Nopi

Very laid-back and easy-going atmosphere at this modern Middle-Eastern influenced restaurant (but it's not Middle Eastern in any traditional Kebab type sense at all). Very fresh ingredients and most dishes have a light touch to them. Personal and attentive service.

Pleasant, casual atmosphere,efficient and helpful staff, very good quality and interesting food! Keep it up!

Like Joey from Friends, I don't like sharing food. But sometimes greediness dictates perversely that you should and this applies in places like NOPI where you are encouraged to order 3 dishes per head, racking up a whopping 12 savouring opportunities if you include dessert (which, of course, you do) when dining in a threesome. There were detailed descriptions from our charming waiter of the efforts taken in the food prep and the subtleties this would impart, but for the most part I found the cooking either heavy handed, like the rather garlicked aubergine and overly spiced gurnard, or underwhelming, as in the case of the Romano peppers which were fine (but £9 worth of fine? No). Cheese stuffed courgette flowers were delicious, but I'm becoming bored of writing that; it has applied to every tapas I've been to recently. Maybe our taste buds were tainted by the frankly unpleasant Riesling from Slovenia (an adventurous mistake I won't repeat again) as once we switched to the much more quaffable Spanish Rioja things started to look up, and we finished the mains with a deliciously salty Presa Iberica. The atmosphere downstairs on the communal tables is great: with the open kitchen at one end and racks of supplies along one side it feels a bit like you're in the kitchen at a chef's house, albeit a house with the most extraordinary toilets you've ever seen (like the Hotel California, it is difficult to leave). I confess I was slightly disappointed with my second visit here, but this could be put down in part to the fact that I was picking up the bill and I didn't feel I'd consumed £255 of gastronomic oomph. We hadn't held back, having between us scoffed 3 cocktails, 9 mains, 3 desserts, 2 bottles of wine, 2 digestifs and a tea; but you won't come out with much change from £50 even if you exercise restraint. Still, I won't let it put me off returning (if nothing else for the delicious financiers dessert). Only next time, we're splitting the bill 3 ways.

We were there early for dinner as we were shooting off for a gig and so had originally booked downstairs at the communal tables. At this time it felt a bit like being on the naughty step and so they were very accomodating and moved us upstairs. Our waitress was fabulous, making the meal even nicer.

It is a slight confusing mixture of smallish sharing plates, with sides and mains to choose from. I would recommend the sharing plates to get a taste of everything. This place is especially good if you are a veggie too. Everything we ordered was truly delicious, served at a reasonable pace, so that your meal flowed and we were stuffed by the end of it.

Be warned however, 6 plates of vegetarian food and one £30 bottle of wine came to £127 with service, which I do think is a bit steep considering.

A lovely place and highly recommended.

Remember the scene in Pulp Fiction where the briefcase opens and showers people with a dazzling, golden light? This is how I felt, happily propped up at Nopi's shiny, gilt-edged bar, surrounded by animated chatter.

The service seems warm and informal, with staff that appear genuinely jolly. It's infectious, even as a solo diner. To my left was a trendy media type with the rosy glow and happily pink cheeks of the well-fed, lazily pawing his way through the Guardian. To my right was no shortage of gentle flirtation, as the lucky chap left with a fellow diner's number. It's all very ‘Soho brunch-fest’, but not obnoxiously so.

I hungrily scoured the menu and was immediately seduced by the rabbit pastilla; a curious, sugar-dusted pastry with a rich ragu within. There's no starters here so you order a scattering of dishes; I plumped for twice-cooked chicken and an aromatic cauliflower salad. The latter was spiked with capers, milky ricotta and the sharp zing of a keenly-seasoned dressing. The chargrilled chicken was flavoursome, moreish and soused withe lime, albeit accompanied by a slightly weedy chilli sauce.

But the pastilla stole the show – the luscious filling of bunny and spice encased in buttery pastry now resides in the chambers of my most prized foodie memories. Puds were a lively combination of new and unusual ingredients (including a little layered delicacy made from cherry stone pulp, which was chewy and toothsome but tasty) and the cocktails were similarly imaginative.

Then the bill arrived, and my podgy little bubble burst. I'm torn: half of me is an Ottolenghi believer that's cooked much of the way through Plenty, but the other half thinks the prices are largely indefensible. I'd happily devour most of the menu and think it's a genuine challenge to the resolutely carnivorous, but £8 to £12 for a veggie side? Yikes. I racked up a £70 bill all to easily, which didn't enhance my post-gorge glow.

The restaurant is beautiful and even spending a penny in the glittering facilities feels like a treat, but it'll sure cost you.

Having visited this restaurant a few times it can be summarised as follows – Overall, this restaurant has potential. It is stylist , vibrant, offers great food and employs friendly and professional staff. However it is expensive and the portions are rather small, which leaves one with the option of either ordering more food and thus getting hit with a large bill or buying a sandwich on the way home to sate one's hunger. If the restaurant could increase its very small portion sizes it would be a winner.

