian YMCA: see below.
Cuisines French/Algerian
Momo, on Heddon St, off Regent St, is the most
fashionable, and we think, best. Madonna and other
stars hire out the whole restaurant for entertaining
friends. Their cafe is excellent for afternoon or
early evening snacks and costs 1/4 of the price.
Moro at 34 Exmouth Market, just south of King's
Cross is also excellent, if a bit far out for most
tourists. Cheaper is the Souk, between St Martin's
Lane and Charing Cross road, a few metres away from
The Mousetrap.
Sushi-bars:
none but the most expensive rivals Kyoto or
Vancouver in quality, but they can be a good source
of cheap food: Gilu Gulu on St Martin's Lane and
Ikkyu on Newport St in Chinatown offer all-you-can
eat for around £12, which is a good deal.
Ikkyu have a better branch on Tottenham Court Rd,
just by Goodge St Station. There's also a good
concentration down Brewer Street in Soho (just north
of Piccadilly Circus)
Chinese:
much of the chinese cuisine in London is
authentically chinese - ie: lowbrow, rather than
Hong Kong or San Francisco style, though of course,
all markets are catered for. Remember that 'Chinese
food' is like 'European Food' and there is a long
distance to travel between pickled herring and
fettucine. An authentic chinese restaurant will have
dual menus and be full of Chinese eating stuff
you've never seen before, unless in China itself,
and maybe not even there. A case in point is 'My Old
Place' in Petticoat Lane (Liverpool St) where we're
usually the only westerners, but it's friendly and I
can guarantee you'll eat stuff you've never
experienced before - for example the shredded chili
potato or any of the Szechuan dishes. Beware the
tastes here can be extreme.
Persian Cuisine is often over-priced, for example on Edgware Rd but there are bargains to be had: Mahdi on King St, Hammersmith ( a stone's throw from Ravenscourt Park tube) is a favourite, extremely cheap and authentic, full of Iranian families. Fermented buttermilk is the thing to drink and the stews and bread are fantastic. They were prosecuted for the state of their kitchens a few years back but have cleaned up their act since then. We eat there regularly... we've worked in 4* kitchens and have seen things that would make your stomach turn ( in one posh hotel, meat dripping onto the trifle, mould on the sponge and very fermented fruit) and have never been put off eating at Mahdi.
Thai
food in London can be expensive, but is usually
good. Our favourite, and the best is Esarn Kheaw,
(Southern Thai/Royal cuisine) 314 Uxbridge Road,
Shepherd's Bush - a bit far out for passing trade -
we live 10 miles away and eat there for the
food. The Blue Elephant in Fulham also gets
good reviews, but isn't cheap
Vietnamese
there's a Viet enclave in Hackney/Shoreditch - just
north of Liverpool Street (Shoreditch or Old Street
tubes are nearest) - it lies on Kingsland road just
south of the Geffreye museum. Unpreposessing
surroundings but very good food - The Viet Hoa, Tay
Hoa are OK but the best of the bunch is the Song
Que Cafe - virtually next door to the
Geffreye Museum - we regularly eat there. A much
better bet than Brick Lane curries if you're in the
area and want to eat ethnic - Shoreditch/Hoxton area
is brimming with restaurants brimming with media
types so there's a lot of competition. We eat at the
Song Que at least once a month and it's one of our
favourites, not least because it's extremely cheap
(try beef in betel nut, soft shell crab, fresh
rolls, any of the soups).
Indian
(sub continental) - Britain's favourite food -
official. Indian food in England is very good, if
not authentically Indian. Actually it's mostly
Bangladeshi, but if you can find Pakistani cuisine
it's worth seeking out. The best 'Indian' food comes
from up north, in places like Bradford, but there's
little else there worthy of attention. Actually some
of the best Anglo-Indian restaurants in the world
are in London, which has taken the cuisine to heart,
refined it and amplified it. In particular the style
of 'Balti' cooking, which was invented here, like
Chop Suey was in San Francisco. Basically it means
tasty, fresh ingredients and seasoning, and should
be cooked in a small wok, and brought to your table
in it. Served with bread, not rice. It's even been
endorsed by no less an august body than the British
Medical Association, as an excellent source of
minerals (they leach out of the wok into the
food....)
Persian/Afghani/Cypriot
inhabit a strip called Green Lanes in Finsbury Park
(Manor House tube, then walk north with the park on
your left. Persian and Afghani food up here is good,
but there are some Turks and Cypriots too (Check
Hardens for which is the best). There's another
turkish/cypriot enclave at the very top of Kingsland
road (vide supra) - the restaurants are OK but many
of the cafes are not women-friendly.
