If the Square Mile of the City is where London goes to work, then the square mile of Soho is where Londoners come out to play. The West End area, now bounded by Oxford and Regent Streets, Shaftesbury Avenue and Charing Cross Road, was developed from farmland into a park by Henry VIII in 1536. The now mainly Georgian and Victorian streets have been colonised by every creed and class of Londoner ever since, from the aristocracy who moved into Soho Square in the 1680s to the Greeks and gays, writers and gangsters of the 20th century.
The name itself comes from a hunting cry, though these days Soho is fertile ground for entertainment, whether cinema, theatre (see our guide to pre-theatre restaurants here) or the handful of sex clubs that are a reminder of Soho’s seedy past. Most of all, Soho is London’s preeminent dining destination.
Every generation seems to mourn that Soho isn’t what it was. Certainly the Soho of the 21st century is far more sanitised than the vice squad of the Sixties would recognise, but it hasn’t become the Disneyfied London of Covent Garden quite yet, and the recent arrival of the likes of Mountain and the Devonshire prove that Soho is where the capital’s most ambitious chefs and restaurateurs still want to set up shop.
With a restaurant entrance in seemingly every doorway of the main thoroughfares of Greek, Frith, Dean, Wardour, Berwick and Poland Streets (remember the east-west mnemonic: Going For Dinner With Billie Piper), it can be hard to know where to choose to eat. So from modern British to vegan French, northern Thai to southern Italian, here’s our edit of the best restaurants in London’s Soho. Given we haven’t crossed the threshold of Shaftsbury Avenue, a few big-hitters — Speedboat Bar, the Palomar, Evelyn's Table — haven’t made it in, on the grounds we’d consider them to be in Chinatown. But look — you won’t go hungry.
Andrew Edmunds
Andrew Edmunds the man died in 2022, but his name enjoys a glorious afterlife at the restaurant he founded in 1985 which, prices aside, remains heroically marooned in a Soho long lunch from the mid Eighties. But while, at that time, one’s fellow diners are likely to be ad execs and media types lamenting the long-lost glory days of expense accounts and no-one watching the clock, come suppertime the place is wall-to-wall romance, thanks largely to the compact dimensions of the candlelit, white-clothed ground-floor which enforces intimacy whether wanted or not, and the low lighting of the marginally more spacious, dark-green downstairs. (Actually, that’s not entirely true: lunchtime is also great for romance of the illicit, love-in-the-afternoon kind.) Either way, the food is judiciously prepared, simple modern British — cold roast pigeon with pickled ginger, mackerel with horseradish crème fraîche, buttery Dover sole and garlicky lamb neck — while the famously good-value wine list excels in bottles that sound all the more seductive whispered with the correct French pronunciation. Excellent service, too.
46 Lexington Street, W1F 0LP, andrewedmunds.com
Rita’s
Missy Flynn and Gabriel Pryce have been around the block with Rita’s a few times, taking it from Dalston pop-up to a sandwich shop in King’s Cross, but their first restaurant proper is their most alluring proposition yet. Window counters provide a ringside seat for the Soho street scene, there’s a pocket handkerchief of a courtyard for when it’s warm enough to sit outside, and mood music courtesy of candlelight and a funky soundtrack. Pryce’s American-accented cooking has evolved from sarnies and fried chicken to something more urbane that one might encounter on a cool corner in Brooklyn, based on native meat and fish raised and caught sustainably paired with organic Home Counties produce and a wine list curated by Flynn that leans into low-and-no intervention. Dorset clams with árbol chilli and tequila butter might be followed by braised lamb with turnips and collard greens. The cocktails are as excellent as ever, not least the mini martinis that deliver a thimbleful of gin, vermouth and lemon oil for £7.50 (even if opinion on them is divided).
