Matt Skinner's inside guide to London

 

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For gourmet travellers, London is about as good as it gets. From the vast and well-stocked shelves of the High Street wine chains through to the hidden treasures of the city’s finest cellars, if it’s grown, crushed and fermented somewhere on earth, then you can bet it’s available to drink somewhere in London. And the same goes for good eating, with the city in the midst of a major food revolution – new restaurants, new markets, new ideas and new operators – a revolution that should bury the perception (held mainly by non-residents) that London is home to little more than an out-of-date restaurant scene fuelled by pricey sub-standard produce.

London’s new-found appreciation of good food and drink has come about for several reasons, but mainly because the city has swelled in size. In just 10 short years, London’s population has ballooned by more than 500,000 people to its present figure of 7.56 million. Its inhabitants have become more diverse, more widely travelled, more open-minded and more adventurous. Eating and drinking has also become more democratic and the rise of the gastro-pub is a classic example. Faced with soaring city rents and a desire to offer great food in a casual setting, the iconic London pub got a make-over and the gastro-pub – many of which now offer a Michelin-starred experience for a fraction of the normal price – was born. 

Beyond that, weekend farmers’ markets have become a regular fixture in almost every London borough. You no longer have to purchase an airfare to  experience great food from the West Indies, North Africa, South America, Portugal and Mexico, just invest in a Tube ticket. And largely due to the likes of Fergus Henderson of St John Restaurant fame, there has been a groundswell of enthusiasm for re-discovering Britain’s food heritage. All good stuff.

Bearing that in mind, London is a huge place and finding great food and wine experiences can be time consuming. But rest assured, they are there to be had in abundance. And although it remains a difficult task to put your hands on a decent cup of coffee in the capital, the following selection are worth the long haul.

Well before you pick up a knife or fork, the prospect of sleeping in London can be frightening and so the rise of small-scale, great-value hotels is very welcome. Located in the heart of uber-cool Shoreditch, The Hoxton Hotel (81 Great Eastern Street EC2A 3HU, 020 7550 1000) is the brainchild of Pret A Manger co-founder Sinclair Beecham. More urban lodge than hotel, the rooms are small and compact yet they cleverly cater for everything you’d expect from a larger, more expensive alternative – you just have to look. And the more you look, the more you realise just how clever this concept is. To begin with, there’s no mini bar, although everything you’d normally find in one – beer, chocolate, chips, travel adaptor, even a cold bottle of Krug 1985 – can be purchased at retail prices from the front desk. But it gets better. For breakfast, you choose between dining in the hotel restaurant or you simply tick a few boxes on the breakfast bag provided in your room, hang it on your door, and wake up to a free breakfast of yoghurt, muesli, orange juice and a banana – a welcome gesture in one of the world’s most expensive cities.

A short walk from The Hoxton, and in a neighbourhood that already boasts eateries such as Smiths of Smithfield, St John, and Moro, The Modern Pantry (47-48 St John’s Square Clerkenwell EC1V 4JJ, 0207 250 0833) is one of the most eagerly anticipated new additions to the London dining scene. Open for breakfast, lunch and dinner, this is the first venture from Anna Hansen, a former pupil of Kiwi fusion king Peter Gordon, where you can expect to find such globally inspired treats as a prawn omelette studded with spring onion, chilli and coriander; feta, date and chorizo fritters; fall-apart pork belly and the all-time Kiwi classic, hokey-pokey ice-cream. Dining is largely communal, noisy and surprisingly affordable. A late brekkie – better known here as brunch – was a highlight.

From St John’s Square, cross busy Clerkenwell Road and, depending on what side of lunchtime it is, make a beeline for London’s favourite wine bar, Vinoteca (7 St John Street, Smithfield EC1M 4AA, 0207 253 8786). Since 2005, this down-to-earth team has been enthusiastically pulling corks from some of the world’s greatest bottles, and largely to the delight of the many thirsty Londoners who keep it busy from open through to close. The selection of offerings by the glass ranges from weird and wonderful wines, such as Camel Valley Bacchus from Cornwall, to established and well-known classics. Expert advice, sensible pricing and great food are why Vinoteca is the kind of wine bar we all wish we had at the end of our street.

