Latest reviews by t0m

Wahaca

t0m — Sun, 31 Aug 2008 19:37:17 +0000

Rating: 3.7

Location: 66 Chandos Place, WC2N 4HG, London, United Kingdom

Phone: 020 7240 1883

Website: http://www.wahaca.co.uk

Tags: lively, cheap eat, good value, crowded

Tasty, quick, good valueI finally made it to Wahaca with a few friends on a Sunday night. It wasn't too packed, but pretty busy.

The food was excellent - a diverse range of flavours on offer, and the prices were good. Their 'tapas' style means you get to try a whole bunch of dishes, which is great. Service is speedy and good (possibly because they want to get the next punters in..). Just don't go here if you don't think you'll like the grease.. It's not really the superfood salads of Leon.

Franco Manca

t0m — Sat, 30 Aug 2008 17:42:58 +0000

Rating: 4.3

Location: 4 Market Row, SW9 8LD, London, United Kingdom

Phone: 020 7738 3021

Tags: italian, cheap eat, good value, crowded, lively

Seriously good pizzaOh wow. Despite living only up the road, I cannot believe I didn't discover this place sooner. It's apparently been here for 5 months already.

Proper Neopolitan pizza with a sourdough base. Delicious, fast and cheap. This place is a gem, off the beaten track and in an unexpected location. Expect to queue to get a seat, but once seated the service is fast and exactly as you would expect from the Neopolitan owners. I just wish it was open in the evenings.

The prices are ridiculously reasonable at around Â£5 for a pizza, Â£1.90 for organic beer or Â£1 for delicious home made lemonade.

I'll be back. Very soon.

Redroaster Coffee House

t0m — Sun, 04 May 2008 23:03:56 +0000

Rating: 4.6

Location: 1 St. James's Street, BN2 1RE, Brighton, United Kingdom

Phone: 01273 686668

Tags: cosy, amazing brew, quiet & relaxed, crowded, quick bite, lively, cultured

Perfect coffee, go now!This place is legendary. You often have to queue for quite a while, but that is because everything about their coffee is meticulous. Their coffee is the thing of legends.

Go there and have an iced latte with gomme. It's the best drink I've ever tasted!

115 At Hodgson's

t0m — Sun, 04 May 2008 22:59:51 +0000

Rating: 3.0

Location: 115 Chancery Lane, WC2A 1PR, London, United Kingdom

Phone: 020 7242 2836

Website: http://www.hodgsonsbar.co.uk/

Tags: good value, gastro pub

Not bad, but not greatA large group of us went here for an evening meal. The food that we had was reasonable, but the chef was in fact off work ill, and so they had a restricted menu.

The prices are very reasonable, especially for this part of town. It's a nice atmosphere, but the service was patchy, and the lack of most dishes was a little bit frustrating. I'd definitely give it another go though.

Blue River Cafe

t0m — Sun, 04 May 2008 22:53:52 +0000

Rating: 3.0

Location: Riviera Hotel, The Bridge, SL6 8DW, Maidenhead, United Kingdom

Tags: posh, mature, young professionals

A reasonable place for lunchThis hotel restaurant has a lovely location, and it's a pretty good place to go for lunch - especially to escape the town.

The food was good, but perhaps slightly overpriced. Service was excellent, although a number of items were missing from the menu, which was a little frustrating.

Francesco's

t0m — Sun, 04 May 2008 22:50:57 +0000

Rating: 4.5

Location: 73-75 King Street, SL6 1DU, Maidenhead, United Kingdom

Tags: italian, cheap eat, good value

Cheap and reasonableI think you get what you pay for at this place.. the food is reasonable, but not amazing. It's ridiculously cheap though!

I went at lunch time, the service started off quick but then tailed off, and it proved almost impossible to pay our bill. A quick lunch turned into an hour and a half.

Jonathans Restaurant

t0m — Tue, 19 Feb 2008 22:55:53 +0000

Rating: 4.8

Location: 11 Bridge St, SL6 8LR, Maidenhead, United Kingdom

Tags: italian, good value

Pretty good food and food valueI've been to Jonathans a couple of times now. Both times the food has been good - you know what you're going to get..good, reasonably authentic Italian food. It's pretty hard to find a good place to eat in central Maidenhead, so this is a good find.

Prices are good, and service is fine. It's not usually too busy at lunch time, with a relaxed but upmarket atmosphere.

San Fairie Ann

t0m — Sun, 17 Feb 2008 22:52:51 +0000

Rating: 4.2

Location: 43 Alexandra St, SS1 1BW, Southend On Sea, United Kingdom

Phone: 01702 348088

Website: http://www.sanfairieann.com/

An excellent findThanks to TrustedPlaces, we were able to find this lovely eaterie in the otherwise seeming foodie void of Southend. We had a sunday roast here on a worryingly quiet Sunday lunchtime.

For such an establishment the food was exceptional - I had a huge portion of perfectly cooked roast pork with all the trimmings. We were offered an extensive range of sauces, but we turned them down in favour of the unadulterated flavours of the food.

The service was attentive, but not annoying. We were immediately serviced some delicious bread with whipped up spread (we never quite worked out whether it was butter or cheese), and offered olive oil and balsamic. A simple and easy touch, but it makes all the difference.

The surroundings are delightful - there is so much to look at, and a great atmosphere in the restaurant. The biggest concern was the lack of punters - we expected it to be heaving, but there were only a few other couples and families eating there.