49 Lexington Street, W1F 9AP, ritasdining.com
Kiln
The basement dining room of this sibling to Shoreditch’s Smoking Goat takes bookings, but expect to queue for a stool at the stainless-steel counter at street level, which is the best place to eat here with its shoulder-to-shoulder view of the clay pots and barbecues cooking over the embers of the namesake wood kiln. Self-taught chef Ben Chapman caught the northern Thai bug on a fact-finding mission in 2016 but, though the flavours here aim to recreate the roadside stands where Thailand’s borders meet Laos and Burma, much of the ingredients are homegrown, with rare-breed British meats butchered in house, fish supplied by Cornish day boats and lemongrass and Szechuan peppers grown in polytunnels. Whole turbot might be aged for four days and broken down into sour-spicy broths, wild ginger curries or deep-fried; pork offal finds its way into a spicy Isan-style laap, while the brown crab meat and Tamworth pork belly noodles are not to be missed. Hate queuing? Book downstairs with a gang of mates and pre-order a suckling pig to share.
58 Brewer Street, W1F 9TL, kilnsoho.com
Laxsa
A Soho veteran, Laxsa is one of those restaurants that keeps its head down in a sea of spots vaingloriously shouting about themselves. Admittedly, it’s not a looker, but the food — Malaysian, obviously — is a wonder; beside the namesake laksa is a beautiful beef rendang, piles of noodles, plenty of rices, piles of prawns, lobsters in puddles of sauce. Cocktails are hit and miss, the wine isn’t up to much, but somehow, it remains a treasure. When it’s raining outside, few places are better to curl up in.
37 Old Compton Street, W1D 5JY, @laxsa_soho
Cafe Boheme
Given this corner brasserie is where Soho House all started, you might think Boheme has some explaining to do. But, as is often the case, the original is the best. In fact, the somewhat rackety Boheme feels a calming antidote to the studied, pink-hued cool of the brand it launched. The place is all atmosphere: it tremors with laughter and gossip, with ice rattling in shakers, with coffee machines hissing. The French menu will be familiar — bavette steak, moules mariniere, confit duck — and is executed decently. Cocktails are straightforward, classic, well done and suitably boozy. The dream is to come in at midnight, have a croque monsieuer from the late night menu, a glass of Champagne, and barrel on into the night. There’s live music in the bar most days, and it’s open till 3am on Fridays and Saturdays.
13 Old Compton Street, W1D 5JQ, cafeboheme.co.uk
Noble Rot Soho
This venerable site was once the home of the Gay Hussar, a Hungarian restaurant famous in the second half of the 20th century for being the haunt of, if not Champagne socialists, then Labour grandees with a taste for the finer things in life. Former regulars Aneurin Bevan, Michael Foot and Barbara Castle would surely have approved of its reincarnation as the Soho sibling of Bloomsbury’s Noble Rot, not least because who wouldn’t rather be eating cuisine bourgeois than borscht? There’s no wine bar here, leaving the focus purely on the cooking: roast chicken and morels in a vin jaune sauce to share is the showstopping signature dish but everything is prepared with equal panache, whether the smoked eel vol-au-vent or the pain perdu. A wine list selected by Noble Rot’s founders, wine importers Mark Andrew and Dan Keeling, means this is one of the few places left in Soho where the long lunch remains an article of faith.
2 Greek Street, W1D 4NB, noblerot.co.uk
Bao
Few restaurants have introduced Londoners to a whole new food group that eventually finds its way onto supermarket shelves, but this tiny Taiwanese is responsible for bao buns appearing everywhere from Itsu to Asda. Ubiquity, however, should not be mistaken for mediocrity, and nowhere has yet to better the fluffy buns on offer at Bao, where the signature dish of peanut-encrusted, melt-in-the-mouth 12-hour braised pork deserves a place on any list of London dishes to eat before you die. Nothing else on the menu quite manages that delirious wallop of pure umami, but that’s no reason to overlook the likes of the fried chicken or beef short-rib bao and finger-lickin’ small plates like trotter nuggets and crispy noodle chips. It’s not cheap, though — figure on around £50 a head for hungry and thirsty diners — and the fact that one is often back out on the pavement within an hour is the only thing here likely to leave an unpleasant taste in the mouth.
