Eating in London
England's reputation for miserable food is now dated, and the British cuisine scene is lively, trendy, and pleasantly surprising. (Unfortunately, it can also be expensive.) Even the basic, traditional pub grub has gone "upmarket," and you'll generally find fresh vegetables rather than soggy fries and mushy peas.
In London, the sheer variety of foods — from every corner of its former empire and beyond — is astonishing. You'll be amazed at the number of hopping, happening new restaurants of all kinds. If you want to dine (as opposed to eat), drop by a London newsstand to get a weekly entertainment guide or an annual restaurant guide (both have extensive restaurant listings), visit www.london-eating.co.uk for more options...or catch a train for Paris.
The thought of a £40 meal in Britain generally ruins my appetite, so my London dining is limited mostly to easygoing, fun, inexpensive alternatives. I've listed places by neighborhood — handy to your sightseeing or hotel. Considering how expensive London can be, if there's any good place to cut corners to stretch your budget, it's by eating cheaply.
Tips on Budget Eating
You have plenty of inexpensive £7 choices: pub grub, daily specials, ethnic restaurants, cafeterias, fast food, picnics, fish and chips, greasy spoon cafés, or pizza.
Pub grub is the most atmospheric budget option. Many of London's 7,000 pubs serve fresh, tasty buffets under ancient timbers, with hearty lunches and dinners priced at £6–8.
At classier restaurants, look for early-bird specials, allowing you to eat well and affordably, but early (around 17:30–19:00, last order by 19:00). A top-end, £25-for-dinner–type restaurant often serves the same quality two-course lunch deals for £10.
Ethnic restaurants from all over the world add spice to England's cuisine scene. Eating Indian or Chinese is cheap (even cheaper if you take it out). Middle-Eastern stands sell gyros sandwiches and shwarmas (lamb in pita bread).
Most large museums (and many churches) have reasonable cafeterias.
Fast food places, both American and British, are everywhere.
Picnicking saves time and money. Fine park benches and polite pigeons abound in most neighborhoods. You can easily get prepared food to go. Munch a relaxed "meal on wheels" picnic during your open-top bus tour or river cruise to save 30 precious minutes for sightseeing.
Bakeries sell yogurt, cartons of "semi-skimmed" milk, pastries, and pasties (PAST-eez). Pasties are "savory" (not sweet) meat pies that originated in the mining country; they had big crust handles so miners with filthy hands could eat them and toss the crust.
Good sandwich shops (try curry-flavored "tikka chicken") and corner grocery stores are a hit with local workers eating on the run. Try boxes of orange juice (pure, by the liter), fresh bread, tasty English cheese, meat, a tube of Colman's English mustard, local eatin' apples, bananas, small tomatoes, a small tub of yogurt (drinkable), trail mix, nuts, plain or chocolate-covered digestive biscuits, and any local specialties. At open-air markets and supermarkets, you can get produce in small quantities (3 tomatoes and 2 bananas cost me 50p). Supermarkets often have good deli sections, even offering Indian dishes, and sometimes salad bars. Decent packaged sandwiches (£2–3) are sold everywhere. Cheap and cheery chains like Pret a Manger, Benjy's, and Eat provide office workers with good, healthful sandwiches and basic food to go.
Breakfast
The traditional "fry" is famous as a hearty way to start the day. Also known as a "heart attack on a plate," the breakfast is especially feasty if you've just come from the land of the skimpy continental breakfast across the Channel.
Your standard fry gets off to a healthy start with juice and cereal. (Try Weetabix, a soggy English cousin of Shredded Wheat and perhaps the most absorbent material known to man.) Next, with tea or coffee, get a heated plate with a fried egg, lean Canadian-style bacon, a bad sausage, a grilled tomato, and often a slice of delightfully greasy pan toast and sautéed mushrooms. Toast comes on a rack (to cool quickly and crisply) with butter and marmalade. This meal tides many travelers over until dinner. Order only what you'll eat; hoteliers and B&B hostesses don't like to see food wasted. There's nothing wrong with skipping the fry — few locals actually start their day with this heavy traditional breakfast.
