Fun with chalk and blackboards at the Odeon Covent Garden.

The Odeon Covent Garden has always had terrific film introduction game. Usually, a screen is devoted to one film only, but I've noticed they've recently mixed it up a bit more, so there's more variety in the films they show.

Here are two introductions that tickled me, whether it be for the font, wording used, or in the latter case, the creative way they squeezed five film titles onto one board!

Of course, this BBFC nerd's eye was drawn to how, coincidentally, all five of these films were 15-rated! Although one of them really ought not to be.

Restaurant review: EAT TOKYO (Covent Garden)

Over the past few months, I’ve been to Eat Tokyo twice, and if I’m ever in Covent Garden and struggling to decide on somewhere to eat, this restaurant will be at the forefront of my mind.

Just with Dishoom and On the Bab, it doesn’t take reservations and you have to queue. This suggests the restaurant cares more about profits than comfort of its customers. However, the fact that there are always droves of people queuing outside the Covent Garden branch of Eat Tokyo means that these people deem the food is worth queuing for.

The first time I dined there, I had a salmon teriyaki bento box. There are a variety of bento boxes at Eat Tokyo, ranging from sashimi, chicken katsu and vegetarian. They range in price, but the most expensive bento box is £18. These two are both less than that (~£16 and £8.50, if I remember correctly):

Authentic Japanese food at its best!

Restaurant review: STICKS’N’SUSHI (Covent Garden)

Despite meeting Per Mertesacker at Sushisamba, I’ve never actually dined there, and thus the mantle of fanciest sushi restaurant I’ve been to is Sticks’n’Sushi at Henrietta Street, London.

We had the ‘Gala’, which, at £75, wasn’t cheap. The option included Beef Tataki, Edamame, Hotate Kataifi, Nigiri, Chicken with chili & teriyaki, lamb chop with miso herb butter and duck breast with panko & wasabi Caesar, so there was plenty to fill two people’s boots!

Restaurant review: BARRAFINA (Covent Garden)

On my birthday (18^th April), I ventured out of my cheap and cheerful and/or Groupon-bought dining comfort zone and celebrated in style with an altogether more upmarket dinner at Barrafina.

The restaurant specialises in Spanish tapas, and after the nightmare that was Salvador and Amanda with all their short-cut taking, I was naturally, a little hesitant.

I needn't have worried; Barrafina has restored my faith in Spanish tapas in London.

Here are some pictures:

Restaurant review: TGI FRIDAY'S (Covent Garden)

I've been to several TGI Friday's across the UK (Reading, when my family and I were checking out universities, Bath when I was there doing my undergraduate degree and Leicester Square just for an impromptu delicious meal one evening), and it's a chain which I have never been disappointed with.

Last Tuesday, me and three others were dithering over where to get dinner (Belgo was being suggested as an option, but I wasn't enamoured with it when I'd visited Belgo three years ago) in Covent Garden when I clocked a TGIF, confident that that represented a much better option.

And of course, I wasn't wrong. We were served by a bubbly waitress, who asked us if we were celebrating anything. Although it wasn't the cause of our get-together, I had just passed a critical PhD landmark, and one of the people I was with mentioned this. I didn't expect that to lead to anything, but she very kindly gave me this gorgeous and delicious slice of cake for my troubles!

Bar review: ADVENTURE BAR AND LOUNGE (Covent Garden)

Continuing with my reviews of bars and restaurants in the Covent Garden is Adventure Bar, which boasts a healthy menu of creative drinks and generous Happy Hours. I probably saved a bit more money than I would have spent in the presence of Happy Hour, with a Groupon voucher that entitled the buyer to six cocktails for £24. 

Unlike some other Groupon deals which restrict you in the choice of food and drink you can buy with your voucher, this deal was valid on all the cocktails. An Old Fashioned and 50 Shades of Earl Grey were the first drinks sampled:

Restaurant review: BYRON (Covent Garden)

I’ve had mixed fortunes when it comes to burger joints in London. Places like Tommi’s Burger Joint and Prime Burger were so awful I wouldn’t recommend them to my worst enemy, and other venues which don’t specialise in burgers, seem to treat them as an afterthought (Maxwell’s Bar and Grill, be ashamed. Be very ashamed). Still, due to the sheer majesty of the burgers I’ve had such as Bird, I still haven’t up hope in the capital’s ability to produce delicious burgers just yet.

Byron definitely delivered on the burger front. I had the Smoky burger, with the meat cooked medium rare, and that, along with all the ingredients (mature cheddar, streaky bacon, crispy onions, shredded iceberg, pickles and smoked chilli) rendered this a verifiable feast for the taste buds. You know it was tasty because normally I would object to paying £10 for a burger and no sides, but in this case, I feel the money was well spent. The way all the ingredients complemented each other and bought out the succulence of the steak… heaven.

Restaurant review: MAXWELL'S BAR & GRILL (Covent Garden)

Just adjacent to Covent Garden underground station is Maxwell's Bar and Grill an American-style diner of TGI Friday's ilk.

Bar review: SCARLET'S (Covent Garden)

Scarlet’s is a bar that I’d visited quite a few times when it was called ‘The Verve’, but last weekend was the first time I’d been to the bar under its new name.

The drinks were pretty much the same as they were when I’d visited two years ago, although I did notice some pretty unreasonable inflation: the Pornstar Martini sharer was now £25. In 2015, it had been £20. Come on! 

Graciously, Happy Hour is still between 5pm to 8pm in Scarlet’s, where it’s Buy One Get One Free on cocktails and cocktail sharers/pitchers. Lamentably, it’s one of those inconvenient Fifty Five Camden-style Happy Hour deals where the two drinks you’re buying have to be the same, which is less than ideal because invariably, someone has to compromise and forgo their first choice.

Restaurant review: BRASSERIE MAX (Covent Garden)

About two or three times a year, I deviate from my questionable practice of dining at mediocre restaurants using Groupon deals (and then absolutely destroying the dumps on my blog, and give patronage to restaurants which don't need deals in order to get custom. Although such an act (of paying full price for a meal) doesn't strike most as out of the ordinary, when I do, I always feel like Charli XCX, in that 'I'm so fancy', and it means I've gotten to eat at some pretty awesome places.

I had the Thanksgiving dish, which, given the time of year, I felt was apropos:

Restaurant review: FIRE & STONE (Covent Garden)

(I'm making my way through the backlog of pizza places I've visited in the last few months, but not yet made the time to review!)

Restaurant review: HI SUSHI (Covent Garden)

As my little adventure three months ago should illustrate, I bloody love sushi. The idea of paying a fixed amount and then stuffing my face is right up my alley, although at Yo Sushi there was a time constraint.

At Hi Sushi, the restraint is that you can eat as much as you want within reason, that is, you get a huge quantity of everything, more than you could want, and are allowed to make "orders" on top of that. This detracts from the buffet-style quality that Yo Sushi had, but on the upside, the quality of the sushi supplied is noticeably better:

It was a while ago that I went, so unfortunately my memory of the actual names of items is a little hazy. However, in the photo above, I loved everything served other than the brown thing on the left.

In terms of the quality/quantity trade-off, I would say that this place has the beating of Yo Sushi. Prices are about similar in the two, but in Yo Sushi they're fairly brazen about the fact that for £19.50, you won't be tasting any of their premium stuff. Pretty much everything I had to eat in Hi Sushi was premium, carefully crafted and satiated by taste buds wonderfully. 

Thus, it is very probable that I'll be saying Hi to Hi Sushi before I re-say Yo to Yo Sushi.

Grade: A