After some inspiration. Going up to the big town to meet my daughter for her 21st birthday. Want to take her out for a meal, but need some help to find something memorable.

She’s a punk rock chick, very arty, so nothing pretentious. Needs a decent veggie selection too!

Mind if I ask the sort of budget here?

Bargain and interesting, or blowout de luxe?

Gilgamesh IF you can get in.

Tayyabs…Est End cool.

Dans le Noir (I think) everything served/done in the dark.

Ottolenghi, never tried but a vegetarian friend said it was nice

Ottolenghi very good but not cheap. Yalla Yalla in Soho is very nice, cheaper than Ottolenghi. Heard good things about Dishoom too but never been. Personally I really like Belgo but not great for vegetarians, but the moules are super as is the beglian beer selection.

Edit. Moro in Exmouth Market is also excellent but again not particularly cheap.

Busaba Thai – In central London. Really good food and nice atmosphere, right in central Soho:

Busaba Soho

Looking more bargain and interesting. Theme restaurants or in unusual places, as long as the food is edible ?

My wife’s just suggested eating up the oxo tower

Bonnington cafe Vauxhall. You won’t get any quirkier in London, great food and wine from the deli across the road is awesome. Great history that area too, squats, cooperatives and now gentrification.

Is busaba Thai nice? I see there’s one in Kingston. Might try it as amuch there soon.

Another vote for Tayyabs, excellent Indian food. BYO too which is nice.

This place was recommended to me on here about 4 years ago.

I have fond memories but, as I say, it was 4 years ago…

India Club on the Top Floor of the Strand Continental hotel just by Waterloo Bridge – very basic ( formica tables and BYOB) South Indian restauant, therefore good for veggies, in very central location. Massala Dosa and chilli bhajis are recommended, nans are not more like pittas, other breads good. Menu and history here.

ten ten tei is a good Japanese place on Brewer Street – cheap and basic but a katsu curry to remember if you like your comfort food!

Quirky and cheap – govindas the hare krishna run cafe between soho square and Oxford St. I like the Indian in the strand hotel – very different.

40mpg – Member
My wife’s just suggested eating up the oxo tower

Fnar fnar…

http://www.dosa-world.com/

For top & different vege or any other South Indian place. Nothing particularly about the places themselves, though.

Maybe try https://www.designmynight.com/london for something a bit different?

The heliot steakhouse at the hippodrome casino at Leicester Square is a wacky environment in an old theatre balcony with surprisingly good and cheap food. Gets best steakhouse awards and my partner, a veggie, likes it… BUT I’d go South Indian if she’s veggie, like Chettinad off Tottenham Court Road.

Go to the Breakfast Club at Spitalfields, and then ask to see the mayor.

They have a few locations tale a look at their Website

Most of them have a hidden cocktail bar…the one in Spitalfields is through a fridge and then downstairs.

100 Hoxton is ace. Rough around the edges and you order a set of dishes like a tapas bar – food comes when in whatever order it’s ready. Unpretentious and reasonable prices. We always go when we’re down dat London.

For “unusual” archipelago is right up there. Very good too. Maybe not great for.veggies though.

NOPI (Otolenghi) Israeli/ Eastern Med/ North African is good for Vegas and Meaties. The toilets are disturbing.
Fera at Claridges (Simon Rogan) modern British is also good, with an equal emphasis for v’s & m’s.
The Palomar – again Israeli/ Eastern Med/ North African has a funkier vibe than NOPI – either book or queue to eat at the bar. Good for both again.
Benares (Atul Kotchar) modern Indian. Very nice. Good for v’s and m’s.

Would definitely recommend Dishoom. They are all good but the Granary Square Venue is utterly superb. Very good for veggies and the black dahl is insanely good.

Ottolenghi is fabulous but not cheap and not “rock chic”

Hoxton suggestions are good ones. IMO correct vibe for your daughter.

London has many great veggie restaurants from simple to lavish, Hoxton to Chelsea and Belgravia ! Have a look on TripAdvisor or TimeOut. 2 of my daughters are veggie and we have eaten at many great places.

This place is a real little secret hidden gem, real rickety entrance, like a time warp:

http://www.strand-continental.co.uk/Restaurant_%26_Bar.html

The charmingly eccentric India Club Restaurant has remained much the same since its opening in 1946.

Hidden up a flight of stairs, India Club is one of London’s best kept secrets. Enter a timewarp, with portraits of the Independence era on the walls, bottle-green leather chairs, red lino flooring and wooden laminate tabletops. It is a British curry house of the first generation. Authentic ‘home cooked’ South Indian cuisine at extraordinary value makes India Club an unforgettable dining experience.

40mpg – Member
My wife’s just suggested eating up the oxo tower

Can honestly say that the restaurant there was the most overpriced and disappointing i have ever been too. I was given £150 of Harvey Nichols vouchers as a thank you for a favour i did for a friend and we realised that restaurant was owned by them so we could them there, table was booked for 7pm, told they were to busy when we got there, steered to cocktail bar, finally seated at 8.45pm! Had starters about 9.30, then there was about an hour wait til mains came out, which was cold, finally by the time we got to order dessert, half the things were off the menu as that chef had gone home, and by the time the bill came we had missed last train back to Guildford. Final insult, despite moaning, no apology, not even a free drink and the bill came to £320 for the 2 of us, so we had to cough up the other £170 and had to get a hotel as well.