Pubs
Pubs are a basic part of the British social scene, and, whether you're a teetotaler or a beer guzzler, they should be a part of your travel here. "Pub" is short for "public house." It's an extended living room where, if you don't mind the stickiness, you can feel the pulse of London. Smart travelers use the pubs to eat, drink, get out of the rain, watch the latest sporting event, and make new friends.
Pub hours vary. The strict wartime hours (designed to keep the wartime working force sober and productive) finally ended a few years ago, and now pubs can serve beer daily 11:00–23:00 (Sun 12:00–22:30). As it nears 23:00, you'll hear shouts of "Last orders." Then comes the 10-minute warning bell. Finally, they'll call "Time!" to pick up your glass, finished or not, sometime before 23:25, when the pub closes. Children are served food and soft drinks in pubs, but you must be 18 to order a beer.
A cup of darts is free for the asking. People go to a public house to be social. They want to talk. Get vocal with a local. This is easiest at the bar, where people assume you're in the mood to talk (rather than at a table where you're allowed a bit of privacy). The pub is the next best thing to having relatives in town. Cheers!
Pub Grub
Pub grub gets better each year. It's London's best eating value. For £6–8, you'll get a basic, budget, hot lunch or dinner in friendly surroundings. The Good Pub Guide, published annually by the British Consumers Union, is excellent. Pubs attached to restaurants often have fresher food and a chef who knows how to cook.
Pubs generally serve traditional dishes, like fish and chips, vegetables, "bangers and mash" (sausages and mashed potatoes), roast beef with Yorkshire pudding (batter-baked in the oven), and assorted meat pies, such as steak-and-kidney pie or shepherd's pie (stewed lamb topped with mashed potatoes). Side dishes include salads (sometimes even a nice self-serve salad bar), vegetables, and — invariably — "chips" (French fries). "Crisps" are potato chips. A "jacket potato" (baked potato stuffed with fillings of your choice) can almost be a meal in itself. A "ploughman's lunch" is a modern "traditional English meal" of bread, cheese, and sweet pickles that nearly every tourist tries...once. These days, you'll likely find more Italian pasta, curried dishes, and quiche on the menu than "traditional" fare.
Meals are usually served from 12:00 to 14:00 and from 18:00 to 20:00, not throughout the day. There's usually no table service. Order at the bar, then take a seat and they'll bring the food when it's ready (or sometimes you pick it up at the bar). Pay at the bar (sometimes when you order, sometimes after you eat). Don't tip unless it's a place with full table service. Servings are hearty, service is quick, and you'll rarely spend more than £8. A beer or cider adds another couple of pounds. (Free tap water is always available.) Pubs that advertise their food and are crowded with locals are less likely to be the kinds that serve only lousy microwaved snacks. Because pubs make more money selling drinks than food, many stop cooking fairly early.
Beer
The British take great pride in their beer. Many Brits think that drinking beer cold and carbonated, as Americans do, ruins the taste. Most pubs will have lagers (cold, refreshing, American-style beer), ales (amber-colored, room-temperature beer), bitters (hop-flavored ale, perhaps the most typical British beer), and stouts (dark and somewhat bitter, like Guinness). At pubs, long-handled pulls are used to pull the traditional, rich-flavored "real ales" up from the cellar. These are the connoisseur's favorites: fermented naturally, varying from sweet to bitter, often with a hoppy or nutty flavor. Notice the fun names. Short-hand pulls at the bar mean colder, fizzier, mass-produced, and less interesting keg beers. Mild beers are sweeter, with a creamy malt flavoring. Irish cream ale is a smooth, sweet experience. Try the draft cider (sweet or dry)...carefully.
Order your beer at the bar and pay as you go, with no need to tip. An average beer costs £2.50. Part of the experience is standing before a line of "hand pulls," or taps, and wondering which beer to choose.
Drinks are served by the pint (20-ounce imperial size) or the half-pint. (It's almost feminine for a man to order just a half; I order mine with quiche.) Proper English ladies like a half-beer and half-lemonade shandy.
