Restaurants

When The Frog E1 opened last summer, I was quick to declare it one of the year’s best openings. One of the absolute best restaurants in east London, in fact. Sadly, so many brilliant restaurants fail to live up to the initial ‘hype’ and ultimately slump into a routine of serving terrible food with slow service, even though booking a table remains harder than Trigonometry. 365 days later, many of these places eventually fail, closing their doors to make space...

Unlike so many other South East Asian cuisines, I’d be surprised if I weren’t the only Londoner unfamiliar with Burmese food until recently. According to Dan Anton, co-owner of Lahpet in London Fields, this is likely due to the relative lack of Burmese nationals anywhere outside of Burma (or Myanmar). Leaving complex political situations aside, if (like me) you are uninitiated, you’ve been missing out. Located in the railway arches of London Fields, at the edge of the park itself,...

Battersea’s new neighbourhood Mexican, Cartel, specialises in hand-pressed tacos, tequila and mezcal. Reassessing all of the moments in life I’d rather forget, tequila has played an integral role in nearly all of them. Teenage recollections of bottom-shelf bottles adorned with synthetic Sombreros, lime wedges and salt almost inspire me to give up the booze, for good. Over the past six years, in fact, tequila has been incremental in the ruination of so many perfectly good shirts, shoes, livers and friendships....

Of the few restaurants I actively choose to visit again and again, few are as charming as The Hinds Head in Bray. With less bells and whistles than The Fat Duck (or Dinner in Knightsbridge) but ritzier than The Crown, each within spitting distance of one another, The Hinds Head is the embodiment of the quintessentially British ‘gastro-pub’, before Gordon Ramsay helped to make the ‘gastro’ prefix seem as desirable as queuing around the block for dinner, in torrential rain....

By Chris Moss  With two major city-centre retail developments completed over the past few years to compliment its historic arcades and renowned Briggate shopping street Leeds is quickly becoming the shopping capital of the north. Following the opening of the "outside-in" Trinity shopping centre which boasts 120 shops, restaurants, bars and a cinema the newly-erected Victoria Gate was opened late last year which is Dubai-esque in stature. The glittering arcade draws on digital wizardry and the city’s rich textile past and brings...

Of all the earth’s gifts, there are few foods that aren’t instantly enhanced by the addition of sesame. So it’s hardly surprising that the prawn toast at duck duck goose, with its thick layer of prawn mousse and vaster area to be coated with toasted sesame seeds, is so implausibly transcendent. A stone’s throw from Brixton’s mainline train station, duck, duck, goose is just one of the restaurants situated within Pop Brixton. Opened in 2015, Pop Brixton is a community...

There aren’t many cuisines that are considered to have a history so rich and of such importance that UNESCO will declare it an Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity, but in 2010 this very honour was bestowed upon the ever-popular and widely celebrated cuisine of Mexico. Take to the streets of its namesake capital city and you will see why. Taquerias line the streets offering Mexican staples such as tacos and burritos and as many street vendors can be seen littered around offering...

A private jet company has designed the ultimate food tour, enabling customers to visit four of Europe’s best restaurants in a single weekend. Following the announcement of the World’s 50 Best Restaurants, private jet booking platform Stratajet has devised the most desirable gastronomic trip imaginable, comprising a total of ten Michelin Stars. Visiting four countries in just two days, the trip is designed to titillate the taste buds, with customers benefiting from the use of their own aircraft to fly them...

One year after originally visiting, Launceston Place (D&D’s restaurant on the Kensington street of the same name) has changed immeasurably. Previously, Chef Raphael Francois’s menu promised so much, but failed to constantly deliver. Yes, the skill was there, but the chef’s passion for cooking, if any, wasn’t presented in the dining room. When last year’s Michelin Guide was published, the restaurant even lost its Michelin star. Now, the first thing noticeable upon entering is the refreshing change of décor. Previously dark...