One of London's best at a price you can afford and other London, United Kingdom Restaurant Reviews

Restaurant Name: Clarke's

A small and intimate venue for a special treat.

One of London's very best restaurants at a price that's at least manageable (expect to pay GBP 50 a head without wine). There is no choice - you get what Sally Clarke chooses to offer you on any particular day, but you can guarantee that it will be superbly cooked in the nouveau-Brit style from the very best ingredients. What separates a good restaurant from a great one is the trimmings, of course, and all the bread is freshly and imaginatively baked on the premises, and the hand-made chocolate truffles will make you think you have died and gone to heaven. The shop next door sells the bread and truffles, so if you can't afford the restaurant, you can at least splash out in the shop.

Have pre-dinner drinks in the Churchill Arms (qv) across the road.

Favorite Dish: The bread and the truffles. There is no menu as such, you get what you are given on any particular night.

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Theme: Eclectic/International
Comparison: more expensive than average
Prices: US$41 and up  » Currency Converter
Phone: 0 20 7221 9225
Address: 124 Kensington Church Street, W8
Directions: Notting Hill Gate tube.

Restaurant Name: A Cooke and others

Never mind the sort of junk food you get the world over, pie and mash with parsley liquor is London's very own soul food. It pre-dates fish 'n' chips and although you won't find pie and mash sold in the main tourist areas, it still hangs on in pockets around the fringes and still attracts a loyal following from some surprising people.

The pie will be best beef, the pastry is delicious, the potatoes mashed to perfection and the parsley liquor much nicer than it looks (it's bright green!).

Traditionally, eels are served as well, stewed or jellied. Personally I can take or leave the eels - it's worth bearing in mind that the eel became a London speciality in the days when the Thames was so filthy only eels could live in it!

Favorite Dish: Pie, mash and liquor

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Theme: Local
Comparison: least expensive
Prices: less than US$10  » Currency Converter
Phone: 0 20 8743 7630
Address: 48 Goldhawk Road W12
Directions: Goldhawk Road tube

Restaurant Name: Goddards Pie House

Goddard's traditional pie and mash shop in Greenwich has adapted to a more cosmopolitan world by offering a wider range of pies than is traditional, with alien side orders like baked beans. But it still does the real thing as well (the liquor was a bit thin for my liking but that's a small point). Judging by the queues on a Saturday evening it remains extremely popular with the locals.

Unusually for London's pie shops, it's licensed, though a cup of tea is still best!

Favorite Dish: Double pie, double mash and liquor, with a cup of tea to wash it down.

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Theme: Local
Comparison: less expensive than average
Prices: less than US$10  » Currency Converter
Phone: 0 20 8293 9313
Address: 45 Greenwich Church Street SE10
Directions: Greenwich DLR stop
Website: http://www.pieshop45.freeserve.co.uk

Restaurant Name: Costas

Very friendly and unpretentious family-run Greek chippy serving perhaps the best fish 'n' chips in London. There are rival claims of other places of course but you can bet that famous places like the Seashell in Lisson Grove or the infernal Harry Ramsdens have big business conglomerates behind them with corresponding advertising budgets.
You may have worked out that I dislike chains.

Nearby Geales is in all the tourist guides and used to be really good - cheap, chaotic and a great place for rubbernecking local celebrities out "slumming it". Now it's changed hands and trades on its reputation. Stick to modest Costas!

Favorite Dish: Haddock and Chips. All of the fish here is cooked to order and the portions in the sit-down restaurant at the back are enormous and excellent value for money.

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Theme: Seafood
Comparison: less expensive than average
Prices: less than US$10  » Currency Converter
Address: Hillgate Street, W8
Directions: Notting Hill Gate tube

Restaurant Name: North Sea Fish Bar

Yet another good and famous (not always synonymous) chippy, close to the centre this time in Bloomsbury, close to St Pancras parish church.

This one is within a short walk of Euston, St Pancras and Kings Cross stations, as well as being handy for the British Museum and the landmarks of literary London.

Favorite Dish: Haddock and chips.