Besides beer, many pubs actually have a good selection of wines by the glass, a fully stocked bar for the gentleman's "G and T" (gin and tonic), and the increasingly popular bottles of alcohol-plus-sugar (such as Bacardi Breezers) for the younger, working-class set. Teetotalers can order from a wide variety of soft drinks.
Indian Food
Eating Indian food is "going local" in cosmopolitan, multiethnic London. Take the opportunity to sample food from Britain's former colony. Indian cuisine is as varied as the country itself. In general, they use more exotic spices than we're accustomed to — some hot, some sweet.
As with Chinese food, you build an Indian meal with several dishes. The portions can be quite small, so you'll need at least two dishes per person. A typical meal for one might include dal (lentil soup) as a starter; one meat dish with sauce (for example, chicken curry, chicken tikka masala in a creamy tomato sauce, grilled chicken tandoori, or the spicy chicken vindaloo); one vegetable dish (in a similar sauce to the meat); rice (boiled white basmati rice, fried rice, or pilau — cooked in broth with meats); nan (a leavened, grilled tortilla, used by Indians to mop up food); and an Indian beer (wine and Indian food don't really mix).
A meal like this will set you back about £20. Many restaurants offer a fixed-price combination meal that's simpler and cheaper than ordering à la carte.
Desserts (Sweets)
To the British, the traditional word for dessert is pudding, although it's also referred to as sweets these days. Sponge cake, cream, fruitcake, and meringue are key players.
Trifle is the best-known British concoction, consisting of sponge cake soaked in brandy or sherry (or orange juice for children), then covered with jam and/or fruit and custard cream. Whipped cream can sometimes put the final touch on this "light" treat.
Castle puddings are sponge puddings cooked in small molds and topped with Golden Syrup (a popular brand and a cross between honey and maple syrup). Bread and butter pudding consists of slices of French bread baked with milk, cream, eggs, and raisins (similar to the American preparation), served warm with cold cream. Hasty pudding, supposedly the invention of people in a hurry to avoid the bailiff, is made from stale bread with dried fruit and milk. Queen of puddings is a breadcrumb pudding topped with warm jam, meringue, and cream. Treacle pudding is a popular steamed pudding whose "sponge" mixture combines flour, suet (animal fat), butter, sugar, and milk. Christmas pudding (also called plum pudding) is a dense mixture with dried and candied fruit served with brandy butter or hard sauce.
Spotted Dick is a sponge pudding with currants. How did it get its name? Some say it looks like a spotted dog, and dogs were often called Dick. Another theory suggests that "Dick," "duff," and "dog" are all variants of the word "dough." One thing's for sure: The stuff isn't selling very well today, thanks to the name's connotation. Grocers are considering renaming it "Spotted Richard."
The English version of custard is a smooth, yellow liquid. Cream tops most everything custard does not. There's single cream for coffee. Double cream is really thick. Whipped cream is familiar, and clotted cream is the consistency of butter.
Fool is a dessert with sweetened pureed fruit (such as rhubarb, gooseberry, or black currants) mixed with cream or custard and chilled. Elderflower is a popular flavoring for sorbet.
Scones are tops, and many inns and restaurants have their secret recipes. Whether made with fruit or topped with clotted cream, scones take the cake.
Afternoon Tea
People of leisure punctuate their afternoon with a "cream tea" at a tearoom. You'll get a pot of tea, small finger foods (like cucumber sandwiches), homemade scones, jam, and thick clotted cream. For maximum pinkie-waving taste per calorie, slice your scone thin like a miniature loaf of bread. Tearooms, which often serve appealing light meals, are usually open for lunch and close around 17:00, just before dinner.
While teatime is still going strong, the new phenomenon is coffee shops: Starbucks and its competitors have sprouted up all over town, providing cushy and social watering holes with comfy chairs, easy WCs, £2 lattes, and a nice break between sights.
Tipping
Tipping is an issue only at restaurants and fancy pubs that have waiters and waitresses. If you order your food at a counter, don't tip.
