The Garrison

The Garrison, which I have mentioned previously as being one of my favourites, is a gastro pub on Bermondsey street. It is still beautifully decorated and retains a good atmosphere, it is still a great place for a drink if you can get a table. However, having eaten there a couple of times recently, I think that the quality has slipped. Twice food has arrived cold and the cold dish has been taken away while Joff had either to eat his or wait for mine and leave his to go cold(i have to say that both times it was taken off the bill). The most recent visit was better, but even then the food was not quite as hot as it should have been and was ok rather than delicious. It all gives the appearance of having been assembled and heated up rather than actually having been cooked, if you see what I mean. Anyway, sadly, I will not be going back for a while and will instead be going to the superior Bermondsey Kitchen.

Royal Festival Hall

Company of Cooks have installed themselves in the terrace cafe area at the Royal Festival Hall and have made it an excellent place for lunch. There is plenty of space, much of it with a riverside view, and the place has a light and airy feel to it. It is not really a formal lunching kind of place but a good lazy Sunday or
Saturday destination. Excellent sandwiches on good, dense, seedy bread or focaccia with hummus and roasted courgettes. The cake is excellent and unusual, including a lavender cake with a wonderfully subtle flavour or, for Easter, a good rich, fruity simnel cake with generous amounts of marzipan. They also do seasonal salads and soups. Well made coffee and quick service make it one of my current favourites.

Nordic Bakery

The Nordic Bakery in Golden Square, is a relatively new Scandinavian bakery and coffee shop. It serves open sandwiches on dark rye bread (salmon tartare, egg and anchovy, cheese and gherkins) and, the real draw, warm, fresh and deeply enticing cinnamon buns. The interior, as you might expect, is clean and modern looking and yet, mainly because of the comforting and drool inducing smell of cinnamon and baking when you enter, it also immensely comforting. We escaped the hailstorm there and had tea in retro looking and oversized cups. The tea was perfectly brewed and reasonably priced, the smell was deeply delicious and the service friendly and efficient. In this part of London, tucked behind the generally overpriced and tacky Piccadilly, this is a rare find and i strongly you pay it a visit.

Red Fort

Red Fort is an Indian restaurant on Dean Street. Sounds nice and simple, well it's a posh Indian restaurant on Dean street. One with a slightly intimidating but smart exterior and a man on the door. Starting to sound more complicated? Good. There is a bar downstairs that serves good cocktails and has slightly worryingly efficient service. But back to the restaurant, for an Indian restaurant it has a small selection of vegetarian food, no mains, but all vegetable dishes can be eaten as mains, fair enough. In fact I found it hard to tell whether the vegetable dishes were sides or mains and, when they came, what the difference was. And this is where the trouble starts, the food tasted good and the service was brisk and friendly enough but by the end of the meal, although we had all had a good time, one look at the bill left me feeling thoroughly ripped off. Joff had a mushroom dish as his main but it was served in the same dish as the side dishes and put on the table without an explanation, was it part of the table's side dishes or his main? As a result he had to grab it quickly before it was snaffled by someone else. My aubergines were good, spicy and stuffed with paneer and cashews, but absolutely tiny ( I guess I should have paid more attention the descriptor 'baby' on the menu). A selection of starters for everyone translated as everyone getting a plate each containing all of the starters - an expensive an unnecessary way of doing it as we had to give away all of our fish and meat starters and were left with a tiny patty and a mini veg kebab. with rice and bread for the table, again, (the table was very well fed) and water brought without the choice of tap, the bill came to an astounding £60 a head! i have been to a fair few expensive restaurants but this was undoubtedly the most expensive when you take into consideration what we actually got for our money. Oh and the bill for the water alone came to £ 40. We managed to have a good evening despite this and the bill was met with disbelief and good humour. However I will not be going back and I would advise others not to unless they are feeling extraordinarily flush. Next time i might try Amaya or Veeraswamy.

Dealer's Choice

Dealer's Choice is a Patrick Marber play. Patrick Marber wrote Closer and the screenplay for Notes on a Scandal, for which he won an oscar nomination. Dealer's Choice has transferred from the Menier Chocolate factory and has had excellent reviews. It stars Roger Lloyd Pack (Trigger from Only Fools and Horses) and is directed by Samuel West.

We went to see it last night full of expectation. I like the Trafalgar Studios, steep seating which means there is no restricted view and some seats right on the stage where you can almost taste the actors sweat (if you really want value for money). The start was promising, a good set and funny dialogue, the characters a little stereotyped but plenty of room for them to develop. However after about half an hour the characters were stuck firmly in stereotype and the plot looming inevitable ahead, the possibilities for misunderstandings and betrayal laid out all too clearly.

The story was played out around a pivotal poker game, which happened in the second half, but by the time it started I felt as if I had seen it already. The game itself was supposed to draw out all the simmering tensions and father /son relationships within the 4 characters working in an unnamed restaurant. There were suggestions of the desperation and compulsive risk taking that may have made it more interesting but these were not developed enough. There was plenty of crying and teasing laughter but it all rang hollow, the crying in particular was entirely unconvincing, something which at this level of theatre is really not good enough. The long, tension building pauses were so devoid of tension that it seemed as if the actors had forgotten their lines. the ending was completely obvious from the start and roger Lloyd Packs attempts at sounding menacing meant him lowering his voice to a throaty growl devoid of any actual malice. Any threat of physical violence was staged badly so that hands raised in anger hovered uncertainly in the air, immediately dissipating the tension and making the threat seem fake.

I know it easier to slam a production than praise it but I was really hoping to enjoy this. However it seemed hopelessly dated, even though it was only written in 1995, and the acting could not save the script which was not funny enough or menacing enough to truly explore the relationships between the men, or to make us care about their blasted hopes and dreams.

Cafe Koha

Cafe Koha is a wine bar and restaurant in the centre of London, st. Martin's court just behind Leicester square. I have been going there for years now but recently it has had a refit and now is more spacious and better designed, you no longer have to walk sideways to avoid bumping into tables.

It is a rare find in Soho as it is not a chain, not a pseudo club, not frighteningly crowded and they do not force you to eat if you don't want to. The wine list is good, the waiters friendly and if you find yourself getting peckish as you linger over your wine you may fancy the meditteranean platter at £6.95. Not enough for a meal but enough to take the edge off. The food on the rest of the menu is good but not spectacular, but that is not really the point. The point, as I see it, is that Koha is a refuge in Soho, a good meeting place, good for a glass or two before or after shopping, theatre or a film.It is calm, classy and welcoming, and you can't say that about most of the places around Leicester square tube station.