Inamo

134-136 Wardour Street, Soho, London, W1F 8ZP - View on a map
Telephone: 020 7851 7051

Inamo Restaurant In London
Details Image
Overall 3.8
Food 6.0
Service 5.0
Atmosphere 4.0
Value 0.0
Based on 1 reviews

what the critics say

Guardian

Jay Rayner

Sunday, May 16, 2010 - Inamo's shtick is an interactive menu. Pictures of menu items are projected on to the table in front of you. You order your food. It arrives. What larks...With all these bells and whistles, most of the food is about as good as it needs to be. It succeeds best with the smaller dishes and when it sticks to the Japanese end of the Asian repertoire, the one exception being long-braised honey-roasted spare ribs in XO sauce. We liked slices of seared wild boar rolled around asparagus and enoki mushrooms.

TimeOut

Charmaine Mok - 3/6

Thursday, October 09, 2008 - For the most unsociable of diners, Inamo is the ultimate experience whipped straight out of cyberspace. Interaction between diner and waiting staff is virtually eliminated by way of individualised computer screens set into the tables and projected by giant, silkworm-like monstrosities looming above diners' heads; staff cruise about, stopping only to plonk down the desired dishes.

+ Show more critic reviews

your comments review this restaurant and win a bottle of champagne

what can one say that hasn't been said?

not much, really.

the gimmick of online ordering is cute, but only the once.

the portions appetising but tiny and overpriced.

i don't think i'd hurry back.
Comment on this reader review

benscaro - View all reviews by this user
Overall rating 4 stars
Food 6 | Service 5 | Atmosphere 4 | Value for money 0
Wednesday, July 25, 2012

Not a bad choice. It was reccomended to me by a Japanese friend so i was a little dissapointed as i thought it would be more in keeping with Japanese cuisine and Tokyo's funky restaurants.

The interactive table was a gimmick which wore off within 10 minutes. There is sadly very few options available. Apart from changing the colour or background of your table, playing a game of battleship and ordering your food through the table there is nothing else really to do so within 10.

I found it a little pricey for the portion sizes.

All in all it was ok. I wouldnt reccomend it to others but then again i am not going to knock it either. A very average 6.5.
Comment on this reader review

Sam
Overall rating 7 stars
Food 6 | Service 7 | Atmosphere 7 | Value for money 6
Tuesday, April 10, 2012

Avoid at all cost

Unless you want to pay 100+ for rubbish food.
Comment on this reader review

Romani
Overall rating 2 stars
Food 0 | Service 2 | Atmosphere 5 | Value for money 0
Wednesday, December 21, 2011

Get em in and get em out!!!

This restaurant was talked about by many friends so we thought we would give it a try. The experience of ordering by clicking a button was fun and exciting, the food was yummy with lots of flavours going on and the waiting staff were efficient and kind. The only negative was the maitre 'd who came to our table after we had been there for an hour and a half and told us that we had to finish eating and leave as they 'needed our table back'. One of us had ordered dessert which we were still waiting for and when we mentioned this we were told that it would have to be eaten quickly. Then our digital table menus were turned off and I couldn't even order for the bill. We felt that this get em in and get em out end to the evening really tainted what would have been a lovely experience otherwise. I would only recommend this restaurant with a caution that you must eat fast, pay and leave or you risk getting told off!
Comment on this reader review


Overall rating 7 stars
Food 7 | Service 7 | Atmosphere 7 | Value for money 5
Saturday, November 26, 2011

Don't go here if you are hungry. The food wasn't too bad but the portions were pathetic. I sent my mail course back - a seafood curry that had about 50g of seafood at best and cost £17. On reflection I should have sent everything back and left. Waiters and waitresses looked disinterested.

I had a nice tuna sushi starter - all 10 grams of it for about £8. The prices are an absolute joke and the owners must be making a killing because of mugs who pay these prices for no food at all. Its a great menu for supermodels who eat 500 calories a day and have millions of pounds to waste.

I will never, ever go back. I would have to spend about 100 on one person to get full here. Avoid.
Comment on this reader review

Pete
Overall rating 2 stars
Food 2 | Service 2 | Atmosphere 3 | Value for money 0
Wednesday, October 26, 2011

Cold and expensive food. Totally relying on the concept. Avoid at all costs. Over £100 for a meal that they should have been paying me to eat!
Comment on this reader review


Overall rating 1 stars
Food 1 | Service 1 | Atmosphere 1 | Value for money 0
Monday, October 17, 2011

His: This is a restaurant that reminds me of others like it that rely on gimmicks and/or decor instead of the quality of food to draw customers in. The problem with that approach for restaurant owners, though, is that the customer comes in only once. The projection system is very neat; the food is awful and pretentious, the service even worse. So, having tried the ordering system and the food, I'll be a one-time customer.

