Banca Ristorante Italiano, London

Opened in July 2012, this restaurant quickly establish a good reputation and it is not difficult to know why. Located in buzzing North Audley Street in a venue that was once a bank with the original features still attached it was not difficult to spot this restaurant. 

We arrived few minutes before the restaurant open for service, we saw the staff were given a briefing around the back corner, but the reception staff were ready to welcome us. Spacious, bright, perfect temperature, fresh smell and immaculately laid tables impressed us immediately, that's a good start. There are plenty seatings to choose from too. At the bar, booths, by the window and the terrace. All seats are comfortable and inviting. We settled for a nice table by the window. 

Satisfied with our table, we order our favourite palate cleanser, Campari and soda while going through the menu. We noticed a few standard dishes but presented differently. Fascinating. We chose rather unusual Gamberi Crudi - Raw Red Mediterranean Prawn served with Ligurian extra virgin olive oil and Fiori di Zucca - Stuffed Courgette Flowers. Red prawn were fresh, sweet and melting in the mouth. Ideal starter that will not spoil your appetite if you fancy both middle and main course and of course a dessert. The stuffed courgette flowers may sound predictable but it was not an ordinary one. What we had was courgette flowers stuffed with chopped prawn. The batter was light and crispy, very tasty indeed. Nice to dip it into tomato sauce though having it on it's own is just as delicious.

The middle course. We chose Spaghetti Chitarra - Spaghetti with crab in tomato sauce and Pennoni Vongole - Large Penne with clams and broccoli. Flavour wise they were absolutely define. Though we found the pasta was a little bit thick and slightly undercooked. But apparently, the pasta came from a particular area in Italy and that is how to it supposed to be served. We wish we could recall the name of the area, we will get back to you after our next visit. 

The main course. Despite the fact there are plenty selections of main courses, meat and seafood, we settled for Triglia Livornese - Seared Red Mullet served with baby fennel and olive tapenade. In addition to the fish we ordered roast potato on the side. Another dish well executed. 

We enjoyed all the dishes with 2010 Vermentino Vigna 'Ngera Capichera from Sardegna served chilled. A random choice of wine made by us that was excellent. So good that we had to have another bottle. For the dessert, we shared a Caprese Limone - Lemon cake served with limoncello spuma. Creamy, cakey yet refreshing ending to our dining experience. 

At the end of our lunch, the restaurant manager approached us to ensure we were satisfied with the food also the service. And he offered to take us on a tour to the kitchen. How could we turn that down?! We followed him down stairs to the heart of the establishment. 

We were in awe. What a magnificent kitchen they have. So well organized, clean and obviously well equipped. Then we were shown the Chef's Table that still have the original safe deposit boxes attached to the wall. At the end of the tour we were introduced to the master of the kitchen, Chef Gabrielle Milani, a very talented young chef who has been in the business for fourteen years. No wonder the food that he has produced were so good. 

Would we recommend this restaurant to our readers? But of course!! Fantastic restaurant, with great food and service, reasonable price to ensure the guests keep coming back. We certainly will...

Banca Ristorante Italiano
30 North Audley Street, W1K 6HP, London - United Kingdom
Phone: + 44 (0) 20 7647 2525

More photos of our most recent visit to Banca Ristorante Italiano:

Delicious sea bass encrusted in sea salt served with sun kissed tomatoes, capers and olive oil! Truly heavenly!

Classic choice of dessert, Tiramisu - not to be missed!!

Nishimura - Japanese Restaurant at Shangri-La Hotel, Jakarta

Japanese idea of simplicity immediately recognized as we entered Nishimura Restaurant at Shangri-La Hotel, Jakarta. Fresh, clean, tidy, all in natural colour scheme, sufficient lighting and dining space and not forgetting option of privacy that may be required by some customers. Ideal venue to hold a casual business lunch or dinner idea came across to our mind. 


We were greeted by a friendly faced waitress dressed in Japanese traditional costume, shown our table and menu then offered something to drink. Getting into all Japanese vibe, we asked for hot ocha - the green tea, as we going through the menu. We noticed, it was rather quite for a dinner time, could be because of Ramadan, where people would rather to spend their quality time at home with family. 