3 Lexington Street, W1F 9AS, baolondon.com
Mountain
Tomos Parry’s Brat is housed in a former strip joint; the chef’s new smash-hit Mountain was in a former life a private cabaret club where Christine Keeler and Mandy Rice-Davies were hostesses. The similarity is coincidence rather than contrivance, however, as Mountain is not simply Shoreditch transposed to Soho. Sure, there’s the fire-smoked potatoes and four-year-old sirloin that made Parry’s name and won him a Michelin star, but the trick of Mountain is to pass off labour-intensive, creative preparation of painstakingly sourced ingredients as the breeziest, easiest thing one might eat. North Spain meets north Wales is the gist of Anglesey-born Parry’s flame-licked cooking that comes from a pair of Gozney wood ovens in kitchens that are as essential a part of guests’ experience of the open dining room as the tables and seating. Whole John Dory slicked with pil-pil sauce is an early standout but there’s not a dud dish to be had here, from the first mouthful of something snacky from the in-house bakery to a final scoop of ice cream.
16-18 Beak Street, W1F 9RD, mountainbeakstreet.com
Bubala
A well-named restaurant is a fine thing, and anyone with an inkling of an understand of Yiddish will know “bubala” can roughly be taken to mean “darling”. It is more than suitable here. The place simply is. It’s comforting, warming, cosseting. The menu is a meat-free ode to the Middle East — boundaries for this are vague in food — with largely Israeli dishes championed. Think halloumi sticky with honey, or a skewer of oyster mushrooms heavy with tamari. Lively, available (they’re open every day), reliable.
15 Poland Street, W1F 8QE, bubala.co.uk
Miznon
Israeli restaurateur Eyal Shani has made a formidable impression since arriving in London in 2022, opening not only two branches of Miznon but the more formal Lilienblum at Old Street plus Seven North in the City in the pipeline. This original statement of intent, however, remains his best, a transplant of a Tel Aviv pitta sandwich counter which offers everything that is good about casual Israeli cooking — hunks of grilled protein or veg tumbled into pillowy bread with keenly spiced sauces and palate-pricking pickles — with some Insta-bait updates to the formula. Still, while one might have a pitta filled with cheeseburger or fish and chips, we’d recommend staying classic with lamb with tomatoes, onion, tahini and pickles, plus a bowl of intensely savoury hummus on the side and more of that divine bread for dunking. Reasonable prices and copious amounts of booze (the palomas are excellent) guarantee this place is packed most of the time, but the friendly staff cope with the crowds with good humour. Lots of fun.
8 Broadwick Street, W1F 8HW, miznon.co.uk
Darjeeling Express
Lawyer-turned-chef-turned-Chef’s Table guest star Asma Khan recently found herself on Time magazine’s 100 Most Influential People of 2024 list. The recognition will likely feel deserved to anyone who has eaten at her pioneering restaurant, where the all-female brigade are home cooks with no formal chef training. Darjeeling Express began life as a supper club before moving to larger premises in Covent Garden, but the restaurant’s return to its original Kingly Court location suits the homely premise of the place, where the vibe is dinner at the house of a friend who just happens to be a knockout Indian chef. Khan herself is often on hand to talk through her family’s Mughlai recipes and favourite Kolkata street-food snacks. Dinner is a three-course set menu (£65) offering the likes of methi chicken, paneer korma (a Khan classic) and a full spread of sides and accompaniments, though the restaurant’s most celebrated dish — a spicy keema toastie — is only available on the à la carte lunch.
2-4 Kingly Court, W1B 5PW, darjeeling-express.com
The Devonshire
Who doesn’t like a good pub, especially when it comes from a hospitality dream team who clearly love pubs? Landlord Oisín Rogers might be the headline act here for his commitment to pouring the perfect pint of Guinness, but head upstairs to the curtain-fringed dining room and there’s meat cooked over oak embers in a wood-burning oven installed by Flat Iron owner Charlie Carroll then served up on a menu overseen by Ashley Palmer-Watts, former right-hand man to Heston Blumenthal. It sounds too good to be true — and negotiating the bar scrum of Mayfair suits who’ve followed Rogers from the Guinea Grill is not for the faint-hearted — but for those diners with pockets deep-enough, lost afternoons and long dinners upstairs are a Soho fantasy come to vividly exhilarating life. Kick off with buttery rolls to soak up every last drop of baked scallops with crisped lardons, follow with rib-eye steaks and lamb chops partnered with duck-fat chips and finish with a scoop of chocolate mousse. The Devonshire serves not only some of the finest pub grub in London but is one of the capital’s best British restaurants, too, while Rogers is surely one day destined to join Muriel Belcher and Jeffrey Bernard in the pantheon of Soho deities.