If the menu states that service is included, there's no need to tip beyond that. If service isn't included, tip about 10 percent by rounding up. Leave the tip on the table, or hand it to your server with your payment for the meal and say, "Keep the rest, please."
Restaurants
Near Trafalgar Square
St. Martin-in-the-Fields Café in the Crypt is just right for a tasty meal on a monk's budget, sitting on somebody's tomb in an ancient crypt (£6–8 cafeteria plates, cheaper sandwich bar, Mon–Wed 10:00–20:00, Thu-Sat 10:00–23:00, Sun 12:00–20:00, profits go to the church, no CC, underneath St. Martin-in-the-Fields church on Trafalgar Square, tel. 020/7839-4342).
TheChandos Pub's Opera Room floats amazingly apart from the tacky crush of tourism around Trafalgar Square. Look for it opposite the National Portrait Gallery (corner of William Street and St. Martin's Lane) and climb the stairs to the Opera Room. This is a fine Trafalgar rendezvous point — smoky, but wonderfully local. They serve traditional, plain-tasting £6–7 pub lunches and dinners (kitchen open Sun-Wed 11:00–19:00, Thu-Sat until 18:00, order and pay at the bar, tel. 020/7836-1401).
The International is a mod complement to The Chandos (just across the street), offering a bright and spacious retreat for local office workers oblivious to all the touristy hubbub nearby. The ground-floor bar has two-for-one bar meals daily (12:00-17:00). The classy restaurant upstairs serves modern European cuisine (daily, 2-course menu £10, 3 courses £13, 116 St. Martins Lane, tel. 020/7257-8626).
At Gordon's Wine Bar, a simple, steep staircase leads into a candlelit 15th-century wine cellar filled with dusty old bottles, faded British memorabilia, and local nine-to-fivers. At the buffet, choose a hot meal or a fine plate of cheeses and various cold cuts. (One £7 cold plate and a couple of glasses of wine provide a light, economical meal for two.) Then step up to the wine bar and consider the many varieties of wine and port available by the glass at excellent prices. The low, carbon-crusted vaulting deeper in the back seems to intensify the Hogarth-painting atmosphere. While it's crowded, you can normally corral two chairs and grab the corner of a table (arrive before 17:30 to get a seat, Mon–Sat 11:00–23:00, Sun 12:00–22:00, 2 blocks from Trafalgar Square, bottom of Villiars Street at #47, Tube: Embankment, tel. 020/7930-1408). On hot days, the crowd spills out into a leafy back patio.
The Clarence Pub, down Whitehall, a block south of Trafalgar Square toward Big Ben, is touristy but atmospheric with decent grub (£8 meals, daily 11:00–22:00, indoor/outdoor seating). Nearby are several cheaper cafeterias and pizza joints.
Sherlock Holmes Pub, a block from Trafalgar Square, sounds touristy but is the haunt of government workers and locals awaiting trains at Charing Cross Station. Fans of the fictional detective will appreciate the pub's location in the former Northumberland Hotel (featured in Holmes stories and one of author Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's haunts) and the fact that Old Scotland Yard was just across the street. Upstairs in the restaurant area is a replica of 221-B Baker Street (Mon–Sat 11:00–23:00, Sun 12:00–22:30, pub fare downstairs, restaurant meals served upstairs at lunch and dinnertime, 10 Northumberland Street, Tube: Charing Cross/Embankment, tel. 020/7930-2644).
Crivelli's Garden Restaurant, serving a classy lunch in the National Gallery, is a good place to treat your palate to pricey, light Mediterranean cuisine (£15 lunches, daily 10:00–17:00, first floor of Sainsbury Wing). For something more Dickensian, try Hamptons Wine Bar (Mon–Fri 11:30-23:00, closed Sat–Sun, around the corner at 15 Whitcomb Street, tel. 020-7839-2823).
