London restaurant openings on the rebound

Published: 30 August, 2012

London restaurant openings grew by 25% in the last year, with many newcomers favouring large and ambitious projects, according to a survey by restaurant guide Harden's.

The rebound saw 134 new restaurants open last year, up from 107 in the previous year.

Seventy-four venues closed, which is little changed on last year and normal compared with standards seen since 2000.

The Harden's London Restaurants 2013, out today, shows that many of the new outlets are "notably ambitious". These include Soho's vast marbled chamber 200-seater Brasserie Zédel, and the Sushisamba and Duck & Waffle complex, which caters for around 250 diners, with bills up to £100 a head. There are also a plethora of steakhouses opening, generally charging around £70 a head. Average costs for dinner for one has grown from £45.01 to £46.55 and prices are up slightly above inflation to 3.5% ahead of last year.

Richard Harden, co-editor of the guide, said: "Traditionally, dining out was considered a luxury and 'the first thing to go' in hard times, so it is very odd that the longest recession anyone can remember is coinciding with this extraordinary flowering in the London restaurant scene, at all levels. It is all 'through the looking glass'.

"It is probably no coincidence that, as younger Londoners have embraced the sort of excitement that had been thought of as the exclusive province of New Yorkers, New York-style dining has become London's default style du jour."

Other trends include growing interest in Japanese/Japanese-fusion styles of cooking, Peruvian is bang on trend, with Ceviche (Soho), Lima (Fitzrovia) and Tierra Peru (Islington) demonstrating this.

What's more, most newcomers to London's restaurant scene are in the east of the city, continuing the trend of the past 20 years.

Other findings of the guide's 22nd annual survey, which includes 75,000 reports from 7,500 regular restauant-goers:

Heston Blumenthal's Dinner was voted best meal of the year

The Ledbury in Notting Hill was the best-rated top-end restaurant

Ollie Dabbous's "industrial-style debutant", Dabbous (Fitzrovia) was voted "London's best newcomer in years"

Bruce Poole's Chez Bruce in Wandsworth was the survey's most often-nominated favourite restaurant for the eighth year running

The Wolseley scooped Best for Business and Best for Breakfast

Clos Maggiore came top for romance

The Anchor & Hope (South Bank) scooped best Bar or pub food

But others didn't fare so well

The Oxo Tower was voted most disappointing cooking and most overpriced restaurant

After 15 years, Restaurant Gordon Ramsay fell out of the top-10 list for Best Meal of the year. His group's only appearance in the top-10 nominations lists was a second place for most disappointing cooking at Gordon Ramsay at Claridges

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