THERE is an attractive view of St James’s Church on Piccadilly – said to be Christopher Wren’s personal favourite – from outdoor tables at Bentley’s Oyster Bar & Grill. The red brick and Portland stone of the church is tightly framed by the buildings at the end of Swallow St; at its other end the street leads into Regent’s St’s curvature.
Easily found halfway down Swallow St, Bentley’s, established in 1916, has earned its reputation for quality seafood and exemplary service since Richard Corrigan took over the kitchen in 2005 and nothing suggests standards are falling. The classic oyster experience is best enjoyed tucked in at one of the two marble counters inside but they taste just as appetising when brought outside to a white tablecloth on the pavement under black umbrellas.
The oysters come from the UK and Ireland and can be dressed in a variety of different styles, including French, Spanish and Vietnamese.
Bentley’s seafood delights, outside or inside
A steak, lamb cutlets and a potato gnocchi are on the menu but Bentley’s excels in fish and a generous set of specials on a chalkboard adds to the difficulty of making a choice. One of the house cocktails — Melody Fields suits the time of year with its summery blend of gin, honey, orange bitters and a twig of rosemary pegged to the rim – and Irish soda bread with seaweed butter will help in the selection process. The fish pie, a mustard-infused mix of haddock, prawn and salmon, is one way of solving the dilemma.
Bentley’s is not for a rushed meal. Its self-assurance is balanced with courtesy and the restaurant feels as well established on London’s culinary landscape as St James’s does on the architectural one.
Traditionalists may feel that the intrinsic atmosphere of Barrafina at Covent Garden, like Bentley’s, is best enjoyed by plonking yourself on a stool at the bar counter. The kitchen team are feet away in front of you and their voluble busyness around pots, pans and calls in Spanish are all part of the buzzy yet intimate fun.
But at Barrafina’s Covent Garden branch, the outdoor tables are under the open windows so the ambient élan is there in the background while the infrequent footfall on the pedestrianized Broad Court creates the sense of a personal space. In summer, courtesy of a glass of tapas-friendly Manzanilla, it’s as close as you’ll get in the heart of London to the scent of a sea breeze from Sanlúcar de Barrameda, the town in Jerez where the drink originates.
Like the other half dozen sherries on the drinks list, it decisively buries sherry’s tired stereotype as grandmothers’ favourite tipple.
Barrafina’s space for outdoor tables
A choice of five tapas will arrive in separate sets, emulating a three-course meal, and that’s fine, but if you start with the palate-teasing olives – marinated in-house — it’s a faux pas to nibble them with a fork; fingers must get oily. The rest of the menu is full of zesty choices and there are specials on top of that, making a meal here stretch longer into the evening that you may have anticipated.
I’ve never been a fan of TV’s Dr Who but know that the Tardis has the exterior dimensions of a phone box while, once inside, is spacious and full of intergalactic technology. It may come to mind after entering Frederick’s in Camden Passage, a few minutes from Angel underground station. Easily walked past, the restaurant’s street width allows for only three small tables on the pavement but step through the door and measurements magnify exponentially. In place of hi-tech wizardry all is airily light, with conspicuously colourful artwork on the walls and a dining conservatory.
Walk through this to a rear garden and feel your spirits rise at the sight of a Himalayan birch tree, its venerable white peeling bark overlooking a green lawn bordered by plants and smaller trees – including a fig tree, I think, but couldn’t see any fruit on it – that block out the brickwork of neighbouring buildings.
This is an angelic setting for dining outdoors under duck-blue umbrellas; to call it a miniature garden of Eden in the urban heart of North London would be a stretch of the imagination but it sure is a soothing milieu for jaded minds and bodies.
Blissful setting, minutes from Angel Tube station, at Frederick’s
Frederick’s has been in the same family since, in 1969, they bought what was then a pub and converted it into a restaurant. Over the course of half a century it has become a firm favourite with well-heeled Islington residents. The menu has a solidly British base line with continental touches, decidedly non-ethnic, and generous helpings coming to your table at well-timed intervals from amicable staff. It is easy to appreciate the well-established reputation of Frederick’s in territory where eateries are choc-a-block but good restaurants surprisingly thin on the ground.
The colourfully garlanded outdoor tables at classy Coya Angel Court, mere minutes on foot from the Bank of England, are a treat and contrast strongly with the restaurant’s darkly illuminated indoor dining area; fully lit, its vibrant mix of blues, Peruvian furnishings and crafts, fabrics and large earthenware pots above the open kitchen evokes an interior from an Amodóvar movie.
The decorative distinction is definitely the large photographs on display, copies of Peruvian Martín Chambi’s images of his country’s indigenous people. Their ghostly presence on the walls makes a strange contrast with the restaurant’s City young and lively customers whose priorities must surely be fundamentally askew with theirs.
Floral heaven at Coya’s Courtyard in Angel Court
Coya’s cuisine is instantly appealing: an exotic blend of Peruvian and Japanese which is not as odd as it seems given that the country has the second largest Japanese population in South America outside Brazil. Protein-rich sharing dishes can kick off with a guacamole starter, mixed at your table in a mortar, an introduction to aji amarillio, the medium-hot and fruity chilli that is quintessentially Peruvian. Sharing plates should follow and the menu is not short of choices.
Intriguing interior at Coya Angel Court in the City
The whole experience, its glitz and glamour, is a robust affront to the corporate, ghostly-grey identity of the City. No wonder it’s hugely popular.
by Sean Sheehan