We really like the street food markets in Brick Lane. Actually have a very similar atmosphere to the ‘real’ ones in SE Asia. The bigger one on the west side doesn’t really have anywhere to sit though but the range of food is huge and very good. The smaller one on the east side is a bit better set up with tables, less ad-hoc. Maybe not a fancy sit down meal but pretty memorable

May I be so bold, as you say …

meet my daughter

… does that mean she’s down here already? Has been for a little while ??

If so, maybe let her choose somewhere she might want to “show off” and you pick up the bill ?

Apologies if I’ve got the wrong end of the stick.

Have fun

Would definitely recommend Dishoom. They are all good but the Granary Square Venue is utterly superb. Very good for veggies and the black dahl is insanely good.

Went to Dishoom in Shoreditch for breakfast at the weekend, you can’t beat a good sausage naan (the veggie options looked good also)

Dans le noir, was a strange but unforgetable eating experiance. It truely is completely dark & all the waiters are blind (we were convinced they were wearing night vison glasses initially). There are 4 menu options fish, meat , vegy & exotic & afterwards they take you through what you have actually eaten!

How has nobody mentioned Aberdeen Steak House…………

Not sure if they have a veggie option though ( I’ve never been in one much the same as I don’t know anyone who has. Always full though. Weird…..)

How has nobody mentioned Aberdeen Steak House…………

Not sure if they have a veggie option though ( I’ve never been in one much the same as I don’t know anyone who has. Always full though. Weird…..)

Americans…

My current London favourite is A Wong. Highly recommended, and rightly so, by Ken Lo among others .

Paradise by Way of Kensal Green…. if she’s got aspirations/ideas of being cool and arty….even the name derives from a GK Chesterton poem opposing the prohibition of alcohol…if you don’t want to spend loads…the parents can just stick to the bar menu and maybe let your daughter choose whatever she wants?

Don’t listen to the oldies on here…. 😀

Not sure if this is too late for you – but I was in Shoreditch at the weekend and discovered The Bike Shed. It’s brill – excellent food and full of friendly bikers who let my 6 year-old daughter have her photo taken on various Harleys etc (I appreciate your daughter may be a little old for that of course 🙂 Highly recommended.

“Tayyabs…Est End cool.”

Tayyabs stopped being ‘cool’ about 15 years ago. it’s a truly awful place to eat now, even at quieter times. It’s so packed you just can’t enjoy your meal, regardless of how good the food is (I assume it’s still just as good unless something has changed). I’d only pick up a takeaway from there now.

Like Tayyabs, the whole Brick Lane/Whitechapel ‘scene’ is well over. Most places just sell sugary, otherwise insipid and uninspiring dross now. It’s just for tourists and those without a clue these days. If you want genuine Subcontinent grub, then look for the scruffier little cheap places; they’ll offer a far more ‘real’ eating experience. I’d say that for most food really; I’m seldom impressed with well established ‘proper’ restaurants, and find the quirky little local places often far more rewarding. From things like a great little cafe doing Polish food in a park in East Barnet, to a cheap and cheerful chips-with-everything greasy spoon in Bethnal Green; a totally hipster fully organic cafe in an industrial estate in South Tottenham, to a funny little part time cafe in a nature reserve behind Kings Cross/St Pancras stations. That’s what you need to look for in London. I’d suggest picking an area, then Googling for ‘unusual places to eat’ there. Bit of a gamble, but then that’s part of the fun! 😀

“100 Hoxton is ace… Unpretentious and reasonable prices”

😆

One of the most overrated places in London! Very mediocre food, dreadful venue, and crap staff. You’ll get a far better experience all round, by getting something off the takeaway West Indian van just outside. 100 Hoxton is the only place I’ve ever refused to pay and walked out. Food took ages to come, was stone cold, staff were more than rude, and the coffee was shit (and cold). Go just a mile up the road to Dalston, and you’ll do much better.

Given some of the ‘suggestions’ on this thread, if I were you, I’d ignore them and take pot luck!

My wife’s just suggested eating up the oxo tower

I thought you didn’t want pretentious? We went there 18 years ago for our wedding day meal (just 4 of of after the Registry Office). Got given a crappy table near the toilets and serving area (ie not near the windows). Unmemorable food and average service. Could be better now but I wouldn’t go back.

The business lunch at Ting (on the 35th floor of the Shard) is a bargain for the location but nothing for a veggie (unless they eat fish).

the whole Brick Lane/Whitechapel ‘scene’ is well over. Most places just sell sugary, otherwise insipid and uninspiring dross now.

Brick Lane itself has always been terrible IME but there are still good places just off the main drag. http://sichuan-folk.co.uk/ was good and had good cheap South Indian at http://www.dosa-world.com/

This Thai place is on my ‘must go’ list at the moment – Som Saa

Brixton Market wins on the interesting – go for cocktails in one place, starter somewhere else and then finish at a third. Partly depends where in London she is and where she goes out normally.