Restaurant review: KIMCHEE (Holborn)

I was so delighted that Parasite rightly won Best Film and Director at the Oscars this year (as you can probably tell by me proudly wearing their merch!), that I had an informal victory lap in its honour. This involved having several drinks celebrating its win, but the most specific bit of celebrating I did was dining at a Korean restaurant, Kimchee.

Sadly, Kimchee did not serve the ram-don that was made so iconic by the thrilling scene in the movie, but it did serve bimbimbap, kimchee, pajeon, and various other staples of Korean dining, so I was excited to visit it, hoping that it would join On the Bab, BimBimBap and Gogi Korean Bar and Grill in the pantheon of fabulous Korean restaurants I’ve visited in London.

But this wasn’t to be. The food at Kimchee was awfully overpriced for what it was:

Those portions of kimchi are tiny, yet it cost £5!

Restaurant review: MAI SUSHI (Kings Cross)

Eat Tokyo is my favourite Japanese restaurant in London. Their dishes are marvellous, so reasonably priced, and their meals are both flavourful and healthy. Because of this, I've dined there over ten times, and it's become my go-to Japanese place when I don't feel like researching other places.

Concerned that Eat Tokyo was becoming my favourite due to my own laziness and inertia, I decided to scope out its competition. As part of my job, I have tutorials for professional actuarial qualifications in Kings Cross, and I saw that Mai Sushi, which has a very salubrious TripAdvisor rank of being a top 1,300 restaurant in over 19,000 in London, was located in the vicinity of where my classes were. Thus, I decided it would be rude not to go there for lunch one day.

To start, I had veggie tempura. It was nice, but for £6.50, the structural integrity of it could have been more precise, robust (John Wick Chapter 2 reference, ehehe). You get roughly the same quantity of food for the same price at Eat Tokyo, and the one at Eat Tokyo is much more satisfying.

There were a few sushi boats on the menu at Mai Sushi. On one of my countless revisits to Eat Tokyo, I had actually tried a boat once, pictured in the centre below:

There's something about a whole lot of sushi, all laid out together, that I just can't resist, and the quality of the salmon at Eat Tokyo is unparalleled.

Restaurant review: KOUZU (Belgravia)

I bought a voucher to dine at Kouzu on BuyAGift. The restaurant fancies itself an upmarket Japanese restaurant, and the deal retails at £49 ordinarily, so I will be assessing it as if I paid this amount for the deal (in fact, I got a fair bit off the price due to a discount code, but I’m aware discount codes don’t occur all the time).

The starters were perfunctory. With regards to the salmon, if they were going for the 'high quality and low quantity' vibe that's typical of many high-class restaurants, they really needed to work on the presentation, because what is photographed below doesn't scream 'high-class' to me:

Restaurant review: DAWAT (Tooting)

I could have South Asian cuisine for dinner most evenings, and Tooting boasts two great Pakistani restaurants, situated across the road from each other, to ensure that you never get tired of going to the same place.

My comments about Lahore Karahi pretty much all apply to Dawat, with regards to affordability, portion sizes and the no-frills dining experience. However, of the two, I think Dawat just edges it, because, from my two visits to Dawat, I felt their ingredients were fresher. See the photo below:

Restaurant review: LAHORE KARAHI (Tooting)

A friend recommended Lahore Karahi to me as a tasty, cheap curryhouse, and being an ardent fan of both Pakistani food and bargains, I ventured to South-West London to investigate. I have now been to Lahore Karahi twice, and here are my impressions of the dishes there!

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: GOGI KOREAN BAR AND GRILL (Warwick Avenue)

Having done my Masters (part-time, over two years) very close to Tottenham Court Road, I was able to indulge in all the Korean restaurants in TCR’s vicinity, which certainly gave me an appetite for the cuisine. This fondness was cemented by On the Bab, one of the best restaurants I’ve been to, by far, and recipient of a coveted A-grade on this blog.

One part of my Korean dining experience that was sadly lacking, however, was that of the Korean barbeque. This is where Gogi, situated about a ten minute walk from Warwick Avenue underground station, came in.