17 Denman Street, W1D 7HW, devonshiresoho.co.uk
Hoppers
A Sri Lankan spin on the accomplished Indian pioneered by JKS siblings Jyoti, Karam and Sunaina Sethi at the likes of Gymkhana and Trishna, Hoppers comes courtesy of Sunaina’s husband Karan Gokani, who swapped corporate law for restaurant cheffing — though his genuine affability perks up every aspect of this feel-good smash hit. The decor takes its cue from 1970s Colombo which, with its rattan-backed chairs, turns out not to look a million miles away from English homes of the Eighties. The cooking, however, is a revelation. Start with soft-and-spicy hot butter squid or the yielding crunch of a pair of mutton rolls; follow with deeply flavoured curries (breadfruit, lamb, prawn) and mop up with a side order of dosas and hoppers for a thrilling dose of tear and share, and do not expect to leave with clean fingers. Hoppers is perfect for sharing with a group of friends, though a solo supper at the counter should not be discounted to lift the spirits on the greyest London day.
49 Frith Street, W1D 4SG, hopperslondon.com
The French House
Famous as the location for Charles de Gaulle’s morale-boosting wartime broadcasts and for an equally Gallic devotion to Breton cider, “the French” takes a rather more cross-Channel approach in its first-floor dining room up a rickety flight of stairs, overseen by chef Neil Borthwick (who also happens to be Mr Angela Hartnett). The daily changing, handwritten menu might bring pork and duck rillettes and navarin of lamb with aligot, but specials chalked-up on the blackboard could be Barnsley chops with Swiss chard and mint or crispy pork jowl with endive, apple and mustard. None of it is complicated cooking but Borthwick knows how to make a virtue out of simplicity with his top-notch ingredients: much as previous chefs including Fergus and Margot Henderson have always done here. Book ahead: there are only seven tables, and they are often full — deservedly, given it’s not just one of best in Soho, but across London as a whole.
49 Dean Street, W1D 5BG, frenchhousesoho.com
Barrafina Dean Street
The loss of Barrafina’s Michelin star in the 2024 red guide may be a boon to London diners, if it means fewer gastro tourists and shorter queues at this outpost of a group that now extends to a quartet of restaurants. In truth, Barrafina Dean Street always seemed an odd recipient of the accolade, not only for the awkwardness of its no-reservations policy (bookings are available at the other branches), but for customer service which doesn’t really extend beyond handing dishes over the L-shaped marble counter as and when they’re ready, and cooking which excels in simple preparations of top-quality ingredients rather than any cheffy fireworks (Cal Pep, the Barcelona tapas bar on which Barrafina is based, doesn’t have a star either). Expect sizzling red prawns, meltingly tender octopus, runny-yolked tortilla and plump chicken thighs with nubbly romesco. And if the idea of queueing doesn’t appeal, consider that the very best thing on the menu, the gooey ham croquetas, can be scoffed while you wait in line, a plate in one hand and a glass of rosé cava in the other.
26-27 Dean Street, W1D 3LL, barrafina.co.uk
Berenjak
Follow your nose (or the queue) along Romilly Street to this hole-in-the-wall Persian joint, part of the all-conquering JKS stable (Hoppers, Bao et al). Booths in the corridor-like front room sit across from an open kitchen; there’s a slightly larger dining room behind, where the cracked plaster walls and rug-strewn floors are about as close as most London diners are likely to get to a taste of Tehran these days — though rest assured that with Iranian-born Kian Samyani as chef-patron, authenticity is guaranteed. Freshly made breads come hot and fluffy from the tandoor and meats are sliced juicy from the rotating spit; the koobidah kabab, minced lamb shoulder with onions and black pepper, is as herb-strewn and juicy as one would find in Iran, with only the £19 price tag a reminder that this is the West End not the Middle East. Elsewhere are fresh-tasting small plates and a pair of stews that include an aubergine and split-pea number that is one of several compelling vegetarian options. There’s wine and beer to drink, but the trio of Persian fruit cordials are the best thirst-quenchers here.
