Critic gets hot and sweaty at “utterly compelling” Golden Day restaurant

Jay Rayner finds excellent Hunanese cooking at London restaurant Golden Day, which puts heat in his belly and sweat on his brow, calling for buckets of water.

The Observer’s food critic says the flavours of the food served at the Chinese restaurant on Shaftsbury Avenue are so “utterly compelling, the hit so addictive that we kept going back, both knowing that there would be a price to pay”.

“We knew we would suffer. We knew we would be left attempting to quench an all but unquenchable thirst. We didn't care,” he says.

Lisa Markwell, writing in the Independent on Sunday, says London’s iconic food store Fortnum & Mason sells fare fit for a Queen. But there can be no such gushing praise for its Fountain restaurant.

She says: “We start with two classics from a menu that has little other than classics - and there's nothing wrong with that, provided that they're done well. The problem is, they aren't.”

Meanwhile, the Sunday Times’ food critic AA Gill is thoroughly disappointed with both the food and atmosphere at the Crab at Chieveley in Berkshire where he finds a room filled with an air of complaints.

“The thing with complaints in a room is that they’re catching, like yawns, or cholera. They go from plate to plate,” he says. “Next to us, a couple got a corked bottle of wine. Next to them, a family waited for an hour for something they didn’t order. And then the couple got another bottle of wine that was corked.”

Writing in The Times, Giles Coren finds brilliant food at the Harwood Arms in Fulham, south west London, the capital’s first Michelin-starred gastropub owned by the Ledbury’s Brett Graham.

For this review in full and more, see What’s on the menu? To book a table, see Caterer Eats Out. Visit Guide Girl for the latest gossip from the fine dining world.


Alain Ducasse and Brett Graham are the big Michelin winners in London >>

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By Kerstin Kühn

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