One Leicester Street is on the site of the old St John Hotel which means all eyes were on the restaurant, bar and hotel long before it opened. Now owned by the same peeps behind The Townhall Hotel the building offers a complete contrast inside to the utter chaos outside.
We started our visit with some cocktails in the bar upstairs which are pretty punchy, we sampled the Wild Nettle and Rhubarb Gimlet and a Lady of The Night, because, well we have been known to like the night. Cocktails sipped and suitably lightheaded we went down stairs to the intimate restaurant with large open kitchen.
The menu is on trend with smaller and larger dishes split into different categories which are ordered to share and come when they are cooked – it’s all a bit mixed up but works really well given the dishes are all bang tidy. The standouts were the uber fresh crab, fennel and monks beards, the creamy goats curd and wild fennel topped with grilled onion, the sweet tomato salad with barley and arrow grass (possibly our favourite of the lot, summer in a bowl!) and the salt caramel, apple and hazelnut.
We ended with a plate of the kirkhams lancashire, heather honey and water biscuit and the stawley, pickled fennel and rye cracker. Both generous portions of cheese which were made even better by the two complimentary dessert wines brought over by the waiter who took pity on us when we mentioned we’d had the worst day ever – that’s 5-star service right there people.
Take a date, but this ain’t one for fussy eaters!
1 Leicester St. London WC2H 7BL T
www.oneleicesterstreet.com