27 Romilly Street, W1D 5AL, berenjaklondon.com
L’Escargot
Ever since the Gay Hussar rode off into the sunset and was reincarnated as Noble Rot, L’Escargot has, along with Quo Vadis, been one of the last links to bohemian old Soho. The story goes that the restaurant began life as Le Bienvenue before moving to its current location in 1927 and being renamed after the house speciality. Escargots come by the dozen flambéed with Pernod or in a snail, mushroom and Roquefort pie; elsewhere are old-school Franglais classics like crab mayonnaise, duck confit and Grand Marnier soufflé. The quality of cooking is competent rather than compelling, but no one is really here for the food; the series of wood-panelled rooms provide some of the most civilised surroundings between Regent Street and Charing Cross Road. If these walls could talk, imagine the century of Soho secrets that would spill out.
48 Greek Street, W1D 4EF, lescargot.co.uk
Gauthier Soho
Is Gauthier Soho the future of French fine dining? Chef-patron Alexis Gauthier certainly seems to think so, putting his money where his mouth is and steadily turning this serene Georgian townhouse vegan since he himself adopted a plant-based diet in 2015. The whizzy idea used to be providing vegan versions of haute-cuisine classics — “faux gras” made from lentils was a social media sensation — but now the cooking (or lack thereof) allows the plant-based creations to shine without the anxiety of influence. Each dish on the eight-course tasting menu (£95) places one ingredient centre stage: purple Ligurian artichoke with onion tempura nut crunch and carrot, say, or a seasonal special such as springtime green asparagus from the Landes served with morels and garlic and a morel-infused dashi sauce. Wines (free from animal products, of course) take their cue from Gauthier’s native southern France.
1 Romilly Street, W1D 5AF, gauthiersoho.co.uk
Sola
Sola’s name is a portmanteau of Soho and LA, though the world-famous restaurants of northern California such as Chez Panisse and the French Laundry are a more obvious inspiration here. The kitchen takes the European structure of the haute cuisine tasting menu and filters it through an American perspective, with Japan a strong secondary influence. The nine-course menu (£139) begins with elaborately wrought canapés before heading through labour-intensive assemblies such as the signature langoustines cooked tableside on hot rocks, though note that in very un-Californian style, vegan and vegetarian diners cannot be accommodated. A refurbished dining room that now extends to the basement and first floor and includes a chef’s table is a far more polished-looking operation than when Sola opened in 2019, while the wine list features rarely encountered American producers for reasonable mark-ups.
64 Dean Street, W1D 4QQ, solasoho.com
Bob Bob Ricard
This Fabergé egg of a restaurant conjures a fantasy of dining on the private train of the Russian royal family — but did even the tsars have the luxurious convenience of a “Press for Champagne” button set into the marble of each table, or Château d’Yquem offered by the glass? The food, thankfully, has fewer imperial ambitions, with chicken Kiev alongside prawn cocktail, though almost everything comes with some sort of decadent flourish, such as mac’n’cheese adorned with a whole lobster tail. The greatest luxury of all? No children under 15 are allowed. Bob Bob, alas, no longer delivers the glamour on a budget of old, though the all-booth restaurant has always been a special occasion sort of place, as well suited to proposals (whether indecent or corporate) as impressing out-of-towners with the ineffable glamour of life in the capital. For something more dressed-down (and more affordable), newcomer Bebé Bob over the road offers whole rotisserie chicken to share for £39. Whichever side of the street one eats on, the friendly staff are an absolute delight.
1 Upper James Street, W1F 9DF, bobbobricard.com
40 Dean Street
A refuge from whatever the current hot ticket is sucking up the Soho oxygen, this old-school Italian has been something of a local secret for 20 years, a rare longevity in these parts which means it must be doing something right. That something is pizza, pasta and meat and seafood classics served up in candlelit surrounds by staff who take their friendly cue from the family-run ownership, headed by Nima Safaei. Pizza comes as Margherita or pepperoni, pumpkin and ricotta ravioli sit in a butter and sage sauce and it’s a toss-up whether the deep-fried whitebait or breadcrumbed veal Milanese has the crunchier coating. Portions are generous, sauces are freshly prepped and everything tastes exactly as one would hope — which is to say as comforting as the restaurant’s chocolate fondant. And should you find yourself walking the dog in Soho, 40 Dean Street is pooch-friendly, too. An address to know (and, if you can’t get in, try more of the same as sister restaurant 64 Old Compton Street).
