Category: Restaurant Review

If your restaurant requires constructive criticism and promotion, I have an empty stomach and a car full of petrol ready. Discretion is assured; bribes are happily accepted.

All photographs and words are my own: I endeavour to review fairly, considering restaurants’ cost, level of trade and intended target market.

Restaurant Review: Bibimbab Cafe, Bloomsbury

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Bibimbab Cafe – Time For A Korea Change

I fully expected to love Bibimbab Café. It benefited from a fantastic location – spitting distance from the fabulous British Museum. Unlike many of the surrounding restaurants, it bravely managed to be both independent and reasonably priced. These positive omens, combined with an unfamiliar cuisine and empty stomach, provided an appetising prospect.

Unfortunately, Bibimbab Cafe’s atmosphere was so dour, it made Pyongyang seem like Las Vegas. When I learnt Bibimbab Cafe was a Korean, I assumed South not North. Service was so anonymous, I came into the restaurant knowing nothing about Korean cuisine and left knowing less.

Feeling like the typical Brit abroad, the laminate drinks menu left me utterly clueless; with no support on offer, I meekly helped myself to a Diet Coke. The drinks menu was at least genuine, and no doubt familiar for the already initiated.

The menu focused on finely shredded healthy things honouring a sliced egg, terracotta broths with brillo pad sized tofu and uniform sushi. The website proudly advised: “Bibimbab can be almost anything you want it to be” – the one request it couldn’t accommodate was flavour.

The Spicy Pork was not spicy; I gave it the benefit of the doubt it was pork. It was languid with redundant floppy fatty pieces, served in an impressively anaemic soup. The Korean Style Beef had the elegance of a Döner kebab, but certainly had a punchy flavour that really was the dogs’ bollocks.

As Bloomsbury offers other Korean restaurants; unfortunately, I can’t justify a return to the Bibimbab Cafe.

Bibimbab Cafe
Review Summary

Atmosphere 2  Cost 7  Quality 3  Service 3

Bibimbab Cafe London Review
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Restaurant Review: Su Tzilleri e le Cantine, Cagliari

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Su Tzilleri e le Cantine – Scary Sardinian Supper

Visit Su Tzilleri e le Cantine for unpretentious, informal Sardinian food, rich in both history and flavour. If you seek something else, Sardinia won’t be your island, let alone Su Tzilleri your trattoria.

Choosing the taster menu, I naively brought only one stomach. Don’t bother with lunch beforehand and only pencil in tomorrow’s breakfast. Never before had I been intimated by a pending main course. Su Tzilleri e le Cantinea didn’t sell meals but character building challenge. The realisation I’d eaten too much came as I struggled to breathe. Mercifully, my partner’s inhaler rescued me, despite not being asthmatic.

Now I see why Italians are so fusilli fussily protective of their pasta. The Culurgiones (Sardinian Ravioli) with goats cheese, tomatoes and mint were perfection. A minimalist celebration of summer on a plate. Seeing the tomatoes basking in the sun outside, was iconic as it was romantic. The antipasti produced cured wafer thin lamb so good it would be illegal in England. Ensuing Su Tzilleri e le Cantinea highlights included delicious rabbit, tasting like a gym-obsessed chicken pampered in luxurious oils, and a perfectly balanced, angelically light tiramisu. All washed down with local Cannonau and Barbera which was embarrassingly rambunctious for its frugal price point.

Dining wasn’t faultless; meatballs yearned for seasoning, rigatoni flirted with being raw, plates were cold, and the menu didn’t always match what arrived. However, all this can be forgiven when the same euros in Milan only get you some prosecco and a scowl.

Su Tzilleri e le Cantinea haphazard, customer is always wrong philosophy of Italian service wouldn’t survive in England. I didn’t suggest the dishes weren’t strictly as ordered, for fear of a skillet-wielding emotional chef. However, the food was so memorable I had no right to complain. Walking out into the warm, clear Sardinian night I was disorientated, shell-shocked but jubilant. Su Tzilleri e le Cantine served a truly memorable dinner and provided bagged-up bunny for brunch to boot.

Su Tzilleri e le Cantine
Review Summary

Atmosphere 9    Cost 9   Quality 9    Service 4

Su Tzilleri e le Cantine: Soaking Up The Sunshine
Su Tzilleri e le Cantine: Soaking Up The Sunshine
Restaurant Review Su Tzilleri e le Cantine
Exceptional quality antipasti
Restaurant Review Su Tzilleri e le Cantine
Leftover rabbit boxed up and reheated for brunch!

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(Cagliari)

Restaurant Review: Ristorante Luigi Pomata, Cagliari

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Ristorante Luigi Pomata – Poor Attempt At Fine Dining

Foodies visiting Cagliari (or Sardinia) for the first time, will, as I, fall in love with the food. It is simple, fresh and delicious. It is food that has been sun-kissed, honest, and direct from the land and her people – precisely the kind of food lacking from British mid-week dinner tables. It speaks volumes of the Sardinian culture and should be celebrated; however, presentation is rarely considered, menus are incredibly insular in technique and ingredient, and restaurants rarely expect guests in anything smarter than T-shirts. Ristorante Luigi Pomata on paper provided a refreshing, modern alternative.

Unfortunately, Ristorante Luigi Pomata was the worst kind of restaurant: it thought it was sophisticated, but wasn’t. The only thing worse than a snob is an inept snob. I can only assume Luigi saw Michelin star restaurants on TV and tried to emulate them without leaving the house.

Luigi Pomata’s staff for all their running around and snooty faces were entirely unintuitive and inefficient – as though Italy’s declined industry was paralleled in the dining room. The atmosphere, unless eating shortly before sunrise, is non-existent. I find our continental cousins evening dining habits strangely sophisticated, so arrived when it was suitably dark outside. Still, it was quieter than lunch in Islamabad cafes during Ramadan. I’m English; admittedly, but wasn’t staggering in, chanting “Vindaloo, Vindaloo!” I had the decency to turn up before midnight, yet received less rapport than on my driving test.

In Italy, the idea of pushing the boundaries of flavour is daringly swapping oregano for rosemary on focaccia. At least Ristorante Luigi Pomata was serving unique dishes for a 100-mile radius. That said, never eating octopus and chickpeas together won’t keep me up at night. The food, although thoughtfully presented, was largely style over substance; however, the quality of ingredients was self-evident across all dishes.

Ristorante Luigi Pomata thought it should only sell food, not ambience. At least their extra dry Prosecco is as good as a champagne three times its price in England.

Ristorante Luigi Pomata Review Summary

Atmosphere 2    Cost 3    Quality 7    Service 2

Ristorante Luigi Pomata Restaurant Review
Swordfish & Mozzarella
Ristorante Luigi Pomata Cagliari Restaurant Review
Octopus & Chickpeas
Ristorante Luigi Pomata Cagliari Restaurant Review
Tuna & Vegetables

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(Cagliari)