Near Piccadilly
Hungry and broke in the theater district? Head for Panton Street (off Haymarket, 2 blocks southeast of Piccadilly Circus) for cheap Thai, Chinese, and two famous London eateries. Stockpot is a mushy-peas kind of place, famous and rightly popular for its edible, cheap meals (daily 7:00–22:00, 38 Panton Street). The West End Kitchen (across the street at #5, same hours and menu) is a direct competitor that's just as good. Vegetarians prefer the Woodland South Indian Vegetarian Restaurant, across from the West End Kitchen. For a £5 Chinese meal, Mr. Wu's buffet is on Old Compton Street. And Pizza Express has many branches offering a gut-busting £5 buffet.
The palatial Criterion Brasserie serves a special £15 two-course "Anglo-French" menu (or £18 for 3 courses) under gilded tiles and chandeliers in a dreamy Byzantine church setting from 1880. It's right on Piccadilly Circus but a world away from the punk junk. The house wine is great and so is the food (specials available Mon–Sat 12:00–14:30 & 17:30–19:00, closed Sun lunch, tel. 020/7930-0488). After 19:00, the menu becomes really expensive. Anyone can drop in for coffee or a drink.
The "Food Is Fun" Dinner Crawl: From Covent Garden to Soho
London has a trendy, generation-X scene that most Beefeater-seekers miss entirely. For a multicultural, movable feast, consider exploring these. Start around 18:00 to avoid lines, get in on early specials, and find waiters willing to let you split a meal. Prices, while reasonable by London standards, add up. Servings are large enough to share. All are open nightly.
The Dinner Crawl for Two: Arrive before 18:00 at Belgo Centraal and split the early-bird dinner special: a kilo of mussels, fries, and dark Belgian beer. At Yo! Sushi, have beer or sake and a few dishes. Slurp your last course at Wagamama Noodle Bar. Then, for dessert, people-watch at Leicester Square, where the serf's always up.
Belgo Centraal serves hearty Belgian specialties. It's a seafood, chips, and beer emporium dressed up as a mod monastic refectory — with noisy acoustics and waiters garbed as Trappist monks. The classy restaurant section requires reservations, but just grabbing a bench in the boisterous beer hall (no reservations possible) is more fun. The same menu and specials work on both sides. Belgians claim they eat as well as the French and as heartily as the Germans. Specialties include mussels, great fries, and a stunning array of dark, blond, and fruity Belgian beers. Belgo actually makes Belgian things trendy — a formidable feat (£10–14 meals; open daily until 23:00; Mon–Fri 17:30–19:00 "beat the clock" meal specials for £5.30–7.00 — the time you order is the price you pay — and you get mussels, fries, and beer; no meal-splitting after 18:30, and you must buy food with beer; daily £6 lunch special 12:00–17:30; 1 block north of Covent Garden Tube station at intersection of Neal and Shelton streets, 50 Earlham Street, tel. 020/7813-2233).
Yo! Sushi is a futuristic Japanese-food-extravaganza experience. With thumping rock, Japanese cable TV, a 195-foot-long conveyor belt, the world's longest sushi bar, a robotic drink trolley, and automated sushi machines, just sipping a sake on a bar stool here is a trip. For £1 each you get unlimited tea, water (from spigot at bar, with or without gas), or miso soup. Grab dishes as they rattle by (priced by color of dish; check the chart: £1.50–3.50 per dish, daily 12:00–24:00, 2 blocks south of Oxford Street, where Lexington Street becomes Poland Street, 52 Poland Street, tel. 020/7287-0443). For more serious drinking on tatami mats, go downstairs into "Yo Below." (If you like Yo, there are several locations around town, including a handy branch a block from the London Eye on Belvedere Road, as well as outlets within Selfridges and Harvey Nichols department stores.)