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: DISHOOM (Shoreditch)

Dishoom’s reputation precedes itself. Due to great word of mouth, the Shoreditch venue, as with the Covent Garden venue, which I have also been to, doesn’t allow bookings unless the party is of six people or more. If you’re in a party of five people or less, you have to queue on the door, with the length of the queues ranging from half an hour to an indefinite period of time.

The menu claims these prawns are 'succulent'. They tasted dry to me.

Restaurant review: HISAR MEZE BAR (Orpington)

I took my friend Joy here last month for her 26th as a birthday present, before we watched La La Land together. I'm glad to say the restaurant was significantly better than the movie, which epitomises the song, 'Is that all there is?'

Review: JERKKIES (Farringdon)

Spending in excess of a fiver for my lunch is not really my modus operandi, something you may have gleamed from my last blog, where I reviewed a bunch of Easy Cook noodles, all which retailed at 45p a pack or less. Another life hack I am extremely fond of (even if my waistline isn’t), is that every Monday, the Metro have promotional vouchers for McDonald’s, where you can get fries and either a Big Mac, McChicken sandwich, Quarter Pounder or, my personal favourite, filet o fish, for a mere £1.99.

These are two very purse-friendly options, but too much of anything can make you sick, so I strove to take advantage of my office’s Farringdon location to exercise some variety with regards to my lunch, and sample some of the local talent. And that’s how I found myself at Jerkkies, a fast-food joint that claims to produce ‘authentic Caribbean cuisine’.

I had the lunchtime deal, which was one of a selection of chicken dishes (or vegetarian equivalent), along with rice and Peas/ white Rice, steamed vegetables/green Salad and plantain for £6.50. I went for the chicken stew, because the gravy which the chicken had been cooked in looked (and smelt delicious).

I was happy with my selection, given that the element I could control turned out to be the best part about the meal. The stew had a fabulous taste, even if individual pieces of meat in it were hit and miss – some were succulent, other parts tasted bland and chewy. 

There were other missteps in the takeaway container, too. The white rice and peas had been lazily cooked, and the vegetables were soggy and low-quality. These components, graciously, were redeemed by the plantain, which I doused in generous amounts of sweet and sour sauce (it was free, so naturally, I helped myself), and tasted heavenly, the s&s sauce really coaxing out the plantain's texture.

So overall, a satisfying amalgam of flavours, where the tantalising taste of the stew masked some of the cooking shortcuts the chefs made with regards to the vegetables and rice. It was certainly a memorable lunch in a week where I’d been feasting on noodles. I’m glad I sampled Jerkkies, and I have no doubt that I’ll get a craving for the unadulterated in-you-face character of its creations one day in a few months, and saunter back. But for £6.50, I was hoping for more.

B

Review: Wetherspoon’s Thursday Curry Club

I’m a huge fan of cheap and cheerful dinners. Most pub meals tend to fulfil the latter by virtue of them being in a pub, and thus me being merrily tipsy when I’m eating it, hence the ‘cheerful’. But I also recall the majority of these pub meals also tend to be annoyingly pricey for what they are, which is just a glorified microwave job which either ends up being burnt, or tasting bland.

Wetherspoon’s Curry Club, which I had a chicken korma at yesterday (pictured above) may well be a microwave job, but it still tasted great, and the garlic naan bread (for which there is an uplift of 20p) was as yummy as anything I’ve had in various authentic curry houses. Included in the £6.69 price is also a choice of alcoholic or non-alcoholic beverages, of which I had the Coors Light, which washed down the korma a treat.

All of this amounted to very satisfying (and filling) gastronomical experience, which has gone some way to purge memories of the last terrible curry place I visited, the foul The Cinnamon. More like the waiters there were Sinnermen, amirite?

The gold standard for something doing exactly what it says on the tin.

Grade: A-

Restaurant review: KOI SUSHI & NOODLE BAR (Finchley Road)

I went to Koi Sushi & Noodle Bar last year on a Groupon deal, which entitles the bearer to 306pieces of sushi. Truth be told, it wasn't the best deal Groupon have sold me.

The decor in the place is terrible: faded tables that are so rickety, I wouldn't be surprised if they were lifted from a garbage disposal. The toilets smelt extremely bad; one suspects that they're washed once a week, if that. 

