Christopher's Reviews

Fairtrade, organic, locally sourced, environmentally friendly, sustainable, carbon neutral, biodegradable & recyclable. The Table Café at Southwark promises all of these things.

I found the summary of greenie credentials on the biodegradable menu at this ‘award winning restaurant’ about as captivating as the food. It was bland, uninteresting and looked like it had been prepared by a student.

Take your carbon footprint elsewhere.

Atico, I later learned means ‘ancient’ in Italian, however I do know that an Antiques once dominated the floor space of this very new Italian restaurant so I assume this is just an ingenious play on words.

The choice of name is not the only bewlidering inconsistency here – there is a cellar bar and and the restaurant has both bar style and formal table seating and is only open for dinner (apart from weekends). We only actually realised there was a bar downstairs by accident. The menu is also superbly confusing – there are three headings being Antipasti & Spuntini, Pasta & Risotto, Meat & Fish with a sub category of items titled ‘deli counter’ within Antipasti which basically was more starters and wasn't only served at the deli counter.

If I crudely categorising the first section, it was pretty good – a varied and interesting selection tasty Italian food from between £3-£7 tapas style – all the rage nowadays. Second courses (Pasta is also served in half main courses – or should that be starter size?) were a little lighter on imagination. The Pasta was excellent but with main courses mostly in the late teens and a satiated appetite after small plates we went no further.

There is a foodie mile along Bermondsey Street that stretches (almost) to Magdalen. José Pizarro is currently the Don with his two eponymous Tapas restaurants, the award winning Italian Zucca only a few steps away and an assortment of damn good gastropubs inbetween. It seems that Atico has attempted to incorporate elements of all these concepts and fused them into one and opened at the beginning of January.

I hope Atico does well. The food is good and the owner cares – hopefully it will find its own indentity, organise the menu and its opening hours.

A table for 15 in the City on a Friday lunchtime is a very tall order. Even with weeks of notice rather than a few hours, a request of this type is more than likely to be met with a quiet snigger. In an act of simple cowardice I delegated the role to someone else and observed from a distance, waited for this short telephone call to end. But there was a smile and a nod and we were on – lunch for 15 at The Mercer.

Not only were we offered the private dining room, there was to be no room charge, no abridged menu, no forms to fax back, questionnaires, threats of legal action or credit card guarantees. We were even called back an hour later to be offered the option of the table in the main restaurant as we may ‘enjoy the atmosphere’. By the time we arrived at 1.30pm lunch service was well under way, with just one long table at the back of the restaurant awaiting our occupation. Drinks were served (Chapel Down) and menus dispatched. There were big smiles all afternoon, particularly once the dishes arrived, this was faultless British cooking – no foam, no pretention, just big, bold flavoursome dishes that didn’t fail or falter once and were met with unanimous approval from a rather tough crowd.

Suddenly it was 5pm and despite there being no bar area, the staff offered to designate one in order that we could continue our extended lunch. I have rarely felt more welcome. However, we did sensibly decide to end on a high as we had already cleared their cellar of the Katnook Estate, which comes as highly recommended at the restaurant itself and represents similarly excellent value. Top marks x 15.

Simpsons Tavern, not to be confused with the more recently opened Simpsons in the Strand (1828) has been serving lunch to City folk for the last 250 years. There is nothing ‘eclectic’ or experimental about the dishes here, the waiters did not graduate from Le Cordon Bleu and the wooden ‘pew’ seating is damn uncomfortable but nobody seems to care.

Orders are shouted across the table, smaller groups of diners are seated together, conversations are loud as plates heavy with staple British grub are circulated to hungry men. Our table took crispy Pork Belly, Potted Shrimp and Smoked Salmon starters which did exactly what it said on the tin. This was soon followed with Roast Beef, The Mixed Grill, (a protein rich plate Steak, Sausage, Egg, Kidney, Bacon & Tomato) and Lamb Shank, then bravely fought on with a round of nostalgic Suet puddings with Custard and the famous ‘Stewed Cheese’ which tasted significantly better than its description.

Starters are priced between £3.85 – £6.00 and most main courses are also single figures so you will struggle to spend more than twenty pounds per head and in exchange for that, you will leave incredibly well fed.

According to the mini guide ‘Edinburghs best restaurants’ the Witchery has a “world-wide reputation for sensational food in the most indulgent setting”. The guide introduces Scotland’s best-known restaurateur, James Thomson, who according to Scotland on Sunday (in 2003) has. . . “a reputation others would die for”. The rest of the ‘guide’ is simply self aggrandising promotional brochure for Thomsons other two lesser known restaurants and rooms clearly designed to fool tourists. Unfortunately however, the Witchery does not live up to it's glowing reviews of itself. The dining room is dramatic and the location ideal for hungry visitors to the Castle but the food is just about passable and completely overpriced. My suggestion is to ignore the hype, consultant the Red book and eat at 21212 instead. The Witchery is a tourist trap!

Aqua Nueva is the Quaglinos of today – a big, noisy, fashionable central london hangout with lots of sponsored tables. That is not to say it a bad place, in fact it's great fun for a crowd looking for an ‘inclusive’ experience of bar, dinner and dancing – but the food suffers. Cold Tapas was great as expected but I had to fight with the grilled Octopus for some time, this was followed by a bar of Oxtail which was also a bit of a disappointment. Fortunately the service was good, we had plenty to drink and a fun night, but not a great meal.

St Moritz is the perfect way to banish those winter blues – a twee restaurant on Wardour street split over two floors , decked out Alpine style and dishing out some of the best Fondue in London (of which there isn’t enough). The seating downstairs is a bit cramped and the table next to the main door should be avoided, particularly at Winter. When booking (only by telephone or fax?) , do ask for a table upstairs which is much more comfortable. True, the service can be a little brusque occasionally, but the restaurant is small, very popular and inexpensive so I guess that goes with the territory. A great place for a get together with friends and polish off a cauldron of bubbling cheese and a few bottles.

After a period of eating in many homogenous hotel restaurants it was rather refreshing to be led up a creaking staircase to an oak beamed bar occupying the first floor of this of a 17th century coaching house complete with oversized chairs and chaise long. It was a promising start. Drinks were ordered and my choice of Gin ignored and I was offered either Bombay Sapphire or a Gabriel Boudier (Saffron Gin). A straight up Gin was not available, neither was my companions Grey Goose and an alternative Vodka was offered instead. The request for Diet tonic was also overlooked and I was given Fentimans tonic water which has a pretty label but tasted like Soda Water. Our food order was taken at the bar and in addition to the a la carte menu, the ‘menu gourmand’ there was a 10-course ‘surprise menu’ complete with Wine. We figured a 300 mile round trip for dinner demanded something special so elected for the latter.

It is difficult to recall every course so read into that what you will, although there were two very memorable dishes – the Pigeon which was served with an incredible foie gras terrine, mango salsa, sesame and coriander, certainly the best Foie Gras dish I have eaten. Also the Halibut with Morteau sausage and ‘wafer thin’ slices of cauliflower. There was actually a great deal of creative slicing and dicing going on throughout the meal to the extent some plates looked like a demonstration of the latest kitchen appliance. The Wine pairings were good, apart from one Lebanese Wine which was either corked or too leftfield for our palettes. It was quickly replaced with a Burgundy without hesitation. The Cheese Trolley looked amazing but not part of our journey and we had eaten enough. The meal was good, possibly in parts a triumph of style over substance and the atmosphere lacked but worth a visit if in the area.