Cave of Lanka

Rating: Excellent
Meal: Dinner
Price: 31 GBP
Payment: Credit cards accepted
Dishes: Cave chicken appetizer, black port curry set, glass of wine

Finally, an Excellent review!  It's been over a year I think since the last one.  My wife and son were not feeling well so I went out to eat by myself.  There are so many good looking options near Earl's Court Station, but I finally settled on a subterranean wine bar called "Cave of Lanka."  The proprietor told me it's London's second oldest wine bar, under recent new management.  They serve Sri Lankan cuisine and wine of course.

Sri Lankan is somewhat similar to Indian food, but I thought I'd give it a try since I don't have any reviews of that cuisine on my blog.  Of course I had to try glass of red wine, which was quite nice.  I wanted to try a few things, but sticking with mainly meat of course, so I got a cave chicken appetizer, which also comes as a main.  In addition the black pork curry set which came with some roti, and a few other small dishes.  All of it was very delicious and it is by far the best meal I've had since coming to the UK.

The Blackbird

Rating: Very good
Meal:  Dinner for 2
Price: 45 GBP
Payment: Credit cards accepted
Dishes:  3 small beers, pie/beer sampler, cheese board

We really love meat pies, and lo and behold, one of the top rated pie-houses is right near where we are staying by Earl's Court station.  This lovely pub/hotel is a classy joint.  We started by asking for beer recommendations given our Pacific NW hophead nature.  They were free with their tasting and we both settled on a couple of small glasses before perusing the menu.

Of course we wanted all the pies, so we decided to try the pie/beer sampler which came with 3 of their pies and 3 more beers.  The pies were very delicious, especially the steak and minced pies.  The third veggie cauliflower one was just ok.  The beers were typically British, not that great, so I reordered the beer I had originally. The beers were all by Fullers Brewery, and the one I liked best was the Honeydew.

We finished off with a cheese platter, munching on stilton, brie and cheddar (I think).  The stilton was the best...but all quite delicious with the circular crackers.  We were glad we got there early as it became quite crowded towards the end of our meal.

Ma La

Rating: OK
Meal:  Lunch for 3
Price: 54 GBP
Payment: Credit cards accepted
Dishes: 8 piece dimsum set, special peanut sauce dimsum, beef with black bean sauce set, pork belly main, water, rice

We were just done with Westminster Abbey and hungry, so we looked around for a place to eat and came across Ma La, a Szechuan chinese restaurant.  Didn't expect it to be so fancy, but there were hovering waiters, ridiculously expensive bottled water and the whole nine yards.

We ordered as listed and while everything was ok, nothing was really incredible flavor-wise.  And it was very spendy.  Meh.

Maroush Lebanese Bakehouse

Rating: Very good
Meal:  Dinner for 3
Price: 64 GBP
Payment: Credit cards accepted
Dishes:  2 glasses of wine, mutabbel, muhammara, lamb shawarma plate, chicken shawarma wrap, shishtawouk wrap

This Lebanese restaurant appears to have equipment in the back for mass producing arabic bread, probably the origin of their "bakehouse" name.  However they are also a full restaurant, quite a nice one at that, but still do a brisk takeout business as well.

I really liked the look of their lamb shawarma meat on display as it was clearly not the processed gunk you see many other places.  Carefully layered slabs of lamb and fat were clearly visible.  We had the usual mezze items, but not as many as the prices were quite steep.  Also we went for a couple of glasses of Lebanese wine, which was very tasty.  The bread was, unfortunately, pretty much what you'd expect at a supermarket in the Middle East, not the special, hand made, freshly baked variety we'd expect at the better Lebanese restaurants.  Still, the meats were properly spiced and the mezze dishes tasty.  The lamb was a little dryer than I expected, but still quite good.

Wraps and burritos never photo well, but that one was my wife's chicken shawarma.  She liked it.  We also ordered another wrap to go for my son, and he didn't like anything about it but the meat, but he's ridiculous like that.

Masala Indian Restaurant

Rating: Very good
Meal:  Dinner for 2
Price: 27 GBP
Payment: Credit cards accepted
Dishes: Lassi, samosas, paratha, kofta with sauce, chicken saag, butter chicken takeaway

Finally!  Real Indian food in a small, low key restaurant.  This place seems like a local fixture as many people kept coming and ordering to go, seemingly on a first name basis with the lady running the place.  My wife and I enjoyed our first night out in London immensely after finding this spot.  We are staying near Earl's Court station, so many of the upcoming reviews will likely be in the same area.