Wagamama Noodle Bar is a noisy, pan-Asian, organic slurpathon. As you enter, check out the kitchen and listen to the roar of the basement, where benches rock with happy eaters. Everybody sucks. Stand against the wall to feel the energy of all this "positive eating" (£10 meals, daily 12:00–24:00, crowded after 20:00, non-smoking, 10-A Lexington Street, tel. 020/7292-0990 but no reservations taken). If you like this place, there are now handy branches all over town, including near the British Museum (Streatham Street), High Street Kensington (#26), in Harvey Nichols (109 Knightsbridge), Covent Garden (Tavistock Street), Leicester Square (Irving Street), Piccadilly Circus (Norris Street), Fleet Street (#109), and between St. Paul's and the Tower of London (22 Old Broad Street).
Soho Spice Indian is where modern Britain meets Indian tradition — fine cuisine in a trendy, jewel-tone ambience. Unlike many Indian restaurants, when you order an entrée here (£10–15), it comes with side dishes (nan, dal, rice, vegetables). The £15 "tandoori selections" meal is the best "variety" dish and big enough for two (daily 12:00–22:30, non-smoking section, 5 blocks north of Piccadilly Circus at 124 Wardour Street, tel. 020/7434-0808).
Y Ming Chinese Restaurant — across Shaftesbury Avenue from the ornate gates, clatter, and dim sum of Chinatown — has clean European decor, serious but helpful service, and authentic Northern Chinese cooking (good £10 meal deal offered 12:00–18:00 — last order at 18:00, Mon–Sat 12:00–23:30, closed Sun, 35 Greek Street, tel. 020/7734-2721).
Andrew Edmunds Restaurant is a tiny, candlelit place where you'll want to hide your camera and guidebook and act as local as possible. This great little place — with a jealous and loyal clientele — is the closest I've found to Parisian quality in a cozy restaurant in London. The modern European cooking with a creative seasonal menu is worth the splurge (3 courses for £25, daily 12:30–15:00 & 18:00–22:45, reservations are generally necessary — request ground floor rather than basement, 46 Lexington Street in Soho, tel. 020/7437-5708).
Mildred's Vegetarian Restaurant, across from Andrew Edmunds, has cheap prices, an enjoyable menu, and a plain-yet-pleasant interior filled with happy eaters (£6 meals, Mon–Sat 12:00–23:00, closed Sun, 45 Lexington Street, tel. 020/7494-1634).
The fun Zilli Fish Too, with a modern, bright setting near Covent Garden, serves up fresh seafood with a twist of Italy (2 courses-£15, 3 for £19, daily 12:00–15:00 & 17:30–23:30, 8 Wild Street, at corner of Great Queen Street, 2 blocks north of Covent Garden, tel. 020/7240-0011).
Neal's Yard is the place for cheap, hip, and healthy eateries near Covent Garden. The neighborhood is a tabouli of fun, hippie-type cafés. One of the best is Food for Thought, packed with local health nuts (good £5 vegetarian meals, Mon–Sat 12:00–20:30, Sun 12:00–17:00, non-smoking, 2 blocks north of Covent Garden Tube station, 31 Neal Street, tel. 020/7836-0239).
Near Recommended Victoria Station Accommodations
La Campagnola, small and seriously Italian, is Belgravia's favorite budget Italian restaurant (£8–16 meals, Mon–Sat 12:00–15:00 & 18:00–23:30, closed Sun, 10 Lower Belgrave Street, tel. 020/7730-2057).
Ebury Wine Bar, filled with young professionals, provides a classy atmosphere, delicious £15–18 meals, and a £14 two-course special from 18:00–19:30 (Mon–Fri 11:00–23:00, Sat 12:00–23:00, Sun 18:00–22:00, 139 Ebury Street, at intersection with Elizabeth Street, near bus station, tel. 020/7730-5447). Several cheap places are around the corner on Elizabeth Street (#23 for take-out or eat-in, super-absorbent fish and chips, and a Spanish tapas place across from that).
TheDuke of Wellington pub is good, if somewhat smoky, and dominated by local drinkers. It's the neighborhood place for dinner (£6 meals, daily 11:00–15:00 & 18:00–21:00, 63 Eaton Terrace, at intersection with Chester Row, tel. 020/7730-1782).
