Opal

Opal is the kind of big-city venue where off-duty waiters, office workers, PAs, shop girls & students who prefer cosmopolitan to snakebite convene in the hope of pairing up. There’s a smart upstairs bar called Blanca, but the real action takes place below in Club Noir – a black & cream cavern given over to happy house & getting high on pom-poms, my blue tai, & jugs of ‘raspberry beret’ (Absolut raspberry fired up with ginger beer & puréed raspberries). Wines & bubbles will cost less than a black cab out of town, but if you fancy living it large, blow a week’s rent on a bottle of Krug & feast on chicken-tikka wraps, veggie falafels or stone-baked pizzas topped with aromatic duck; the ‘hand-pressed’ burgers are also worth a punt.