Restaurant Tristan

I booked a table for lunch for my wife's birthday. Head waiter remembered I mentioned (in passing when I booked) it was a birthday meal, and welcomed us warmly and with complementary glass of champagne. The service continued to the same standard, and was faultless throughout – friendly and attentive, but not over-burdensome. The food was excellent, with flavours (such as a fantastic Amuse-bouche) and presentation comparable to a recent lunch at Maze. If I were being really picky, perhaps slightly too much salt in pheasant main, but the jus more than made up for this, and was truly scrummy. Meal was accompanied by half a bottle of a well priced and nicely balanced Sancerre. Overall, compared with a good number of Michelin starred restaurants I've eaten at in London recently, this was certainly of a comparable standard, but when you look at the price of the lunch menu (£10 two courses, £15 three courses), you cannot help but be struck by the amazing value for money for food of this quality. We will be heading back to Tristan for dinner soon, and hope to be similarly impressed!

I read how service had improved, but staff that were not interested were working the night we visited. I have had better service in the Strada next door. Plates of leftover food were left infront of us for over ten minutes while empty tables were cleared. No mention of how the meat was cooked when ordered meant my wife had very rare/raw lamb, the comment afterwards being that's the way the chef does it. Together with overpowering sauces and very limited vegetables meant a special occasion was a disappointment. We couldn't face dessert.

In a small restaurant you would expect the chef to see unhappy customers, but everything was left to the most junior waiter.

Absolutely top class food, amuse bouche was fantastic. The starters, foie gras, although very fiddly to eat and rabbit great. Turbot, daube of beef was just divine, the beef literally fell apart. Lemon sole was great. Dessert we shared cheese board with the most gorgeous white truffle honey and chocolate something, which was a bit too chocolatey for me. Staff are very knowledgeable, helpful and friendly.

The only slightly off putting part of the whole experience was the dining room, a little too cramped and our table was in the middle of a through fare, which I know can’t be helped sometimes. It just seemed that there were too many tables for such a small room, thankfully it wasn’t full so felt comfortable.

Update on my last visit (shown below). We went in February. The food was fantastically good as usual and the service was improved beyond recognition. You must try it.

Previous review. I went with a girlfriend on a Saturday lunchtime in November. It was quite quiet but even so the service was not that good. I had chicken for my main course and this had a garlic sauce which tasted garlicky of course, but my husband could not tell that evening. Chocolate pudding with lovely runny inside was fabulous. £15 plus 10% plus drinks, which I though very good value for money.

Having wanted to go to Restaurant Tristan for lunch on Valentine's Day and found it was fully booked (both then and in the evening) we went for our fourth visit on a Wednesday lunchtime instead. We arrived at 1pm and there were nine people seated. Within half an hour the resataurant was almost full, which gave it a great atmosphere. After being brought bread and wine we were served a small cup with an artichoke foam and a small spoon of olive tapanade. This amuse bouche always comes before the meal and is incredibly good and I scraped every last little bit out of the cup and took my wife's too.

The Chef has put on a special ‘Credit Crunch’ menu which is unbelievable value for money, you must try it. I had Mackerel escabeche to start. A really lovely and perfectly cooked fillet of mackerel with pickled carrot slices etc. Delicious. The main course I had was Bouillabaise with gurnard, mullet & pollock. The fish was perfectly cooked, just to the point. Again it was great.

Dessert was Lemon souffle with lemon grass granite. The souffle was staggeringly good but very very sweet. The lemon grass granite was wonderfully powerful.

The previous meal I had there was beef and consisted of three small pieces of beef, which seemed to be from the shin and was quite gelatinous, very flavoursome and melted in the mouth. Along with them were small onions/shallots and an incredibly reduced dark sauce with a wonderfully intense flavour. Vegatables were cold (deliberately) sliced beans and a foamed/moussed potato with a superb flavour. If they have that on the menu do try it as it is truly wonderful.

Previously I have written about the service, which was not as good as it could have been. That has now improved dramatically and the service was excellent, friendly and very knowledgeable about the items on the manu. Frankly, it may have been that we went before when they had a huge group of businessmen causing mayhem. I'm sure that didn't help matters. Anyway there is nothing to complain about now.

Chef Tristan is going the right way towards a Michelin Star and I have given Restaurant Tristan an overall rating of 9.

By the way, it cost us around £44, which included a service charge that was already added. My wife had a glass of house white and I had a bottle of fizzy water.