The restaurant is short-staffed and the waiters are rude and inattentive. You're supposed to get unlimited green tea with the Groupon offer, but we only got two refills, because each time I raised my hand to try and get the waiters attention, he either pretended not to see me, or told me curtly 'later'.

The food was horrifically basic. As you can see in the photos, the sushi rolls were wrapped in plain rice, and the ingredients used for the meat or vegetables inside it tasted strange, like they were past their sell by date, but the chefs would try and hide it by dousing it in sauce. Maaaaate. Your punters have tastebuds. We won't be fooled that easily. Lastly, the rolls were tiny in size, and 18 measly pieces per person did not suffice for dinner.

Even the attempts to make the food look aesthetically pleasing were half assed: the picture above indicates the chef had tried to dress it up with some sauce, but then decided the punter, who had only come in with a deal they bought on the internet, after all, didn't merit such decoration to their plate.

Verily I say, don't be tricked by the £14.80 Groupon deal. Do you tastebuds a favour and just go buy a large box from Itsu or Wasabi, where the ingredients they use at least aren't bottom of the barrel. Your body will thank you.

Grade: F

RESTAURANT REVIEW: Andrew Edmunds (Soho)

The last time I dined in a European/British restaurant in Soho was in March, when, following a good first impression from 10 Greek Street, I went there again. The second time round, I had the massive beef dish to share, and as with the duck sharer, it was fantastic. As 10 Greek Street fared so well both times, I thought favourably of traditional, quaint-looking restaurants in Soho, and decided to sample the cuisine of Andrew Edmunds.

The whole dining experience did not disappoint. As with 10 Greek Street, the menu changes on a daily basis, and is written on blackboards on the walls. Once I deciphered the practically illegible handwriting (one of my few gripes with Andrew Edmunds), I opted for this deliciously soft cheese which was so light it almost melts in your mouth. It was absolutely delicious, and if, in the vicinity of £8, a little overpriced for what it was, just justify it to yourself by saying that you deserve a treat now and then!

This was the same logic I followed for the main, wherein I chose the scallop risotto. Here it is, and yes, it did taste as delicious as it looked:

Although the portion was a little on the miserly side (I could have easily devoured twice the amount that was offered to me, but I do concede that part of the art of tantalising a food blogger's taste buds is to ensure that they're left wanting more, so I would whine too much about that), but the flavour was wonderfully rich, and somehow, the chefs managed to make asparagus a sexy ingredient. That takes some doing. The blend of the rice and the fish were perfect, and unlike many a seafood dish I've had in London, I could tell that scallops were of high quality, rather than just leftover supermarket stock. (naming no names. Ahem).

Factor in a fine collection of wines (no Sainsbury's wine being flogged here), and all in all, Andrew Edmunds made for a thoroughly fulfilling Saturday evening post-concert dining experience. If the managers of the restaurant could find a way to digitise the daily menus, or, even simpler, employ someone other than that person who attended one calligraphy class they bought on Groupon and are desperate to exhibit the ‘skills’ they acquired in that seminar, and just up the portion sizes a tiny bit, then the place would be even better.

Grade: A-

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Second trip to 10 Greek Street

By far, one of the best dishes I've ever eaten in my entire life. I'm bumping 10 Greek Street's grade up from B+ to A.

REVIEW: Christmas Dinner at The Fable (Holborn)

The Christmas package at The Fable consisted of a three course meal, bubbles when we arrived and after the meal, and an entire floor rented out for disco dancing, complete with DJ.

The food

I had seafood for starters and main, and I regret nothing! The starter was a little sparse for my liking, but it certainly succeeded in piquing my hunger for the main, which is pictured, but the photo really doesn't capture the full deliciousness of it. There were tiny pieces of crayfish embedded in the rice in addition to the seabass, making this heaven for seafood lovers like me!

There was a nice selection in the cheeseboard, which is what I chose for dessert, although the jam (orange block at the back of the photo) wasn't liquid enough to spread across the biscuits, unfortunately, so you ended up eating that separately, as you did with each piece of cheese.