Jenny Lo's Tea House is a simple, budget place serving up reliably tasty £5–8 eclectic Chinese-style meals to locals in the know (Mon–Fri 11:30–15:00 & 18:00–22:00, Sat 18:00–22:00, closed Sun, no CC, 14 Eccleston Street, tel. 020/7259-0399).
La Poule au Pot, ideal for a romantic splurge, offers a classy, candlelit ambience with well dressed patrons and expensive but fine country-style French cuisine (£15 lunch, £25 dinners, daily 12:30–14:30 & 18:45–23:00, Sun until 22:00, leafy patio dining, reservations smart, end of Ebury at intersection with Pimlico, 231 Ebury Street, tel. 020/7730-7763).
Grumbles brags it's been serving "good food and wine at non-scary prices since 1964." Offering a delicious mix of "modern eclectic French and traditional English," this hip and cozy little place is the spot to eat well in this otherwise workaday neighborhood (£12–22 meals, £12 lunch specials, reservations wise, self-serve launderette across the street open evenings, 2 nice sidewalk tables, daily 12:00–14:30 & 18:00–22:30, half a block north of Belgrave Road at 35 Churton Street, tel. 020/7834-0149).
The Jugged Hare Pub is in a lavish old bank building, its vaults replaced by kegs of beer and a fine kitchen. They have a fun, traditional menu with more fresh veggies than fries, and a plush and vivid pub scene good for a meal or just a drink (£7 meals, daily 12:00–21:00, 172 Vauxhall Bridge Road, tel. 020/7828-1543).
If you miss America, there's a mall-type food court at Victoria Place, upstairs in Victoria Station; Café Rouge seems to be the most popular here (£8–11 dinners, daily 9:30–22:30).
Groceries in and near Victoria Station: A large grocery, Sainsbury's Local, is on Victoria Street in front of the station, just past the buses (daily 6:00–24:00). In the station you'll find another, smaller Sainsbury's (at rear entrance, on Eccleston Street) and a couple other late-hours mini-markets.
Near Recommended Notting Hill B&Bs and Bayswater Hotels
Maggie Jones, exuberantly rustic and very English, serves my favorite £20 London dinner. You'll get fun-loving if brash service, and solid English cuisine, including huge plates of crunchy vegetables — by candlelight. Avoid the stuffy basement on hot summer nights, and request upstairs seating for the noisy but less cramped section. If you eat well once in London, eat here — and do it quick, before it burns down (daily 12:30–14:30 & 18:30–23:00, less expensive lunch menu, reservations recommended, friendly staff, 6 Old Court Place, just east of Kensington Church Street, near High Street Kensington Tube stop, tel. 020/7937-6462).
The Churchill Arms pub and Thai Kitchens is a local hangout, with good beer and old-English ambience in front and hearty £6 Thai plates in an enclosed patio in the back. You can eat the Thai food in this tropical hideaway or in the smoky but wonderfully atmospheric pub section. Arrive by 18:00 to avoid a line (Mon–Sat 12:00–21:30, Sun 12:00–16:00, 119 Kensington Church Street, tel. 020/7792-1246).
Prince Edward Pub serves good pub grub in a quintessential pub setting (£8 meals, Mon–Sat 12:00–14:30 & 18:00–21:00, Sun 12:00–18:00, indoor/outdoor seating, 2 blocks north of Bayswater Road at the corner of Dawson Place and Hereford Road, 73 Prince's Square, tel. 020/7727-2221).
Café Diana is a healthy little eatery serving sandwiches and Middle Eastern food. It's decorated with photos of Princess Diana, who used to drop by for pita sandwiches (daily 8:00–22:30, 5 Wellington Terrace, on Bayswater Road, opposite Kensington Palace Garden Gates — where Di once lived, tel. 020/7792-9606).
Black and Blue is a trendy bistro serving British/continental fusion cuisine to local hipsters. Follow the crowds to the gas torches and patio seating (£10-12 meals, Mon-Sat 12:00-23:00, Sun 12:00-22:30, 215 Kensington Church Street, tel. 020/7727-0004).
