restaurant reviews

We arrived after a late night out at the nearby live venue Shepherd's Bush Empire. Service was professionally friendly and quick. The brick and tinted windows didn't look too inviting from the street, but once inside, the pink décor wasn't bad - lots of space around the tables which is sometimes hard to find in Indian restaurants.

Food: Large Poppadoms with the best apple chutney, orange coconut (nice and soft), yellow cumin sauce. The 2 Meat and 2 Vegetable samosas were also of a largish size, pastry was nice and crunchy. Veg samosa: good. Meat samosa: mincemeat.
Curries: Large portions. Roagan Gosht was tasty. Chicken Karashi, hottish. All dishes were good and we were all too full to eat dessert.
Cost £15pp

8/10

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China China
Gerrard Street, Chinatown, London WC1
Chinese

Sunday, 6th August 2000

Ade & Ben, Shane & Nic

London was experiencing a heatwave, so this air-conditioned restaurant was welcome respite from the humidity of the street. Downstairs, an electrical fan circulated warm air. At the downstairs tables you watch the cooks chop roast pork and duck or watch the people walk along Gerrard Street.

Spring rolls which were of the large variety and packed with mung bean sprouts, prawns, bbq pork and carrots. Very good. The chilli sauce packed a hidden punch.
Main dishes: Roast duck Cantonese style - very good. Steamed Tofu stuffed with prawns - delicate flavours sprinkled with fresh spring onions. Contrast to the usual fried dishes. Mixed Veges - Large platter, packed with a good variety of veges: baby corn, mange tout, carrots, mung beans, water chestnuts and bamboo shoots. Very fresh.
Beef with Chili and black bean: tender and tasty beef, chunks of capsicum, with a little too much sauce. As for the Diet Coke - a bit flat.
Cost: £50 for 4
Overall: very very good.

9/10

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Wagamama
4 Streatham St, Bloomsbury, London W1
Noodle bar

Tuesday, 8th August 2000

Ade, Charmaine & friends

Wagas boasts a clean, modern décor with the hint of a school cafeteria with the shared long picnic-style tables. This branch is a bit smaller than the Lexington Ave branch, and is very popular with tourists and Londoners alike. Enter the restaurant throught the sandblasted lobby and go downstairs to the dining area with the open stainless steel kitchen. Beautiful smells of oriental style food tantalises the senses. I intended not to eat a hsuge dinner but succumbed to the temptation.
The Yaki Soba (fried noodles with prawn, pork, chicken and veg) was filling yet not as moist as usual. Green tea excellent. Service very fast although once the place started to fill up it was difficult to get the bill. The ramen looked tasty and huge, as did the deep friend prawns.
Cost: £4.85

7/10

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Touzai
147-149 Curtain Rd, Shoreditch E1
Phone 020-7739-4505
Noodle bar

Friday 9.45pm, 13th July 2001

Ade, Tania & Grant, Harry & Juliet

Service: Efficient, waiting staff expressionless and 'cool', the maitre d, a friendly young oriental man.

Billed as 'noodlessence', it is an oriental menu in the trendy and young part of town. Starters included prawns, deep-fried chicken wings, goyoza…all very tasty. The mains are massive servings, and very 'Wagamama'-like, and all very spicy except for the curry-flavoured sauce on rice dishes. The pad thai was the best plate of all.
Like China China (see above review), the coke was flat.

Décor:Long tables which you share with other diners. Very warm when we visited late Friday night, and packed. Bright lighting, loud, casual.

Cheap at £10 pp approx, it's value-for-money. Adequate modern Oriental food.

5.5/10

Chiang Mai Thai Restaurant
48 Frith St, London W1
Phone 020-74377444
Thai

Tuesday, 9pm, 14th July 2001

Ade, Tania, Bowie & Kumlesh, Jenn & Les

Service: When asked for a table for 6, we were turned away by a young man, but his mother (the boss) stepped in and they gave us a table on the upstairs floor. Soon after, another couple were shown up there too. Being upstairs meant that we were a little bit neglected.

Food: Kumlesh had told us that this was one of his fave Thais, and on a par with NZ Thai restaurants.
Starter: mixed platter for 6 - sesame toast (for the europeans we think), delicious prawns, chicken satay, spring rolls (yum), fishcakes (a bit rubbery). Approx £6 each.
Mains: Pad Thai - nice and fresh noodles.
Spicy Prawns with beans - delicious
Duck - sliced and non-fatty - very tasty
Chicken - with cashewnuts - very nice, but tasted exactly like another chicken dish ordered.

On the whole, a very nice mix of Thai food, not bad for London standards. When the bill arrived they had already calculated the service.

Décor: Warm and welcoming traditional décor. Very pleasant. The upstairs part is great with the windows wide open.

£18pp. Pleasant and casual, conversation friendly. In the heart of Soho.

6/10

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Shahnaz Tandoori
70-72 Liverpool Rd, Islington, London N1
Indian

late Sunday, 23rd July 2000

Ben & Ade

From the outside this looks like a gardening shop as there is lots of container plants and ferns. Inside there is also lots of greenery. The décor is clean and unobtrusive.
Service was friendly and fast.
In the background Indian music played over the PA system while we sat in the non-smoking section.
The starters of the Samosas (Vege & Meat, 2 per portion) were fairly small, the pastry was a bit oily and fried in oil not quite hot enough. Resembled a finger food filo triangle. The vegetable samonsa inside was not bad, much better than the spicy mince inside the meat samosa. Skip the samosas and order the Poppadoms which were excellent with a fantastic cucumber yoghurt sauce.
The Rogan Ghosh was fresh, with good lots of tomato. Chicken Tikka Masala was presented nicely with a swirl of cream and sprinkle of mint. Tasty.
Aloo Gobi: very nice. Good potatoes.
Portions were generous and we could not finish. £16pp

7/10

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Le Sacre-Coeur Bistro
18 Theberton St, Islington, London N1
0207-354 2618
French

Monday nite 8.30pm, 24th July 2000

Big windows open on to the street and tables outside. It got very smoky as when we visited, 95% diners smoked. The interior is bohemian, a bit scruffy with plastic tablecloths. Very informal. It can get hot inside.

Service: friendly and efficient, with attractive waiting staff!

The food arrived quickly. Ben had the special menu: duck breast with honey and almonds with new potatoes. Very very good. My main, the salmon fillet on a bed of spinach with a butter sauce was an example of simple country cooking. The portions were huge. Assorted sautéed veges: mangetout and red cabbage were passable, but the cauliflower was really dry - give it a miss.

Minus was the OJ was made from concentrate.

Overall, good homely French comfort food.

6.5/10

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Deliverance
Thai menu

The best thai I have tasted in London. Excellent Green chicken Curry, Fragrant rice.

8.5/10

Disclaimer: Please note reviews of restaurants are the personal opinion of a particular dining experience only. The writer is not a professional food critic and dining encounters are experienced in the role of a customer and the meal is paid for out of one's own pocket (or Ben's).

All content and images are the property of Adrienne Wong and may not be used or copied without permission. © 2002

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