The Observer

18 July
Jay Rayner takes offence at the £180 bill for a meal for two at Cipriani's, London W1

Am I making too much of the price? For the people who go there, yes. This is a casual dinner place for people with so much cash they deserve to be fleeced. Nothing I say about Cipriani will trouble that client base at all - still, I will say it: YOU ARE BEING ROBBED. To everyone else I say this: even in a city as overpriced as London, £180 can buy an awful lot of dinner. You could eat at Lindsay House or Club Gascon and have change for a cab both ways. You could experience French classicism at its best at Le Gavroche, or Restaurant Gordon Ramsay. Three of you could go to Hakkasan, four of you could go to Le Cercle, six of you could have a great night at St John Bread and Wine. Please do that instead.


The Independent

17 July
Tracey MacLeod braves a nasty stretch of Hackney highway to get to Bistrotheque, London E2

The owners have said that though the food is simple, they want to create "the ultimate version of each dish". And they certainly succeed, if by "ultimate" they mean you never want to eat that item again. Of the 10 dishes we tried between the four of us, at least half were below par. Among the edited lowlights: seared foie gras which arrived several degrees colder than the toasted brioche it sat on; an over-sweet French onion soup that lacked the depth of flavour you get from good beef stock; a sauce to accompany roast black leg chicken which was reminiscent of Campbell's mushroom soup.


The Sunday Times

18 July
AA Gill also visited the achingly trendy Bistroteque

I began with Mediterranian fish soup... This was good, but overreduced and slightly too intense, with a heavy spoon in the tomato pur‚e, though unquestionably the best fish soup in Bethnal Green. The Blonde had a very fair and fresh broad bean, pea and mint salad with a mollet egg, followed by a lemon sole of box freshness, with spinach. I had half a garlic-roasted chicken, which tasted of garlic and chicken - a pretty unbeatable double act. The special of fish stew was too like a lumpy version of the soup...


The Guardian

17 July
Mathew Fort embraces the grazing-style menu at one of London's latest restaurant openings, Le Cercle

There wasn't a duff dish in the lot. I remember with particular pleasure a taut, crisp chunk of John Dory with a sharp sauce of Noilly Prat and citrus fruits; a mellow, mini artichaut barigoule; stinking andouillette; rich and dainty veal sweetbreads with morels; top-dog cheeses; and a rather school-dinner pain perdu with vanilla ice-cream. And not one more than £6. (Score: 17/20)


The Times

17 July
Giles Coren visits the wonderful molecular world of Anthony's in Leeds

In the main course, a duck breast rejoiced in the company of a chocolate essence that oozed from a single "olive oil chocolate bonbon". Luscious salt cod came with pork cannelloni that was, in reality, a filling of pork rinds inside wafer-thin slivers of pork belly rolled and steamed as if it were pasta - a little gastronomic joke reminiscent of Ferran Adri…'s "carbonara", which folds leaves of summer truffle into a "raviolo" inside which are nuggets of pasta and bacon. Anthony's is a wonder. Molecular gastronomy for the real world. I love it. (Score: 8.33. Price: "Starters under £7, mains under £18, loads of free stuff. Massive value")