Her: Inamo is certainly in tune with the vibe of its neighborhood, alias not the swanky one, nor the culinary one. It does features an interesting way of ordering food, a program that does give you round 10 minutes of fun until the first dish arrives and you realize that that starter you ordered is about 10 times smaller than its projected picture. Nevermind, hungry, I jumped on my mains, a mushroom Toban Yaki, which was so totally yaki that I had to force the first bite down my throat and did not touch it again. Still hungry, I started dipping my Vegetable Temaki into the truffle infused sauce which gave the beef Carpaccio starter its taste: not bad, I was starting to eat. Our 17 quid rosé sake arrived and like the starter was four times smaller than the bottle we expected and 10 times sweeter. The plain white rice was not bad, it gave me a sense of cleanliness after my horrifying visit to the washroom. The avocado and tomato salad which I ordered as a 'low-risk' stomach filler as a last resort had so much salt on it that I could take it off with my bare hands. With the sake bottle empty and the water glass featuring UFOs (Unidentified Floating Objects) I had nothing left to quench my thirst nor to fill my stomach. The bill: 112 quid, oh no, sorry, 86, there was a computer error. I will never go back.
Comment on this reader review

His&Hers - View all reviews by this user
Overall rating 2 stars
Food 2 | Service 0 | Atmosphere 3 | Value for money 1
Sunday, July 24, 2011

We decided to go to Inamo for dinner yesterday as we had heard about the interactive ordering system. The ordering system was easy to work out however it was a little disappointing. Rather than being touchscreen it was more like a projector system with a mouse pad. And if you are seated by the window when it is still light outside, it is very hard to see! There are other features to the system, i.e. chef cam where you can see the chefs in the kitchen, and games etc. The ambience overall is quirky and fairly cool to be fair.

The main problems are that the food is poor and the portions miniscule. The crispy pork belly comprised 6 thin small, thin slices devoid of flavour - a single mouthful that's even harder to swallow at £8.50. The crab maki was ok, but you can get better elsewhere. The seafood curry - 4 mussels, 2 clams, 1 prawn, 2 morsels of salmon, 1 okra, 1 small potato - would be ok for a microwave meal, but not at £14!

The table next to us even returned one of their mains complaining there was no flavour.

Even the tea we had was bland.

It was not good value for money at all and I would not recommend this place. They should've included a food rating gadget so that one is able to rate all the food one has ordered based on taste, portion etc. - this way, they can find out how bad they are!!

We left feeling ripped off and hungry! And so we finished our meal across the street...
Comment on this reader review


Overall rating 3 stars
Food 0 | Service 5 | Atmosphere 6 | Value for money 0
Sunday, July 10, 2011

good concept, funny order system. But food... never had such a bad pan-asian food in my life. tried to be Japanese and failed dishes are just pathetic. waiters seems wandering around where he/she should bring dishes. I quite liked the system, so it's a huge shame.
Comment on this reader review


Overall rating 5 stars
Food 0 | Service 5 | Atmosphere 10 | Value for money 3
Sunday, July 10, 2011

Quirky "concept restaurant".

Let's get the main point of this restaurant out of the way. This is the first (?) restaurant to use a point and click system to order one's food. There is no paper menu. The menu is projected onto your table and you use hand gestures to order what you want. The food then arrives as it is prepared. They make no effort to send dishes out at the same time - they just arrive as they are ready. But they tell you this before you start.

This actually works quite well, and the system even includes a few games, so you can play battleships with your friends while you're waiting.

Food-wise I was slightly less impressed. I was expecting seriously authentic food for some reason, but what arrived was quite "Europeanised". It was still very nice, though, so it gets an 8 in any case. Some of the portions could have been more generous.

The decor is very plain but it gets away with this since the table projection system has most people staring down all the time, so you don't really notice anything else!

Service is a little on the plain side. To be fair, they are only really there to complete the missing link in the ordering system (you can order from the interactive menu, but the food still has to be carried by hand). So they don't really communicate with you. This is fine, but I'm not sure how they'd cope if there was a problem.

And the bill? Not too bad. Probably about right. You're paying for pretty good food and the menu system works quite well. It's fun. I don't mind paying a little extra for the novelty.
Comment on this reader review

Alan Ingham - View all reviews by this user
Overall rating 8 stars
Food 8 | Service 8 | Atmosphere 8 | Value for money 8
Sunday, June 26, 2011


what the bloggers say

Pig Pig's Corner

Pig Pig's Corner

Tuesday, June 29, 2010 - 'Wagyu Bavette': Perfectly grilled on the outside for a slightly charred surface while the inside remains juicily pink, this was a great main to eat. I wasn't convinced about the marbling of the wagyu, but the beef strips had a great natural beefy taste, nicely augmented by the light soy based sauce...Not much to complain about really. The food all had strong vibrant flavours and there wasn't a lot wrong with most of it. I certainly enjoyed almost all the stuff placed in front of me and I would be more than happy to visit Inamo again.

A Girl Has To Eat

A Girl Has To Eat

Monday, December 08, 2008 - I had come to Inamo on the promise of a gimmick, so I had no expectations of the food, but the food was on the whole good and tasty. Chef Alexander Ziverts, previously of Cocoon, Eight Over Eight and E&O, showcased an almost perfect rendition of a Nobu-esque black cod in miso sauce. The fish was soft, delicate and succulent, and the sauce was rich and think and slightly sweetened. But as part of a £20 set menu served with edamame, a sashimi salad, crispy tofu, rice and miso soup the individual portions were rather small.

You may also like these restaurants:
quick search
user tools
latest blog entry

London Food Fests

Pick Up Gourmet Goodies At A Summer Food Fest
london tweeting

Barrio Bars to open a new site in Shoreditch next month (via Caterer) - http://t.co/DmDQwfUl

save this page
best for...
cuisine
our sites
city eating