Swithins Fish

Astonishingly overpriced 80's style food ie gloopy tastless sauce drizzled over grilled fish, and piped mash! Waiter also took our food order before asking if we wanted something to drink. Would NOT recommend!
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Lady Brady
4 Overall rating
Food 4 | Service 6 | Atmosphere 7 | Value for money 0
Friday, October 08, 2010

My boyfriend and I came here for our anniversary dinner - which I mentioned when I booked in the naive belief that they might give us a more romantic table rather than the one right by the kitchen door that we ended up with.

Swithins doesn't have a great website, and what they don't tell you is that in the evening only one of the restaurant areas is open, so the menu is mixed seafood/Italian. This actually works quite well as there is lots of seafood/fish choice and it offers other options for those who aren't too keen on seafood. My boyfriend, for example, had ravioli to start and lamb cutlets for his main. I had beef carpacio to start and scallops as my main.

The food was good - but not amazing. The carpaccio was quite thickly sliced and the salad accompanying it was plentiful - so there was a good portion size and it was enjoyable but, as I say, not mind blowing. My scallops were good but half way through I got a whiff of something which immediately put me off. I hasten to add that nothing was wrong with it but the scallops were huge, the bacon around them was tough and fatty and the mash potato looked and tasted more like puree. Like I said - not amazing.

The wine list is very good - offering a good range of prices to cater for varying budgets, we chose a £17.95 bottle of Semillon Chardonnay and it was delicious, nicer than I had expected it to be. It drank really well with our food as well.

The desserts menu didn't offer that much choice - almost everything seemed to have cream in it, or chocolate, so we didn't have a dessert in the end but we did choose a glass of Muscat to top the evening off. I am a huge fan of the Muscat grape having grown up in the South of France and this was incredibly nice Muscat.

The service was good, with a smile and a sense of humour which was pleasant - we were not unncessarily interrupted but it would have been nicer to have a slightly quieter table to enjoy our romantic evening together.

Something else they don't tell you is that they charge a 'cover charge' of £1.50 per person. I don't mind, but that is on top of the 'optional' 12.5% service charge (I would always pay a tip but 12.5% is the steep end of service charge and I prefer to decide myself how much the service was worth) and the TasteLondon card we had was supposed to give us a 50% off food discount but we didn't get the entire discount deducted from our bill. We didn't mention it or argue the point. Without the discount the bill came to £103 including service and wine, for which I personally feel is not justified given the quality of the meal. I probably won't be coming back to Swithins but I would definitely recommend it for very good wine with a meal and with a group of friends. I would also suggest going with a discount card in hand.
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Vic
8 Overall rating
Food 7 | Service 8 | Atmosphere 8 | Value for money 7
Thursday, July 22, 2010

Like many others of The City's hidden secrets is this venue hidden down the back streets.

An excellent fish restaurant - I note the lamb cutets mentioned in another review, no you must go there for the fish! Indeed I took a South African work colleague who is normally red meat only and he was pleasantly surprised!

What I also like is that the chef cooks an additional selection of the specials so that the waiter can both impress and tempt you by bringing round the specials on a plate for you to view and consider.

As ever a solid white wine list.

Is also a small wine bar at the front, there are worse experiences than lurking in the window with a glass of Sancerre watching the hordes scurry down the lane to Cannon Street after work.
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Nick S
9 Overall rating
Food 8 | Service 9 | Atmosphere 8 | Value for money 9
Wednesday, April 22, 2009