40 Dean Street, W1D 4PX, fortydeanstreet.com
Quo Vadis
Few London dining rooms trail a past as illustrious as Quo Vadis, housed in the building where Karl Marx wrote Das Kapital in the 1860s. Thanks in large part to the guiding presence of chef Jeremy Lee, an exuberant Scot for whom even the expression “bon viveur” feels lifeless, Quo Vadis is a restaurant that wears its history lightly — though Lee, who worked with modern British legends such as Simon Hopkinson in the Nineties, has helped forge London’s reputation as a culinary crucible as surely as Terence Conran (his former boss) and Marco Pierre White (who used to own this site with Damian Hirst). The British cooking is rigorously seasonal and riotously regional — “kickshaws” are Victorian mini pastries filled with rabbit, there’s a soup and pie of the day, mackerel with rhubarb in spring and goose suet pudding at Christmas — though the smoked eel sandwich dolloped with the hottest of horseradishes never leaves the menu. The uncompromisingly ingredients-led approach might not be to all tastes, but a meal here is as much about soaking up the old Soho atmosphere as it is about eating.
26-29 Dean Street, W1D 3LL, quovadissoho.co.uk
Bar Shu
Once upon a time, Chinese food in London meant Cantonese. Then Bar Shu came along in 2006 and set fire to sweet-and-sour expectations with its tongue-numbing menu ablaze with Szechuan peppercorns, rustling with dried chillies and festooned with room-clearing quantities of garlic. Almost 20 years on and Szechuan is almost as ubiquitous as Cantonese but it’s still a thrill to eat at London’s foremost exponent of the central Chinese cuisine. “Numbing spicy” dishes marked as “ma la” are what order, with the option to go even hotter, though the real joy here is to see how deftly applied chilli and pepper can balance heat with other flavour and texture sensations. First timers should try classics of chicken in a pile of dried chillies and boiled sea bass in chilli oil, with offal specialities (tripe, intestine, duck blood) there to be discovered. Stiff prices have always seemed incongruously out of kilter with a dining room that, were one being kind, might qualify as shabby chic, while service is as brusque as Chinatown on the other side of Shaftesbury Avenue. But Bar Shu is still hot stuff.
28 Frith Street, W1D 5LF, barshurestaurant.co.uk
Brasserie Zédel
There’s nothing ground-breaking about Brasserie Zédel, and that is precisely the point: this is a big (actually vast) all-purpose French restaurant for when a two-hour meal is part of a bigger night out: pre- or post-theatre, something to eat after a movie matinée, or stomach lining for a Soho bar crawl — though one could in fact spend an entire evening here, bookended with classic cocktails in the neighbouring Bar Américain and cabaret in the Crazy Coqs club. Set menus are the way to go: a two/three-course prix fixe for £16.95/£19.75; a three-course “formule” with a glass of wine for £27.95; a plat du jour (veal kidneys, tarragon chicken) for £19.95. There’s à la carte, too, though the rare treat of andouillette aside, one can find better quality for the price elsewhere, and the cost of wine can send the bill higher than the kick of a can-can dancer. The room is a bobby dazzler, a pink-and-cream fantasy of Belle Epoque Paris, and don’t ignore eating at the long bar within the dining room: a faultless martini and a steak tartare with frîtes is as pleasant a way to spend an hour around Piccadilly Circus as possible.
20 Sherwood Street, W1F 7ED, brasseriezedel.com
Yeni
An outpost of a celebrated Istanbul restaurant, Yeni brings sophisticated and contemporary Turkish cuisine to Soho, with slick, designer-y surroundings to match. The idea is to cook British ingredients over an open fire before treating them to the sort of spicing that has won chef-owner Civan Er acclaim back in Istanbul and sending them out on small plates to share. Signature dishes that have made the journey over from the Bosporus include the dried aubergine and double fermented yoghurt yeni manti dumplings, flecked with parsley and chilli oil; elsewhere is oak-roasted salt-marsh lamb that melts in the mouth from slow cooking, and octopus smoky from the chargrill and zinging with a hit of sour cherry. Turkish and Georgian bottles sit alongside France and Italy on the wine list, though lagers and raki shots offer better value.
