As the saying goes, “When a man is tired of London, he is tired of life”. In terms of food, London has come a long way in the last ten years, and now has one of the most diverse restaurant scenes in the world. Whatever the cuisine, you can find it in London. Although I travel a lot, London has always been my base. Here are some of my favourite places to eat my city;
1. Sweetings
📍City of London. A City of London institution since 1889. Sweetings was originally a Victorian oyster bar and the traditional bar layout with stool seating remains. My recommendation is start with a black velvet (Guinness & champagne) in their signature silver tankard, followed by a prawn cocktail, skate wing for main, then a sticky toffee pudding to finish. After the turbot at BRAT the skate wing with brown butter sauce here is probably my next favourite piece of fish in London.
2. Cafe Francois/Maison Francois
📍St James’s/Borough Market. I’m putting both on the list together as I like both equally. Maison Francois is the original restaurant in St James’s and Cafe Francois is the newer restaurant in Borough Market. My favourite dish at Cafe Francois is the rib of beef with snails. It a thick cut cooked medium rare. They also serve a very good rotisserie chicken with merguez sausage. At Maison Francois I’m a big fan of the dessert trolley they wheel over to you at the end of the meal. London has a lot of great French restaurants these days I could have easily added Josephine Bouchon, Bouchon Racine or Casse Croute to this guide too.
3. Crisp Pizza
📍Hammersmith. This pub in Hammersmith is serving some of the best pizza in London. I’ve been a massive fan of it here guys since they started. As well as their thin round crispy NY-style pies, you can order the thicker grandma style square pies. Book your pizza ahead of time or go on a weekday near opening time to avoid queuing.
4. The Plimsoll
📍Finsbury Park. I’m not the biggest Finsbury Park fan (mainly because there are Arsenal shirts everywhere) but The Plimsoll is easily one of my favourite pubs in London. These guys originally built up a following cooking at The Compton Arms, before crowdfunding and taking over the Auld Triangle in Finsbury Park. I love that the old pub sign still hangs outside. As well as serving a great Guinness, the food is top notch. The menu changes a lot but the Dexter Cheeseburger (still one of the best in London) remains. You’re looking at around £50 a head with a couple of drinks. Not cheap, but more than worth it. Book ahead. Also the owners have another great restaurant up the road called Tollington’s Fish Bar which is an ex fish and chip shop turned tapas bar.
5. Berenjak
📍Soho & Borough Market. Berenjak is in my opinion levels above any other Persian restaurant I’ve had in London or anywhere. All the kebabs are next level but my favourites are the jujeh tond (poussin) and koobideh (minced lamb). On top of grilled meats, the dips are so good I could easily come here and just order a bunch of them with freshly baked bread and have a satisfying meal. Their hummus might be my favourite in London. The Borough Market venue is beautiful and has more space upstairs if you’re in a group but I love sitting by the bar or outside at the Soho venue.
6. Manteca
📍Shoreditch. Maybe my favourite Italian restaurant in London. I feel like this place has gotten better over the years. Manteca are known for their pasta and chops. The menu changes often so it’s hard to recommend anything particular but last time I went I had an incredible tamworth pork chop with crispy salumi potatoes, and two delicious pasta dishes. You’re looking at around £120-£130 for two people if you’re going for meat as well as pasta, with a couple of drinks each + tip. If you just want a pasta, starter and no alcohol it’ll only be around £30pp. I love a buzzing restaurant but Manteca is VERY loud, so i don’t recommend going on a hangover. Some parts of the restaurant are definitely louder than others. It’s great for a date or dining by yourself at the bar.
7. BRAT
📍Shoreditch & London Fields. The whole grilled turbot at BRAT is probably the best piece of fish you’ll eat in London if not the whole of the UK. BRAT is an open-fire Basque influenced restaurant. All the dishes are incredible from the baked breads to start, the seasonal vegetables, chops, and aged steaks. My recommendation is to never visit BRAT with less than 4-6 people. The turbot is big, so if there are only two of you, you won’t be able to tackle much else on the menu. Also the more people you go with, the cheaper the meat will cost. Considering they have a Michelin Star, the vibe is incredible casual. I love the Shoreditch restaurant but in summer time, the London Fields location might be one of my favourite spots for outdoor dining.
8. The Tamil Prince
📍Barnsbury. This ex-pub turned restaurant in Barnsbury is serving up some of the best Indian food in London. The head chef is ex-Roti King so you know the star of the show is going to be the freshly made roti, which you can watch being made in the kitchen window. Other favourites for me are the chicken lollipops, prawns and channa bhatura. Other than the lamb chops the menu is incredibly well priced. They have outdoor seating so it’s great to visit in summer too.
9. Ambassadors Clubhouse
📍Mayfair. Everybody knows JKS have some of the best Indian restaurants in town and out of them Ambassadors Club is probably my favourite. It’s not cheap at all but the food, service and atmosphere is ten out of ten. To drink you’re going to want to get a Patiala Peg which is like a Johnny Black old fashioned. It’s named after a large measure of whisky, measured by the distance between the top of the index finger and the base of the little finger when held against a glass. Every dish was amazing but the butter chicken chops live in my head rent free.
10. Normah’s
📍Bayswater. London has loads of great Malaysian restaurants (you can find my Malaysian restaurant guide here) but Normah’s is my favourite. The restaurant is hidden at the back of Queensway Market in a space with no windows and you have to walk through a phone repair shop to get here. All the food is solid but the standout dish for me is the roti and beef rendang. Normah’s roti so buttery and flaky you’ll automatically want to order more. It pairs perfectly with the rich, coconuty beef rendang.