As this is primarily a to-go counter, the food is all on display, but you can order from the menu as well if you want to sit down.  They had a salt lassi on the menu, as well as some meat and peas samosas, both delicious.  Of course we had to try the paratha, which was more of the whole wheat variety, but still full of ghee and fabulous.  I had a special dish with kofta meatballs and a curry sauce, while my wife had her preferred chicken saag curry.  We relished each bite.  We also ordered a butter chicken and rice dish to take home to our son for his dinner.

The only reason I wouldn't give them an Excellent rating is that we have had better Indian, but this is at last a return to the flavors we got used to in the middle east, and the price is great.  There are tons of Indian restaurants in London, but many of them are fancy sit down places which is not our favorite experience.  This place is relaxed and much less formal.

Bep Viet

Rating: Very good
Meal:  Breakfast for 2
Price: 11 GBP
Payment: Credit cards accepted
Dishes: Chicken omelette, mushroom omelette

Hunting for breakfast this morning, I came across a small Vietnamese stand that was open early and had omelettes on the menu.  I bought two, one for myself and one for my wife to eat back at the hotel.  They were both quite tasty, so I'm giving it a Very Good.  Sorry no pictures of the food as take out food never looks very nice.

Himalayan Spice

Rating: Very good
Meal:  Dinner for 3
Price: 51.20 GBP
Payment: Credit cards accepted
Dishes: Lamb and paneer starters, whiskey, bottled water, mutton biryani, lamb and chicken tikka
Smoking: No

Ironic, I know.  The first place we eat on our trip to England/Scotland is a Nepalese Indian restaurant!  But it was the evening of our first day, we were loopy from jet lag, and after wandering up and down the streets at about 4:30pm it was one of the few already open.

Still getting used to the prices, I didn't look at anything and ordered as usual, expecting small portions like in Japan.  However there was plenty per dish and prices are up there, so in future I'll be trying to be more careful.

However I'm happy to report that the food itself was quite good, with much stronger and complex flavors than the Nepalese restaurants in Japan manage to achieve.  My son's biryani was exceptionally tasty, though we wish we had gotten the raita instead of curry dish that came with it.  My wife and I got lamb and chicken tikka, which was quite good.  The chicken was boneless white meat, but still moist, and the lamb had a lovely smoked flavor to it.  They came with a reddish dipping sauce which was disappointing as it was like a slightly spicy thousand island dressing.

Overall I'd give this a very good, but mainly in comparison to our recent Indian experiences.  It is possible there is much better in town, but I don't know if we'll have time to get to them as we're only here two nights.

Little Saigon Kitchen II

Rating: OK
Meal:  Lunch for 3
Price: 3883 yen
Payment: Cash only
Dishes: Beef Pho set, innards platter, cold chicken
English Menu: No
Smoking: No

We had an extra long church service today and needed to eat something before the drive home.  We wandered about Ueno a bit looking for something and settled on this Vietnamese restaurant I'd seen once before.  It's very authentic, with pretty much only Vietnamese being spoken by everyone in there.

We ordered a beef pho set, some cold roasted chicken, and an innards platter (for me natch).  The pho was really good, chicken tough and rubbery, and same for my platter of innards.  Authentic maybe, but not necessarily delicious.  I'd stick with the pho in the future.

Aztecas Mikasa

Rating: OK
Meal:  Lunch for 2
Price: 4000 yen
Payment: Cash only
Dishes: Carnitas asada tacos, chicken burrito, guacamole
English Menu: Yes
Smoking: No

I was surprised to see a new(?) Mexican restaurant in Mikasa mall, upstairs above the meat restaurant.  My wife and I checked it out, and the space is really large, and it feels like a proper Mexican restaurant (hard to explain).  We tried out a few dishes, and while the tacos were good, the burrito was less impressive.  The guac was just ok.  Overall everything was very salty.  Do look forward to trying more things there.  Turns out it's the second branch of the same Aztecas that is between Nawlins and Bar 76, which I have reviewed before.