The dancefloor

The dancefloor was absolutely huge and very well staffed; you could go to the bar and be served promptly. My only issue was with the DJ, who was fairly set in his ways. I requested 'Goldigger' by Kanye West, as that is one of my all-time favourite disco songs, and he didn't play it for ages. It wasn't until I prodded him again that he did. This wouldn't have mattered if the music that he did play instead was good, but it was infuriatingly inconsistent. For every 'Uptown Funk' there would be some undanceable 80s track that he'd obviously shoe-horned in, thinking he was appealing to the older audience, but it wasn't working. So my advice to the DJ is to, ironically, do a little bit more listening to what his people want in the future.

Restaurant review: ERMEI SICHUAN (Chinatown)

The food was plentiful, and, some of it, delicious. The egg-fried was good compared to some of their lazier neighbours, and the liquid element of the chicken soup (pictured at the far right) was precisely what one needed on a blisteringly cold January evening. 

However, the actual chicken component of the soup itself tasted underdone, and the meat thing (bottom, centre) was full of cheap fatty pork and practically inedible.

Restaurant review: TIERRA PERU (Angel)

I booked a Groupon deal to try out the seven-course tasting menu at Tierra Peru. By my count, that makes it the first Peruvian restaurant I’ve ever been to. In terms of ease of using the Groupon deal:

• I called up in advance to book a session a few weeks before the time we actually went, and the only permissible time windows were 6pm and 8pm, which was inconvenient for me given it was a Friday and we wouldn’t have gotten to the venue from work in time.
• The time slots available on the weekend fitted my schedule better, so the second time I tried to arrange a session, was more successful.
• About 50% of the Groupon/LivingSocial deals I try out stick a tip on at the end of the meal, so I wasn’t surprised when they tacked one on here. However, the value of the tip was 12.5%; more than the service merited.

As for the deal, there were some non-entities (starters were a tasteless mound of rice), but overall, they were a culinary delight. 

My favourites were the cheese balls, the potatoes and the prawns (the latter of which there was lamentably little of). My least favourite plate was the pork, and I would have liked less of the chickpeas for some more meat instead.

Another shortcoming over dining at Tierra Peru was a bottle of Inca Kola was £5 for a big bottle, when it didn’t come with ice and tasted far too warm for my liking. 

Overall, I enjoyed the dining experience there, but for the price of Groupon, the tip and the drink, there didn’t seem to be much in the way of "discount".

Grade: B

For more of my restaurant reviews, click here. If you would like me to review your restaurant, drop me an email at lemon_and_lime7@hotmail.com

Restaurant review: CABANA (Shepherd’s Bush)

A day out shopping in London just isn’t the same without a fulfilling meal at the end of it, and Brazilian barbecue chain Cabana has set up sticks in both Westfield Stratford and the Shepherd’s Bush venue, which is the one I visited. With colourful, welcoming interiors, and jaunty Portuguese crooners singing in the background, I probably would have paid it a visit sooner rather than later, but the fact that they accepted Tastecard made eating there even more desirable.

At the time we visited, Happy Hour was also taking place, and I had a Red Tail Parrot, which went down a treat (but was suspiciously lax on the alcohol, disappointing, given it cost £7). My friend had the Dream Team 1970, which he wasn’t a big fan of, but I thought was fine – the bitterness suited the taste of the cocktail.

As for the food, starters were delicious but far too small had they retailed at the price in the menu, sans Tastecard. £3.95 for three small little rice balls simply didn’t impress. Throughout our time in Cabana me and Joe likened it to Nando’s (despite the latter being Portuguese, the former Brazilian), and whilst Nando’s is a bit overpriced for what it is, at least I wouldn’t feel awful eating there without a Tastecard. Cabana’s prices are fine with Tastecard, but without, nothing short of extortionate. I ate my starters in no more than four bites.

As for the pulled pork burger I had for the main meal, I wasn’t sold. Pulled pork is one of my favourite ingredients, and I’ve had many a delicious meal from my old work canteen with pulled pork in it, and my mouth still waters when I think about the pulled pork from Joe’s Southern Kitchen. I don’t even know how you can get it wrong. But the pulled pork from Cabana was lamentably, on the tasteless side. Pro tip to the chefs in Cabana: sticking a Brazil flag on a tasteless, tiny burger doesn't make it more succulent or larger.