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Theme: Seafood
Comparison: less expensive than average
Prices: less than US$10  » Currency Converter
Phone: 0 20 7387 5892
Address: 7-8 Leigh Street WC1
Directions: Euston or Russell Square tubes

Restaurant Name: The Nautilus Fish Bar

Another very good and well-thought of chippy which stands out from the crowd, this time to the north of the centre in the Kilburn/West Hampstead area.


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Theme: Seafood
Comparison: less expensive than average
Prices: less than US$10  » Currency Converter
Phone: 0 20 7435 2532
Address: 27-29 Fortune Green Road NW6
Directions: West Hampstead tube

Restaurant Name: Ye Olde Cheshire Cheese

The Cheshire Cheese ought to be a tourist trap, but somehow it's never really caught on. It's still very popular with the legal crowd who fill this neighbourhood from Monday to Friday, though Fleet Street's hordes of newspaper folk have long abandoned the "Street of Shame".

This is an absolute must for all those seeking out the authentic atmosphere of bygone London.

At weekends it's quiet, and this dark tavern with its gas lights and coal fires and great oak settles can have changed little since Charles Dickens frequented it, though Dickens might be intrigued to find the descendents of Abel Magwitch and Wilkins Micawber serving behind the bar. It's older than that of course, and the ghosts of Johnson and Boswell stalk its gloomy passageways and staircases.

Technology has arrived, however, in the form of the pagers you are given when you order food from the Cheshire Bar at the back, though even these have a satisfying clunkiness as a paper strip vibrates and a big red light flashes when you are summoned to collect your plate.

Favorite Dish: Samuel Smith's Old Brewery Bitter from Yorkshire at the astonishing (for London) price of GBP 1.67 a pint!

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Theme: Pub/Brewery
Comparison: less expensive than average
Prices: less than US$10  » Currency Converter
Address: Wine Office Court, EC4
Directions: Temple or Chancery Lane tubes. Down an alley off the north side of Fleet Street

Restaurant Name: The Windsor Castle

Comfortable locals pub - though be aware that the locals are some of the wealthiest people around! The pub is old-fashioned and unspoiled, with secluded nooks and an outdoor (but partly covered) eating area.

I always found this to be a great pub for entertaining visitors, especially Americans, who love the snugs and the traditional food.

Favorite Dish: Honest pub fare with top quality ingredients. The organic sausage and mash is excellent. The sausages are quite possibly from nearby Lidgates (qv)

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Theme: Pub/Brewery
Comparison: less expensive than average
Prices: less than US$10  » Currency Converter
Phone: 0 20 7243 9551
Address: 114 Campden Hill Road, W8
Directions: Notting Hill Gate tube

Restaurant Name: El Vinos

El Vino's has been reddening the noses of newspaper hacks and Queen's Counsel for as long as anybody can remember. Horace Rumpole dropped in here for a glass of Chateau Thames Embankment (though he called it "Pommeroys"), after a hard day in the cells under the Old Bailey.

Most notorious for its long and bitter campaign to maintain the refusal of service to women. I note the place for historical and literary reasons, not for any great affection for it. Still, it's full of atmosphere.


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Theme: Wine Bar/Wine Tasting
Comparison: about average
Prices: US$11-20  » Currency Converter
Address: 47 Fleet Street, EC4
Directions: Temple tube

Restaurant Name: Lisboa Patisserie

This genuine Portuguese café with its great coffee, mouth-watering pastries and real Portuguese customers used to be an anomaly and now it's thriving. On a Saturday morning in November it was packed out both inside and at the pavement tables.

The best time to go though is on a summer Sunday morning, when there is no market and all is peaceful. When I lived nearby in Chesterton Road, this is where I came for breakfast on Sundays - early though because the seats outside are very popular when the weather is good.

When I first wrote about the Lisboa Patisserie I remarked on the down-at-heel nature of the area. I've revisited since then - the area is definitely improving as the old Notting Hill moves north, driven on by celebrity and the rocketing prices it brings.

Another café over the road is clearly a Portugeuse/Irish crossover. Called the "O'Porto Patisserie". :)

Favorite Dish: Coffee and pastries

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Theme: Coffeehouse
Comparison: less expensive than average
Prices: less than US$10  » Currency Converter
Phone: 0 20 8968 5242
Address: 54 Golborne Road W10
Directions: Westbourne Park or Ladbroke Grove tube