From Vinoteca, jump in a black cab and head to nearby Covent Garden for a post-lunch pick-me-up. Although a good pint can be had on just about any corner in London, finding a decent cup of coffee is an altogether harder task. With the London high street dominated by chain outlets turning out less than ordinary hits of caffeine, the hole-in-the-wall-style Fernandez & Wells (73 Beak St, Soho W1F 9SR, 0207 287 8124) is a beacon in the fog. Using their own signature blend assembled by local bean importers Monmouth, expect rich, creamy coffee configured any way you like it. Solids here range from sweet to savoury, but if you happen to be going by in the morning you would be mad to pass up the best toasted cheese sandwich on the planet. It is a mixture of Keen’s cheddar, leeks, red onion and garlic clamped shut by two slices of toasted sourdough from legendary Parisian bakers Poilâne.

From traditional to cutting-edge-modern, London is a great place to shop for wine. The iconic Berry Bros & Rudd (3 St James Street, SW1A 1EG, 0870 900 4300) is London’s most famous wine retailer and Britain’s oldest wine and spirit merchant. Having acted as official suppliers to the royal family since the reign of King George III, today the Berry’s store at 3 St James Street is like a museum; it’s like a vinous pulse that effortlessly balances great-value drinks from around the globe with some of the most sought-after classics the wine world has produced. The antithesis of the Berry’s experience is the ultra-slick new wine offering from everyone’s favourite department store, Selfridges. Wrapped around the recently upgraded Selfridges wine department, Wonder Bar (400 Oxford Street, W1A 1AB, 0800 123 400) is like a candy shop for grown-ups. Part wine bar/part virtual wine jukebox, Wonder Bar gives weary shoppers the chance to try a huge selection of some of the world’s greatest wines via a wall of high-tech Enomatic wine dispensers. Getting a drink couldn’t be easier: charge up your plastic card and cut loose, or alternatively let the staff do the choosing for you. Servings are offered in 125ml or 175ml pours or, if you’re feeling game, by the bottle. The Wonder Bar selection – which covers a lot of ground in regard to price, age, country, variety and style – comes courtesy of Dawn Davies, one of the city’s most talented young sommeliers, and all the wines are available for purchase in the wine department after you have finished tasting.

And then there’s London’s growing number of amazing produce markets. Ranking as one of the world’s greatest, Borough Market (Borough High Street, Southwark SE1 1TJ), held every Friday and Saturday, is a firm favourite with locals and tourists alike. From the freshest fish to veggies that were pulled from the ground only hours earlier, this is the place for the best of the best. But be warned that countless television appearances and vast column inches singing its praises, have ensured that Borough is rarely quiet. Fortunately, in the wake of this market’s success, London has spawned a wave of smaller, less crowded alternatives, many of which include scaled-down versions of Borough’s most-popular stallholders. Of these, Broadway Market (Hackney E8) every Saturday in East London, and the more centrally located Marylebone Farmers’ Market (Cramer Street car park just off Marylebone High Street, W1) every Sunday, are definitely well worth a visit.

Across the road from Borough Market, Wright Brothers Oyster & Porter House (11 Stoney Street, Borough SE1 9AD, 0207 403 9554) is the perfect primer for an afternoon spent wandering around the nearby Tate Modern and a newish venture paying homage to two of England’s finest products – oysters and beer. This is a blink-and-you’ll-miss-it kind of place, where platters of oysters from around the country are consumed at pace alongside fresh Devonshire crab, local lobsters, soft-shell crab with aioli and melt-in-your-mouth tuna tartar. The wine list is predominantly a well-chosen selection of aromatic whites such as grüner veltliner, fiano, albariño, riesling and torrontés, many of which are from small-scale producers and sourced from around the world.

And then, when the sun finally sets on London, dinner at the newly refurbished Quo Vadis (26-29 Dean Street, W1D 3LL, 0207 437 9585) is a must. Over most of the past decade, brothers Sam and Eddie Hart have taken London’s food scene by storm. First came Fino, then more recently the sardine-sized Barrafina – a nod to Spain’s finest tapas bars – and now their latest project, the reinvention of Soho institution Quo Vadis. And the result is great. First, you can sit in an impressive room that pays homage to the building’s beautiful leadlight frontage. It’s an incredible (if a little noisy) setting. And then there’s the great service. Perfectly groomed waiters in white jackets and black ties calmly move around the room delivering plates of lovely food and pouring bottles of fine wine. Much like the room, the waiters and the wine list, the menu at Quo Vadis is all about the classics. Think cold seafood platters, mushrooms on toast, foie gras, pan-fried turbot, whole roast chicken for two, and an incredibly tender char-grilled veal chop. But no matter how good all of that may sound, be sure to leave room for the heart-stopping, ice-cream-filled profiteroles smothered in hot chocolate sauce. Forget the long haul, these I would happily swim back to London to devour!

PHOTOGRAPHY VINOTECA

This article appeared in the February/March 2009 issue of Gourmet Traveller WINE.