Welcome to our first instalment collecting the reviews of the national restaurant critics along with a highlight from the blogosphere in one handy space. Every Monday, food writer and blogger Oliver Thring will scout out the best reviews from across the land and summarise them here for your reading pleasure.
The Metro’s Marina O’Loughlin visits the laboriously-monikered Apsleys – A Heinz Beck Restaurant along with ‘a gal who runs London’s pioneering underground restaurant’ (who she? answers on the back of a condiment label). ‘Breads and puddings are tasty,’ O’Loughlin declares, but an odd amuse preludes a ‘spectacular duffer’ of ‘somewhat slimy’ cod with a chickpea mousse ‘like hot hummus, bizarrely adorned with what appear to be Rice Krispies’. She concludes that the ‘overblown’ restaurant is better suited to afternoon tea.
Jay Rayner takes his Guardian column oop to Leeds and the City Café, the restaurant of a City Inn. ‘Nothing bad can ever happen there,’ he says of this ‘smart, unchallenging but reliable bistro’. Fishcakes, spring rolls, risotto, chicken confit and a chocolate brownie with peanut butter ice cream are all ‘accomplished, proper cooking’.
Fay Maschler goes to a new high-end Italian, Babbo, in Albemarle Street. It shares the same name as Mario Batali’s famous joint in Greenwich Village, New York, but Maschler finds the portions ‘doll’s house fare’. A salmon and leek risotto is like ‘damp, spineless kedgeree’ and at £22 plus service is ‘paltry value’. The wine list contains ‘little or nothing of interest under £40 a bottle’ and The Standard’s critic calculates the mark-up on a single dish to be almost ten times the cost of the ingredients. She finishes with a comparison of nearby Dolada and detects a Mayfair trend for ‘insouciantly priced Italian food’.
Giles Coren (The Times) is the latest in a throng of critics trooping to the ubiquitous Polpo. The food is ‘nothing to get over-excited about’ and not in the same ‘league’ as nearby Bocca di Lupo. Arancini, meatballs, calf’s liver and pizzettas are ‘old-fashioned Soho trattoria stuff’; his companion’s morning-after text reads ‘Great dinner, despite the food’.
Guy Dimond gives a rare five-star Time Out review to the revamped gastropub The Princess of Shoreditch. ‘This is a kitchen with ambition,’ he announces, while warning readers to ‘abandon hope of a cheap pub meal’. Cider-braised pork belly is ‘colourfully decorated with a purée of this, a splash of that’, while a chocolate fondant is ‘done properly’.
Bloomberg’s Richard Vines is also hanging out in Shoreditch, at Pizza East. He likes the restaurant but is unimpressed with the pizzas, particularly the base: ‘a chewy concoction with a big uneven crust’. Unusual toppings (veal meatballs, prosciutto, sage, lemon, parsley and cream) appeal, but overall he’s convinced that ‘this is one of those restaurants where the experience is better than some of the food … Pizza East? It’s pizza least’.
Zoe Williams of The Telegraph heads to the largely unfurrowed restaurant soil of Sheen and The Victoria gastropub. ‘I wanted every single thing on the menu’, she raves. Curried mussels with sourdough are ‘robust but creamy’, while a Provençal fish stew is ‘all redolent fennel and Frenchness’. Puddings ‘screeched into mediocrity’, but overall she finds this ‘thoughtful, careful, upmarket cooking’.
AA Gill ventures back on African soil after Baboongate, visiting Algiers with the restaurateur Maroud Mazouz, who owns Sketch and Momo. It’s not strictly a restaurant review (though Momo gets a plug at the end), but it’s worth reading as a typically stunning piece of travel writing from The Sunday Times critic.
Blogger LondonEater chugs west to revisit the great Sushi Hiro by Ealing Common. ‘Still the best,’ he says. ‘For the money, Sushi Hiro is unbeatable. The fish is superb, the rice is terrific, the venue could not be more atmospheric’. He accompanies his review with some gorgeous photos and links to an interesting article on sushi etiquette.
And I went to Bom Jardim in Lisbon for fantastic roast chicken and chips.