Vegetarian
- easy to find in London (use the Harden's website -
see our guidebook page for details) and even in
carnivore dens the vegetables aren't cooked with
lumps of meat as they are in France. South Indian
cuisine is vegetarian and there' a whole row of
restaurants on Drummond St by Euston Station that
never have to use a cleaver. The various branches of
Cranks (eg Charing Cross, Goodge St) - the best is
reputed to be Champor- Champor (they also serve
meat) in Weston St, SE1, near Borough Hospital.
Belgian
- used to be something of a cult, restaurants like Belgo
made Moules Frites a habit in the 90s - but maybe
it's just their range of Strawberry and other
flavoured beers (heartily recommended). Their
special offers (lunchtime, early evening before
18:30) offer excellent value - otherwise they can
work out expensive. The decor is great. An
experience. 50 Earlham St, Covent Garden, also in
Chalk Farm, Ladbroke Grove, Upper St,
Islington.
Our shortlist of more expensive restaurants is here.Afternoon tea Eating/Hanging out Areas:
Soho
- high rents here mean low value. The average
restaurant works Mon-Fri to pay their rent (the land
is controlled by a handful of landlords) and only
make profit at weekends. Plenty of restaurants and
coffee bars (not cafes), but we've had as many bad
as good meals here. It's a great area to hang out,
great buskers, streetlife and a colourful history -
though small fry compared to Paris' rive gauche. The
Poets Rimbaud and Verlaine used to hang out here,
getting horribly drunk at their favourite bar on Old
Compton Street (Number 5) then staggering from pub
to pub round the area. - St Christopher's Place very pleasant area with a European feel, just north of Oxford Street, with restaurant seating out on the street. Shepherd's Market - sheltered enclave in Mayfair, just north of Piccadilly - great for a summer's evening. Currently under development so we can't predict what will happen to the area. Marylebone - villagey feel to this small, wealthy, area between Oxford St and Marylebone St. The Borough - great for alfresco lunch on a Saturday, at Borough Market. Has 'Maria's Cafe' and the Monmouth Coffee shop - two of the best places for breakfast in London. Maria's has moved into the main market and lost its 'greasy spoon' premises. Monmouth do an 'open table' where you pay £2.50 to eat as much as you can of a top-quality continental brekkie. Nb: VERY busy on Saturdays when the Organic/gourmet market is on. Great place for breakfast other days of the week, or for buying fruit 'n' veg at 4 in the morning. Also a (small) number of decent restaurants on Bermondsey St. London Bridge tube, including Magdalen on Tooley St/Magdalen St - the chef is fresh from the Fat Duck. Brick
Lane - noted for it's curries, and
at the north end it's salt beef. Stays up til very
late, but can be a bit difficult transport-wise.
Liverpol St or Aldgate tubes. Hoxteth - ugly but trendy area, once full of curtain and cloth making warehouses, now converted into trendy bars, clubs and restaurants. Transport difficult - Liverpool St or Old st tubes. Hampstead - another village, but with a million pound price tag. Expect the likes of Sting or Naomi Campbell to complain if you order meat. Upper Street This main thoroughfare through Islington is famed for the concentration of restaurants - the New Labour conquest of Parliament was planned at Granita at Number 127, and there are very few shops between the restaurants. We recommend Turkish cuisine - due to competition the price and quality are in opposition. If it weren't for the traffic this would be a great hanging out place, and Islington Green would be a major pull. Notting
Hill Large concentration of
restaurants both north and South of the tube
station. On Kensington Church Street, which runs
south they tend to the fashionably expensive, and
clustered around Portobello road and All Saints Road
there are many trendy restaurants with a slightly
lesser price tag. It's also a centre of the largely
overlooked soft drugs trade - around Park Road -
made fashionable (again) by Bridget Jones (at number
192). Drink Beer - although Czech/German bottle beer is popular, traditional British beer should not be looked down on just because it's served at 'room temperature' (actually cellar temperature) and has a name like 'Old Scroat's throat remover'; the tradition of 'real ale' is a good one, given the economic climate and monopolisation of the market by a few companies. Real Ale is an acquired taste, but once acquired is rarely abandoned. Microbreweries often brew something that's a cross between standard and real ale. Most pubs are owned by brewing companies and won't
sell other beers - perhaps a 'guest ale' like old
scroat's but generally pub ownership is seen as a
business like any other. A Free House, rarer, can
sell what it likes. Look out for a sticker for CAMRA
the real ale accrediting body. See our Nightlife
Page for details and pub recommendations.
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