Royal China Restaurant is filled with London's Chinese, who consider this one of the city's best eateries. It's dressy in black, white, and chrome, with candles, brisk waiters, and fine food (£7–9 dishes, dim sum until 17:00, Mon–Thu 12:00–23:00, Fri–Sat 12:00–23:30, Sun 11:00–22:00, 13 Queensway, tel. 020/7221-2535).
Mr. Wu's Chinese Restaurant serves a 10-course buffet in a cramped little cafeteria. Just grab a plate and help yourself (£5, daily 12:00–23:00, check quality of buffet — right inside entrance — before committing, pickings can get slim, across from Bayswater Tube station, 54 Queensway, tel. 020/7243-1017).
Whiteleys Mall Food Court offers a fun selection of ethnic and fast-food eateries in a delightful mall (good salads at Café Rouge, second floor, corner of Porchester Gardens and Queensway).
Supermarket: Europa is a half-block from the Notting Hill Gate Tube stop (Mon–Fri 8:00–23:00, Sun 12:00–18:00, 112 Notting Hill Gate, near intersection with Pembridge Road).
Near Recommended Accommodations in South Kensington
Popular eateries line Old Brompton Road and Thurloe Street (Tube: South Kensington)
La Bouchee Bistro Café is a classy, hole-in-the-wall touch of France serving early-bird, three-course £13 meals before 19:00 and plats du jour for £8 all jour (daily 12:00–23:00, Sun until 22:00, 56 Old Brompton Road, tel. 020/7589-1929).
Daquise, an authentic-feeling 1930s Polish time-warp, is ideal if you're in the mood for kielbasa and kraut. It's likeably dreary — fast, cheap, family-run, and a much-appreciated part of the neighborhood (£10 meals, £8 lunch special includes wine, daily 11:30–23:00, non-smoking, 20 Thurloe Street, tel. 020/7589-6117).
The Khyber Pass Tandoori Restaurant is a nondescript but handy place serving great Indian cuisine. Locals in the know travel to eat here (£12 dinners, daily 12:00–14:30 & 18:00–23:30, 21 Bute Street, tel. 020/7589-7311).
The Zetland Arms serves good pub meals upstairs in their nonsmoking restaurant upstairs (£6-10 meals, hearty £9 specials, table service, Mon-Fri 18:00-22:30, Sat-Sun 13:00-22:30, 2 Bute Street, tel. 020/7589-3813).
La Brasserie fills a big, plain room painted "nicotine yellow," with ceiling fans, a Parisian atmosphere, and good, traditional French cooking at reasonable prices (salads and veggie plates for £10, 2-course menus for £15 and £18, nightly until 23:00, 272 Brompton Road, tel. 020/7581-3089).
PJ's Bar and Grill is lively with the yuppie Chelsea crowd for a good reason. Traditional "New York Brasserie"–style yet trendy, it has dressy tables surrounding a centerpiece bar. It serves pricey, cosmopolitan cuisine from a menu that changes with the seasons (£20 meals, nightly until 24:00, 52 Fulham Road, at intersection with Sydney Street, tel. 020/7581-0025).
Elsewhere in London
Between St. Paul's and the Tower: The Counting House, formerly an elegant old bank, offers great £7 meals, nice homemade meat pies, fish, and fresh vegetables (Mon–Fri 12:00–20:00, closed Sat–Sun, gets really busy with the buttoned-down 9-to-5 crowd after 12:15, near Mansion House in the City, 50 Cornhill, tel. 020/7283-7123).
Near St. Paul's:Degustibus Sandwiches is where a top-notch artisan bakery meets the public, offering fresh, you-design-it sandwiches, salads, and soups with simple seating or take-out picnic sacks (great parks nearby), just a block below St. Paul's (Mon–Fri 7:00–17:00, closed Sat–Sun, from church steps follow signs to youth hostel a block downhill, 53 Carter Lane, tel. 020/723-60056, Claire).
Near the British Library: Drummond Street (running just west of Euston Station) is famous in London for very cheap and good Indian and vegetarian food. Consider Chutneys and Ravi Shankar for a good thali.