We went to Soif on a Saturday night with quite high expectations as I am a Terroirs fan. In brief Soif has a great buzz, good menu, nice wines, service pretty poor. I was a little disappointed but am still intending to go back.

Food-wise, Soif is heavy on charcuterie, cheese and hearty French food. We had the pork belly, fennel and mushroom salad, the chicken liver salad and charcuterie for starters. We also ordered padron peppers but these never arrived. For mains, we had the monbaillac and choucroute (bratwurst and sauerkraut, very Alsace), the kidneys, the hake with mussels and the braised beef. The braised beef was a bit fatty, but everything was really tasty – big gutsy flavours and really fresh. Starters are mostly around £7, and mains are about £12, so the food is well priced.

The wine list was a good mix of comfortable classics for when you just want something reliable and some unusual varieties for adventurous days. Wines started at about £25, but there wasn't much below £35. The wine is definitely where your spend goes in Soif.

In terms of service, Soif is a busy, buzzy place, but the staff need to focus on the table they are speaking to at the time, not gazing over your shoulder while half-heartedly listening (which is what two members of staff both did to us on Saturday night). We arrived ten minutes early for our table for 4 and were shown to a table down the back beside the coat rack and practically under the service area. As the two guys in our party are both large boys I said we would need to sit somewhere else. This caused total consternation, even though there were 3 other tables for 4 empty. Hilarious. In addition to the missing padron peppers, I also asked for the parmesan to be omitted/on the side on my starter, and it wasn't. Our wine took forever to turn up and we had to ask for menus 3 times.

Having said that, Soif is still a great addition to the Northcote Road area and I will definitely be back.