Could anyone familiar with London restaurants give us a bit of help? PaulParkhead and I are going on a rather belated honeymoon journey to London the first week of September, and I would like to fulfill some culinary desires while there.
First, I miss some staples of a diverse city that I used to enjoy in Winnipeg, namely Thai, Dim Sum, and Vietnamese, which are scarce here. We’ll only be there four days, so might not be able to do all of these, but if you know of any quite good but reasonably priced examples, please let me know.
The second thing I want to do is have some ‘fancy’ food, because we watch a lot of Masterchef and I always want to try the stuff that people are swooning over. I’d like to find a place that serves really good-tasting, interesting food that’s perhaps a bit out of the ordinary, but that doesn’t charge a premium for atmosphere. Someplace that’s known for the food, and the decor isn’t really important. I’m willing to splash out a bit on this, but can’t afford like Heston Blumenthal level or anything.
We have a few food intolerances; I can’t handle peppers or any really heavy or hot spices, and Parkhead isn’t fond of fish, doesn’t do invertebrates, and is largely averse to dairy, so it would have to be someplace with a diverse enough menu that we could both find something to enjoy. I’m thinking probably European-style or eclectic food for the ‘fancy’ option, as opposed to, say, South American or African or Asian as such. Proper Italian is quite good, I rather like German and that ilk, and I’d quite like to try French as I haven’t really had it. We both enjoy sushi, but we can get that here and would like to try something different.
Versions of Thai are depressingly common. Plenty of pubs, for instance, do Thai menus. Is it authentic? I’ve no idea.
For Dim Sum, Chinatown is central and surely in all the guidebooks. There is Ping Pong, which tried to roll out a dim sum franchise, but which then overreached and is now a relatively small number of outlets. But I’ve always liked what they do.
Vietnamese? Surely out there. Don’t think I’ve been to any.
If you watch Masterchef and you’re going to be in London and want to try some good French or continental cuisine for a reasonable price, you have to try Gordon Ramsey’s Petrus. It’s a cozy restaurant with great service and immaculate presentation. I don’t know your budget, but it’s pretty much a bargain at £100 per person, (without drinks), for this Michelin-starred restaurant. Honestly, I think Ramsey’s signature restaurant in Chelsea is better in terms of menu fare and overall ambience but you’ll be paying almost double there.
Another option is to go for lunch. You can experience the same menu at a smaller portion for half the price.
Indian is ubiquitous in the UK, and there are some quite good options in our area, the quality of which is probably somewhat lost on me for the most part. Him Indoors loves Indian, me not so much. I find even the milder dishes quite spicy and upsetting to the digestion. Wouldn’t mind a nice big glass of mango lassi, though, I haven’t had that in ages.
We’ll take a look and ask around once we get there, but thought this might be a good place to ask for personal experiences rather than throwing a dart at a list provided by the concierge, heh. Regarding authenticity, I’m probably more keen to find what I’m used to than what’s actually authentic, which can be a problem with the Atlantic cultural divide. I’ve found one Thai restaurant in Glasgow, and was kind of disappointed that they didn’t know what I meant by ‘Thai iced tea’, which is common in American Thai restaurants. I don’t know if that’s an authentic Thai thing or just a Thai-American thing, like all the Indian dishes that were invented to appease British palates. And cumin in the taco seasoning? Really? That’s just weird. Anyway, I digress.
We laughed at the ‘Boiled Egg with UN Peacekeepers’ on that menu.
Now that looks like the sort of thing I’m envisioning, and I imagine it’s not going to be found anywhere for a ‘reasonable’ price by our usual standards, but the lunch suggestion is a sound one. For one huge honeymoon treat it might be worth checking out.
Looking at the Shoe Shop menu, including the blackboarrd specials, and the review by that guy, it’s looking like a feasible contender. There are some interesting looking food options I would like to try, and a steak for Him Indoors that’s not unreasonable. We’ll have to see if it’s open when we’re there. I checked out some of the Gordon Ramsay restaurants, and the ones with the menus I’d most like to try were way-hay-hay too rich for our blood, so this seems like a decent compromise. Thanks for the suggestion.
Since this Board is rather populated by 90% Americans, and, given your dietary restrictions, I’d suggest that you might not get enough replies that help.
Kingsland Road for Vietnamese - see a Time Out overview here. Some of the places along there can be a bit hit-and-miss, so worth looking for additional reviews/ information, rather than just walking into the first one that strikes your fancy.
For other ideas, it’s worth taking a trawl through the Chowhound UK/Ireland board; it’s not the most active forum, but there are often detailed trip reports, which might help you make up your mind whether a particular place would be suitable.
Speaking as a person who lives in NYC, which like London has a vast range of restaurants from ultra-high to ultra-low, you cannot speak in generalities about budget. “Splash out” to one person is “rock bottom cheap” to another. What’s the actual, specific maximum amount of money you can spend per person?
Regarding budget, I can’t really see my way clear to spending more than £100 on a meal for both of us, including drinks, and I would greatly prefer to spend less if possible, as I’m reluctant to spend more than a day’s wages on a meal for two. That puts most of the Michelin-star restaurants out of our reach, but that Shoe Shop place listed further upthread actually looks quite reasonably priced for the quality of the food if the reviews are anything to go by, so I’m definitely going to check them out. Hope the poached pears are on the menu when we do, because that’s one of the Masterchef staples I’ve been wanting to try.
I typically wouldn’t want to drink wine with the meal because I don’t actually like the flavour and it would interfere with my enjoyment of the food. The exception is Retsina with Greek food, which goes really well, and I guess there’s supposed to be similar correlations with other wine and food combinations, but I don’t know enough to pick the right ones so I’d probably just leave it. I don’t know what else is usually on offer for drinks in places like that; if there’s some kind of juice or local specialty soft drink available I’d probably have that, if not, then yeah, probably water, or maybe tea.
I wish I could find the real-world equivalent of Valabar’s from the Vlad Taltos series and afford to eat there, because that sounds like a fun kind of gustatory adventure. Except for the peppers.
I was recently in London and had dinner at Brasserie Zedel. The meal was good, very reasonably priced and the atmosphere was very fun. I felt like I was in a scene from Midnight in Paris.
We will surely check out the guides and ask people when we get there, but I was hoping that somebody here might have personal experience they’d like to share. I’ve had some good suggestions to start with, which is nice.
It also ain’t European. Thanks for the suggestion, but we can go to Wagamama in Glasgow or Edinburgh; I was hoping for something a bit more out of the ordinary.
Someone suggested Le Gavoche, where one might actually get to meet Michel Roux, Jr. if it’s one of his days working, but unfortunately we missed the booking window (three months!), and we probably wouldn’t have met the dress code. That was an aspect I hadn’t considered when pondering the possibilities in the first place. It’ll need to be someplace where Him Indoors can get in without a suit jacket.
I didn’t think the European was a hard limiter - thought that was more as a thought for the dietary restrictions, and was thinking of fun experiences.
However, I DO always forget how close together everything is over there. The closest one to me is in Boston, and that may as well be in London or Edinburgh for as likely as I am to get to it.
Once you do decide and go, let us know which you picked and how they were, because I want to steal ideas for my own upcoming trip in a few years.
That was an aspect I hadn’t considered when pondering the possibilities in the first place. It’ll need to be someplace where Him Indoors can get in without a suit jacket. 