11. Ibai
📍 City of London. Ibai is one of London’s hottest steak restaurants. Go for the 1kg Galician Blond ribeye from Pontevedra, Spain. The steak is aged for 40-60 days then cooked on open flame. It’s £130 but you can share it between or two or three easily. Another must get item is the croque Ibai – a toastie with carabinero prawn with cheese & honey. It’s a nice light open space and they now have outdoor dining too.
12. The Devonshire
📍Soho. The Devonshire is probably London’s most popular pub. It’s busy from when it opens to closes every night of the week. The Guinness is decent although nowhere near the best in the city (like some people claim). Despite adding an extra floor and cramming in as many tables as possible, it’s still extremely difficult to get a booking here. As soon as bookings open, table are gone. They have a great three course set menu for only £29 which includes a prawn cocktail, steak and sticky toffee pudding, also the Sunday roast is £29.50 with all the trimmings. The beef is delicious, the potatoes are crispy and the vegetables are good too. One starter you’re going to want to get is the iberico ribs. Service has been great every time I’ve been.
13. Knave of Clubs
📍Shoreditch. Knave of Clubs was originally established in 1880 but the building itself (Grade II Listed) dates all the way back to 1735. It was known locally as “The Bird House” because local market traders used to sell songbirds at the pub. In 1980 the pub closed down and became occupied by squatters. In 1994 it was taken over by a French restaurant, Les Trois Garcons, followed by the mac & cheese burger guys, Dirty Bones, then empty again for a couple of years after that. The new owners have restored it back to it’s former glory with the help of photos from the 70s. The menu is simple – Rotisserie chicken, toasties and pub snacks. A whole rotisserie chicken is £38 and comes with roast potatoes, salad, bread and aioli. You can share it between two or three easily. My favourite starter is prawn scotch egg. The food is simple but good. It’s just a nice pub, with good food and friendly service. I’m also a fan of their upstairs restaurant One Club Row which serves some great cocktails and delicious dishes too – see reel here.
14. Brigadiers
📍Bank. Brigadiers is another Indian restaurant from JKS. It’s not cheap but all the food is amazing. The lamb chops are the best in London. They have a pool table, private dining rooms, beer towers and play sports. On Saturdays they often have good menu offers.
15. Osteria Angelina
📍Shoreditch. Osteria Angelina is a new Japanese x Italian fusion restaurant from the guys behind Angelina in Dalston. It’s like Manteca with a Japanese twist. The Shoreditch restaurant is a bigger space, with a bigger menu. All the food I tried was amazing. You can see my full reel here.
16. Wong Kei
📍Chinatown. This is a bit of a controversial pick. The Google rating keeps dropping (it’s now a 3.5) and they were recently fined £42k after dead mice & cockroaches were found in the kitchen, but I keep coming back for one reason only – the food. It’s easily one of my top places to eat in China Town. I recommend the salt & pepper pork chop on rice, lemon chicken, prawn stuffed tofu with aubergine, wonton soup, and roast duck & crispy pork on rice. You can’t complain about free tea either. Still cash only. Expect a Karen’s Diner level of service.
17. St John
📍Farringdon, Spitalfields & Mayfair. One of the most well-known restaurants in London, famous for their nose-to-tail cooking. It was also Tony Bourdain’s favourite restaurant in town. St John are basically the reason bonemarrow started popping up on menus everywhere. The original location in Farringdon is my favourite, followed by Spitalfields (Bread & Wine) and lastly Marylebone which I’m not that much of a fan of. The original location is split into two areas; a casual bar area you walk-in and grab a table, and a white table cloth dining area which has the Michelin Star. The bar menu is smaller but you can still order a lot of the classics like the bone marrow on toast. In my opinion St John is one of the best examples of why British food is great. The only reason it’s moved so far down my list and I haven’t been back in a while is because of their diabolical 1994 prices marketing scam last year.
18. Brutto
📍Farringdon. Probably my favourite Italian restaurant in London. The food at Brutto is a basically a greatest hits of all the top restaurants in Florence. On top of that they serve £5 negroni and spritz. Great food, friendly service, good prices. The must get dishes for me are the dough balls with prosciutto & stracchino and penne with vodka & tomato with a side pot of Parmesan (like at La Vecchia Bettola). It’s hard to book but if you come early you’re likely to be lucky with a walk-in. There’s usually space at the bar. I love nearby LUCCA too but a meal is half the cost here so won’t have you sweating when the bill comes.
19. Singburi
📍Shoreditch. Singburi is dead, long live the new Singburi…. Yeh, we’re all going to miss the old Singburi but times change and being able to get a booking and not having to go all the way to Leytonstone is a big plus for me. If you didn’t know, Singburi was a cult-favourite BYOB Thai restaurant in Leytonstone that recently moved to Shoreditch. I recommend going in a group of four and ordering the whole menu (just like you did with the specials board at the old Singburi). You’ll be looking at around £35 each. All the food was great but my favourite dishes were the raw beef, lamb and pork belly.
20. Sessions Arts Club
📍Clerkenwell. Sessions Arts Club is easily one of the most beautiful restaurants in London. So much so, it was used for a scene in Killing Eve. The cocktails are on point and all the dishes are so well presented. When Marina O’Loughlin came here she said “I find myself doing something I don’t think I’ve ever done before and book another table before I’ve left the restaurant”. They’re open Wednesday-Saturday only. It used to be very hard to get a table but is much easier now.
James Dimitri 