All reader reviews by Dom

Strada (Royal Festival Hall)

Food was excellent but not enough waiting staff employed. Sitting on the South Bank, it's a given that this place is always going to be busy - but then the management need to recognise that by employing more waiting staff! This is what lets the place down. Aside from that, the variety of food is good, some lovely wine, and obviously well located on the riverfront.

Monday, February 14, 2011
Overall rating
Food 7 | Service 5 | Atmosphere 5 | Value for money 6

Marcus Wareing at The Berkeley

Simply incredible. Yes, you pay a premium price, but it is so worth it. Quite what was the best part of this meal is hard to say... where do I begin?

Amuse bouche - "BLT" - consisting of lettuce soup, bacon foam and sundried tomato grissini. Starter - langoustines and blueberry infused with the scent of pine needles. Main - lamb served rare, with grilled peaches and freshly enhanced by a black olive and mint yoghurt, sitting on a bed of gem lettuce. Pre-dessert - a mini mojito... Mint snow, cucumber jelly on a white and dark rum panacotta bed. Dessert - tarte tatin, served on a trolley at the table, complete with vanilla ice-cream and clotted cream scoops on a separate saucer. Petit fours - an entire trolley dedicated to them. Banoffee, salted caramel, raspberry and white pepper, turkish delight, praline - the variety was wonderful.

So from a food perspective, pretty good. Meeting Marcus Wareing himself was a real treat - such a decent man, so much time for his customers and appreciation that they're happy - and the fact he chose the tarte tatin especially for us and signed a menu of his own accord to make my fiancee's birthday experience even better, really was the candle on the cake - never mind the icing!

Thank you to Marcus and his team of professionals for making this a night to remember. Would highly recommend this to anyone that wants to really

treat their other half. My advice - go there for romance, not business meetings. You can have the latter at numerous smart restaurants, but when it comes to romance, Marcus Wareing iat the Berkeley is one of those few places that really excel.

Thursday, July 22, 2010
Overall rating
Food 10 | Service 10 | Atmosphere 9 | Value for money 9

40 The Hill

Rather a disappointment. Looks good from the outside, but the quality of the food and service can't justify the prices. The service was so slow... when we queried this, we were told it was because we'd taken quite a while to eat our starter. If we were being slow, though, shouldn't the request for our mains be put in as soon as we'd finished our starters? Instead, we had to wait for ages for our mains to arrive.

The quality of the food itself wasn't bad, it just wasn't up to much. The mains, for example, were uninteresting. A confit of duck had good potential from the description on the menu, but the "red wine jus" was little more than the duck leg's own roasting juices and a splash of red wine. In fact, I needed tomato ketchup and balsamic just to make the flavour less bland. The sticky toffee pudding would've been nice as a light cake in the afternoon, but it just wasn't "sticky" enough to do for a pudding.

Wouldn't return here unless the chef changed or the prices were substantially reduced. The food wouldn't have been out of place at £6 or £7 a main in a cafe bar, but not upwards of £12 in a restaurant.

Monday, March 15, 2010
Overall rating
Food 3 | Service 4 | Atmosphere 4 | Value for money 2