Paramount (bar)

Great View Not so great food

I feel that the service (although friendly) and the food is not up to standard for the price. I had fois gras followed by a steak and have had much better in much cheaper restaurants. I expected better quality.

From my many years of eating and drinking my way through some of the most exotically located bars and restaurants across the planet, I have developed a set of rules. Rule #5 states that: “the quality of fare at a restaurant or bar is inversely proportional to the quality of the view”. The quality of the view from the Paramount bar is sensational. The big advantage is that, being at the top of it looking out, you can't see the eyesore that is Centre Point. What you can see (looking east) is the green dome of the Great Court of the British Museum almost below and in the distance, the Shard, the Gherkin and Canary Wharf Tower (why wasn't that named Thatcher's Needle or something equally daft?) as well as St Paul’s and Tower Bridge.

The views are just magnificent, which means, I’m afraid, that Rule #5 applies. The cocktails aren’t the worst I’ve ever had, but given the renaissance of the cocktail in London, there are myriad other places that you could go to and, for the same price, get a cocktail five times as good.

So don't go for the cocktails, just the view. In fact, if you can avoid buying a drink at all then I'd do so. It isn't that the drinks are expensive (think pub-plus prices rather than top-bar prices) but that the service (whilst charming) is horrendously slow, meaning that it isn't difficult to avoid getting served (tip, if you do manage to order, get the second round in as soon as the first is set down). If this were anywhere other than the 33rd floor of a place with amazing views over London, this would be a serious problem. With this view, honestly, unless you are gasping for a drink, just sit there and drink in the view. It is quite the most perfect way to waste an hour as the sun sets and lights drift on.