Overall, I’d recommend the place if you have a Tastecard, but sadly it doesn’t pass the ‘would I eat there for the original prices posted on the menu?’ acid test. The food was perfectly satisfying, but take a look at the picture of the burger for yourself – is that worth £10?

Grade: B

For more of my restaurant reviews, click here. If you would like me to review your restaurant, drop me an email at lemon_and_lime7@hotmail.com

Restaurant review: LAL QILA (Goodge Street)

I had a cheeky peruse of TripAdvisor after I went to Lal Qila and prior to beginning my review. I was absolutely gobsmacked to see it was ranked 52nd of all the restaurants in London. Punters must have gone to a different restaurant to me.

Alarm bells rang as soon as I asked if the waiters could hang my coat up for me. Imagine my surprise (and chagrin) to learn that they didn’t have pegs to hang coats up on! What’s the point in having such lavish interiors (as Lal Qila certainly did), if you don’t even have a basic necessity such as coat hangers?

With my mac slung over the back of my chair, we turned to ordering drinks. I distinctly remember ordering a beer, because that's my modus operandi at restaurants, but the waiters seemed to decide to ignore me entirely, and serve me a Coca Cola, under the guise that that was what I asked for. I know damn well what I asked for, and that definitely wasn’t it. When I asked for the correct drink to be presented to me, the waiter went about a bout of trying to re-write history, and convince me that that was what I ordered. It was giving gaslighting.

Now, to the food. To its credit, it definitely wasn’t the worst Indian restaurant I’ve ever been to – that would be Tandoori Nights. But it sure as hell wasn’t close to coming to the best. I had a mellow cheese-infused dish, which was inoffensive but also unexciting. The rice was soft but tasteless and the Na’an bread utterly uninspiring. All in all, Bland with a capital B.

I have pored over the TripAdvisor page and it definitely links the same address of the Lal Qila I went to. Perhaps the 52nd best restaurant in London had to be accessed by walking into a wardrobe in the place I went to, Narnia-style. Because the place I went to definitely wasn’t it.

Grade: D

For more of my restaurant reviews, click here. If you would like me to review your restaurant, drop me an email at lemon_and_lime7@hotmail.com

Restaurant review: NIZUNI JAPANESE RESTAURANT (Charlotte Street)

Situated on Charlotte Street, a road that is both close to my University and boasting some great restaurants (the previously reviewed BiBimBap being one of them), Nizuni is an elegant, dimly lit Japanese restaurant which serves a range of Japanese dishes, with sushi being its main draw.

We ordered two different sets of sushi, a nizuni set (in honour of the name of the restaurant, I thought it would be rude not to) as well as a 10-piece sushi selection. Both were utterly delicious (great quantities of fish and the sauces were tantilising), but frightfully overpriced. The 22-piece nizuni set came to £39, which averages to almost £2 per individual small piece, which, just by a visual inspection of below, you can see, are accomplishedly cooked and presented, but certainly not the gold that such a price tag would imply.

Although the waiters were extremely helpful and obliging, there was a trainee member of staff working that day who got our orders confused, and thus, delayed us getting dinner. I’ll be generous and not dock the restaurant too many points for that as I could see her intentions were good, but her mind was jumbled. For her sake, I hope her memory has improved since our visit.

The alcohol selection wasn’t as expensive as the food, and we had a whole bottle of Japanese rice win between us and a beer apiece. Both tasted great.

Aside from the marvellous Hi Sushi, I am yet to visit a sushi place in London that offers good value for money. This certainly hasn’t changed having visited Nizuni. That said, the food was certainly high quality, and if you have the time, do check out their website, which is one of the coolest I've seen of a London restaurant so far! (If only they'd saved the money on their web designer and spent it on lowering prices of their food, I would have an even more favourable view of the place).

Grade: B

For more of my restaurant reviews, click here. If you would like me to review your restaurant, drop me an email at lemon_and_lime7@hotmail.com