Oxo Tower Brasserie

Another South Bank contender for ‘the best view in London’, the Oxo Tower Brasserie offers a stonking ringside seat overlooking the river & its embankment. This is the cheaper – or more accurately, the less eye-wateringly expensive – half of Harvey Nicks’s Bankside venue. The menu blends the best of Asia (pork & coconut patties with papaya salad, a red Thai curry of sea bass) with Italian influences (orechiette pasta with asparagus & saffron cream sauce or chicken breast with caponata & Taleggio-infused polenta), with touches of North Africa & Latin America thrown in for good measure – but there’s no confusion in the fusion. There’s a vegan menu on offer, too. All this, combined with a ‘brilliantly relaxed’ atmosphere, generous portions & impressive service, make the Brasserie one of London’s star venues.