Best of all, the prices were extremely reasonable. 2 huge and delicious main courses and soft drinks came in at Â£22.

Boston Tea Party

t0m — Wed, 05 Dec 2007 22:02:23 +0000

Rating: 4.2

Location: 75 Park Street, BS1 5PF, Bristol, United Kingdom

Phone: 0117 929 8601

Tags: cosy, top food, proper food, amazing brew, lively, cultured

A seriously legendary coffee shopThis place has been around since I can't remember when. Serving the best coffee in town on Park St long before it was as trendy as it is today.

This is a hangout for students and other boho city types. Relax alone reading the papers, or the perfect place to meet friends and lounge around on their sofas upstairs. Get some healthy and delicious food, a tasty sandwich or a wicked cake. I thoroughly recommend you check out the white chocolate cheesecake if it's on the menu.

A truly legendary Bristol hangout.

Severnshed

t0m — Wed, 05 Dec 2007 20:59:42 +0000

Rating: 4.5

Location: The Grove, BS1 4RB, Bristol, United Kingdom

Phone: 0117 925 1212

Website: http://www.severnshed.co.uk

Tags: lively, greek, good value, mediterranean, french

Good value contemporary foodThis modern European restaurant (and bar) serves up excellent contemporary food. The service is generally very good, as is the quality of the food.

They have been known for fantastic off-peak eating deals (such as their infamous Â£7.77 deal, which allowed 2 courses of exceptional food for Â£7.77 if you ate before 7pm.

And.. watch the bar get transformed as they resize the room! The bar, which weights 6 tons, can be moved up and down the building to change the shape of the room. Excellent!

Nowadays it's a bit of a Bristol stalwart, and probably with good reason.

Imli

t0m — Sun, 18 Nov 2007 17:47:51 +0000

Rating: 4.0

Location: 167-169 Wardour Street, W1F 8WR, London, United Kingdom

Phone: 020 7287 4243

Website: http://www.imli.co.uk

Tags: tapas, good value, indian

Good value, and excellent foodWe took up the current TfL/Oyster card deal (half price tasting menu, Â£12.50 each). It was relatively quiet at lunch time on a Saturday, but the service was good.

The offer is pretty good value, you end up tasting about 10 dishes or so, and the flavours are diverse and pretty exciting. I personally preferred the starter type tapas - the flavours were far more interesting. The 'main courses' were still good, but most of them were too heavily spiced for my taste, drowning out some of the delicious flavours that were obviously present.

Nonetheless, I left thoroughly impressed, and will return.

New Tayyabs

t0m — Sun, 18 Nov 2007 17:42:33 +0000

Rating: 4.6

Location: 83-89 Fieldgate St, E1 1JU, London, United Kingdom

Phone: 020 7247 9543

Website: http://www.tayyabs.co.uk

Tags: lively, cheap eat, good value, crowded, indian

ridiculous value, and great food!This place is pretty unique. Although off the beaten track, they were queuing out the door on a Monday evening. We had made a reservation and, although we were 45 minutes early, were ushered immediately to a table, skipping the queue. Excellent service.

The service is almost impossibly fast - you probably don't come here for a long night out. It's speedy service, and they will want your table for the next customer.

The food is fantastic, and ridiculously cheap - partly due to the BYO policy. Highly recommended are the Seekh Kebabs as a starter, at just 70p each!

A meal for 3, which we didn't get close to finishing because there was so much, scraped Â£23.

Highly recommended!

Chon Thong

t0m — Thu, 01 Nov 2007 22:31:41 +0000

Rating: 3.0

Location: 6 Plender Street, NW1 0JT, London, United Kingdom

Phone: 020 7380 1196

Tags: camden, koko, mornington crescent, thai

Good prices, fast service, but quite emptyI frequented Chon Thong on a Monday evening, at 7.30pm. We were the only guests in the restaurant (they rather politely turned on the heater on the wall as we entered).

The food was well priced, and the service relatively efficient (possibly not hard, as during our whole meal they only had to serve 8 covers). The food was reasonable, and good value.

It's just around the corner from Koko, so a great place to stop off for food on the way to a gig - especially in a part of town rather devoid of exceptional eateries.

Smollensky's On The Strand

t0m — Tue, 16 Oct 2007 22:07:47 +0000

Rating: 2.5

Location: 105 Strand, WC2R 0AB, London, United Kingdom

Phone: 020 7497 2101

Website: http://www.smollenskys.co.uk

Tags: steak, business

a quiet place for lunchIt's often hard to find somewhere not too busy in this part of town. Smollensky's is good for that at lunch time. I've had a number of lunches here and it is particularly good for meetings for this reason.

The food is pretty good, but not the most amazing you'll experience. Burgers and steaks are recommended.

The River

t0m — Mon, 15 Oct 2007 22:46:35 +0000

Rating: 2.5

Location: Canons Road, BS1 5UH, Bristol, United Kingdom

Phone: 0117 930 0498

Website: http://www.theriverbristol.com

Tags: lively, british, gastro pub, good value, crowded

Excellent value and excellent piesThe River sells proper English food, in the form of pie or sausage and mash. They sell a delicious array of gravy and a selection of different mashed potato. It's great value, filling and a perfect place to stop for a quick bite to eat.

The pies they sell are Bristol's legendary Pieminister pies. They're they best pies around, so get down there and try them out!