Richard's review of Roka

Roka is a restaurant that feels like it wants to be in Manhatten; big, buzzy, lots of glass, lots of flames, lots of theatre. Alas, it doesn't quite live up to what it wants to be; the buzz is just a heavy, loud bass beat, making conversation possible only at a shout and the theatre would only work if the substance (the food and service) lived up to form (the glass, the flame etc).

The food is fine, sometimes better than fine, but at £22.50 for the black cod, I don't want fine, I want Nobu good. It isn't. The sushi rice was unforgivably soggy, although the rock-shrimp tempura (thank you again Nobu), was on the excellent side of good. Service too was patchy; it took an age to get served, but then everything turned up quickly. The desert menu appeared rapidly, but the deserts themselves must have been lurking at the Canary Wharf branch, and why is it that trying to get a bill at some places is more difficult than getting the (unordered, and soon removed) glass of sake that abruptly materialised from nowhere?

Roka is referred to as Zuma's baby sister, and in a lot of ways there are similarities. The difference is, Zuma works the buzz, works the theatre and works as a whole. Roka falls short. It probably works best as a group place to go, rather than a couple, as we did, and I certainly didn't envy the couple obviously on an early date at the table next to us.