For all the exuberance and heritage in the mix of middle eastern cultures expected of the Ottolenghi duo, Nopi is sleek and slinky, and understatedly stylish.
We sat at the end of the bar, which quite fun and cosy as a couple.
Most of the dishes play with middle eastern tilt (amongst our selection: french beans, smoked wheat, tahini lemon dressing / burrata, blood orange, coriander seeds) and it most definitely works in the mix of flavours and ingredients. The Spiced gurnard wrapped in banana leaf, pineapple sambal was divine, make sure you have enough not-to-need-to-share. The wine, we had a Sardignian wine from the less well known selection, somehow finished disproprortionally fast.
The portions however are minimalistic, bigger than tapas but smaller than a starter and I could not help feeling gluttonous ordering three dishes and desert (Vanilla rice pudding, roasted pistachio, rose) and then left still hungry. Incidentally, I am not sure if it was the wine, but I am sure the rice pudding bowl had a convex bottom implying a bigger portion than was present.
Value for money it is not. Maybe the trick is to have a big lunch before going for dinner. Or even better, to corporate expense the outing. But delicious it was with an atmosphere between Soho cool and Mayfair chic.

Four of us went for supper at Nopi last night. The food was the usual, exceptional, Ottolenghi standard. One of the sommeliers recommended a delicious Spanish rosé to match our dishes. Whilst we were choosing from the menu, we were served with freshly made babaghanoush and olive oil and bread. The bread was good but personally I would have preferred some flat bread to dip into the oil and aubergine dip.

The menu suggests at least 3 dishes per person, but we selected 9 dishes between four of us, and this was plenty. We asked the waiter to recommend a dish from each of the menu sections: vegetable, fish and meat. His choices were undoubtedly the best. From the vegetable section we chose the chargrilled broccolini with skordalia and chilli oil and the roasted delica pumpkin, rainbow chard, manouri tart. The waiter recommended the cauliflower with raisin puree. As a vegetable lover all three dishes were divine, the pastry in the tart and the pumkin was delicious, but the cauliflower exceeded my expectations with its slightly sweet yet spiced flavour.

From the fish section we selected the salmon and bulgar wheat, preserved lemon and the chargrilled octopus, salmorejo sauce, morcilla. The waiter recommended the spiced gurnard, wrapped in a banana leaf with mango. The salmon had a slight Thai flavour and was beautifully presented. The octopus was very tasty but we preferred the gurnard as the spiced taste was amazing.

From the meat section we chose the Hibiscus and tea smoked quail, cumquat and clementine relish and the Goan masala lamb with celeriac, barberry and green chilli sauce. The waiter recommended the roasted beef sirloin, almonds, spinach and pecorino. All of these dishes were beautifully presented with a wonderful balance of flavours. I loved the quail, but the beef was voted the favourite and came a close second to the gurnard for overall best dish.

For dessert we chose the chocolate rum financier with chestnut cream and candied chestnut and the caramel and roasted peanut ice cream with chocolate sauce. Both deserts were yummy and good if you have a sweet tooth. The ice cream was quite rich. It was as the waiter said a snickers bar dessert. I would definitely choose the chocolate financeiers again next time. Overall a great experience. It was on the pricey side but for a special occasion it was worth it, and fortunately I wasn’t paying!

I don't understand how they could have got it so wrong. Whilst I do love the original Ottolenghi(s), the foray into proper dining is overpriced, overhyped and underwhelming.

My main issue is price – SO SO expensive for average innovation and tastes. Yes it is very fresh and good quality, but seriously it is not fine dining.

The space is pretty enough and thank god someone has done a pretty loo again. Nice wine list.

Don't bother though.

I had very high expectations of Nopi – but was slightly disappointed. We started on the wrong foot, as my dining companion and I were about 10 minutes early, and were simply sent away to come back at the right time – there was no room at the bar and, although some tables were free, we weren't offered a seat, even just to have a drink. The greeter was perfectly friendly, but it didn't exactly put me in the right frame of mind!

However, once we were seated, things got better. The bread, which came with a spiced broad bean dip, was gorgeous – as was our waiter. It is hard not to think that Nopi is following in the Abercrombie & bFirch footsteps of only putting the beautiful people on show. The service was as lovely as the man serving – very charming, friendly and winning.

The food was just downright delicious – they recommend 3 choices each, which I would heartily recommend, as the portions are not generous. But the flavours are spot on. We had an aubergine tart – the aubergines dried like tomatoes, with a very deep, almost sweet flavour, with some creamy mozzarella and fresh basil on a crisp pastry rectangle; broccoli with chilli (this was a revelation – the best, absolutely the best, broccoli I have ever eaten, with crispy chillies shredded on top); soft shell crab; trout; chicken with myrtle salt and a chilli dip; and braised pigs cheeks. The last was the least exciting – nothing wrong with the execution, taste or texture, but it was a bit like eating a large spoonful of casserole after a feast of much lighter, crisper textures and flavours.

For pud we shared doughnuts – which were small and scrumptious, with a vanilla cream and berry dip; and coffee financiers (albeit in the shape of madeleines, not ingots) with a maple syrup dip. Both were gorgeous. A glass of wine each, and tap water, and the bill was about £60 a head – if you splashed out on the wine, or ordered a couple more dishes, you would rack the bill up without even noticing.

The restaurant is a pleasant space, but one of the loudest I've ever eaten in – everything is hard – tiled or brick walls; paper tablecloths (too much mess for linen, presumably – linen napkins, though); metal lamps – nothing to soften the noise at all.

So, would I go back? Yes, provided I could arrive dead on time, wasn't enormously hungry, and had cards in my handbag to hold up to my companion when the noise proved too much.