55 Beak Street, W1F 9SH, yeni.london
Yauatcha
This Hakkasan offshoot launched in 2004 as a dim-sum focussed, more affordable alternative. These days, it is neither; the menu takes in full-sized Cantonese plates as well dumplings and the size of the bill has the potential to make one wince. That said, the experience is generally worth it. Classics from the dim sum repertoire are faultlessly prepared — elegantly pleated har gau plump with fat prawns, sticky and sweet venison puffs baked to a deep gold — while the likes of Duke of Berkshire sweet and sour pork are a delicious reminder of just how good the high-street standards can taste when made with quality ingredients and respectfully cooked. Arguably, one is paying for the mood as much as the food: backlit fishtanks lend the basement a sultry Bond-lair vibe, the ground-floor tearoom is more serene (especially off-peak) while, wherever one sits, a meal here can be rounded out with excellent cocktails and a pretty plate of jewel-coloured patisserie.
15-17 Broadwick Street, W1F 0DL, yauatcha.com
Bocca di Lupo
Regional Italian cooking is the name of the game at Bocca di Lupo, where chef Jacob Kenedy offers a cook’s tour of the land of crudo e salumi, paste e risotto, fritti e insalate. Tables at the back of the dining room are cramped and noisy but atmospheric; solo diners and couples should pull up a stool at the long counter out front or even better in the window: the stage-door of the Apollo theatre is along the street. A Ligurian risotto of spinach and wild garlic comes with walnut sauce, Tuscan-inspired cannellini beans are braised with datterini tomatoes and sage, while a grilled lamb pick’n’mix from Lazio offers, if not nose to tail, then tongue, sweetbread and sausage with salsa verde. The wine list takes a similarly path less trodden through the byways of Italian vineyards. There are puddings of wild strawberries and Italian cheeses, but for the ultimate end to a Soho evening, pick up a gelato from Kenedy’s spin-off Gelupo over the road and wander to the tube, ice-cream in hand and imagining one is at the Circus Maximus and not Piccadilly Circus.
2 Archer Street, W1D 7BB, boccadilupo.com
Nopi
Even diners immune to the appeal of Yotam Ottolenghi’s smart deli-café chain are likely to be seduced by this smart restaurant proper which showcases the chef’s trademark blend of Middle Eastern, Mediterranean and Asian flavours. There’s meat and fish served here — miso-glazed cod with celeriac purée and peas; seared ox tongue with burnt butter hummus and marinated pepper — but given Ottolenghi made his name with veg-forward creativity, the veggie plates are the obvious thing to go for, not least because it will somewhat keep the cost down when all those small plates go big on the bill. Aubergine comes with cashew tahini and tomato sambal, burnt leeks with ajo blanco and smoked almond, and runner beans with pineapple sambal and coconut brittle. The eye-catching white and brass decor reaches its apogee in some of the poshest loos in Soho.
21-22 Warwick Street, W1F 9LD, ottolenghi.co.uk
Randall & Aubin
Opened by chef Ed Baines in 1996, Randall & Aubin feels a little forgotten about these days, which is strange and unjust as it offers what many people want from a Soho restaurant: simply cooked seafood, sparklingly fresh crustacea and French bistro classics along the lines of goats’ cheese salad and steak-frîtes: just the ticket for pre theatre, post-pub or almost any 90 minutes. Not that the place is ever less than packed, and little wonder when seafood starters clock in at around £12 and fish mains £25, though there’s also French onion soup for £9.50 and roast chicken for £18. The only downside is seating at cramped counters in a high-decibel, marbled-and-tiled dining room that still looks like the former butchers originally opened by Morin Randall and Cavenur Aubin in 1911. Not the place to bring elderly parents, then, but for anyone else, Randall & Aubin is a pearl.
16 Brewer Street, W1F 0SQ, randallandaubin.com