A couple of minutes later, after we took a sip of ocha, we decided to make our order. A salmon salad, a portion of salmon skin crackers, a chawan mushi and a must have misoshiro. Those dishes we chose may not seem sufficient for dinner, but to be honest, after going through them all, we were full. Not belly popping full, but comfortably full. Full to the point that we will not need to have something else to nibble as we get home also full enough to fall asleep without the worry of restless night as our belly working hard to digest all the food we have devoured earlier. 

Back to our dining experience, before our order delivered to our table, we were served a refreshing and mouth watering pickled green vegetable with dried fish sprinkle. It was delightful. Worked well to tease our taste buds. Salmon salad was beautiful too! Made with the freshest ingredients. When it comes to salmon skin crackers, we must say, we had better somewhere else. But it was a great snack. Chawan mushi was served piping hot, super tasty egg curd with few seafood touch on the top. The misoshiro itself was not disappointing either. All good and all healthy. No guilty feeling had we able to manage another set of food all over again, not that it would be necessary though.

We could not end the evening without a nice sweet treat. We went for a mango pudding. Sounded really refreshing. Well, when it turned up, it was not quite as we have expected. The pudding has a beautiful and silky texture indeed, but lacking of mango flavour to our taste. We were hoping for a chilled and sweet mango-ey pudding and a little bit sour to add a kick. What we had was more like egg curd with a hint of mango served with light caramel sauce, red bean paste, a couple of fruit balls and fresh mint. Not bad but not quite refreshing. 

Although we had a slight disappointment, we would not mind to go back there again. Next time we would like to try their sushi and chicken hot pot, so we can share our experience with our loyal readers.


Nishimura at Shangri-La Hotel Jakarta
Kota BNI, Jalan Jendral Sudirman Kavling 1, Jakarta 
Phone: +62 21 2922 999
Website: http://www.shangri-la.com/jakarta/shangrila/dining/restaurants/nishimura/

Le Boudin Blanc Restaurant, London

As you have noticed it from it's name, yes it is a French restaurant, indeed. Set in French rustic cottage look with a lot of wooden features. We got the idea of what the owner is trying to portray, but certain details do need some extra care. To us, the first impression, the place looked shabby, in great need of refreshment. For example, the upholstery on the seats, definitely worn out and smells musty. Some decorations on the wall covered in dust. This is a restaurant after all, we thought health and hygiene are important factors here. The waiter station looked really sad too.. 

Ok.. Let's get into the food. To start with, we chose Bruschetta with basil, tomato and epoisse cheese. You might be wondering after all that trouble to set up the restaurant as authentic as possible, yet they serve an italian starter. We wondered the same thing, until we noticed that they use epoisse instead of mozzarella cheese, so it is now become an italian starter with a french twist. So they got a way with it. It was well seasoned but a little bit dry, we had to ask for some olive oil to moist the bruschetta. 


We also tried pan fried calamari with chili pepper. Apart from the fact the calamari was tender but under seasoned, the focaccia bread that came with it was excellent, good portion and nice flavor.

For the main course, we chose a Confit of Duck and White Pudding sausage to be accompanied with a bottle of Gevrey Chambertin 1er Cru Les Caxetier 2005. Well.. we have to say that both main courses were rather disappointing. The confit of duck was again under seasoned and undercooked. The best part of that particular meal was the roast potato, it was strongly seasoned with garlic and parsley. The white pudding sausage came out very attractive and appetizing but the taste was like pre-packed food we can pick up from local supermarket. And not the fancy version of it either. 

Not too happy with the main courses, we were hoping the dessert could lessen the disappointment. We chose a classic creme brûlée and special dessert of the day, peach with almond cream tart and irish coffee. Creme brûlée was indeed good. Good texture and flavor, but it was pre-prepared, they did not bother with last finishing touch like blow torch the sugar coating which would give room temperature creme brûlée with slightly warm crust. Everything was done before the order came in. It such a shame, as that little detail would make a lot of difference. The peach with almond cream tart was rather difficult to describe. It was sweet and sour, a little bit sticky yet it tasted dry, not our idea of a tart. Good job the irish coffee was reasonably good. So not all went wrong at the end. 


When it comes to quality of service, like in most restaurants, some staff are friendly and accommodating some just ignorant or even showing arrogance. Although it was a bit slow, we were not too bothered with the service. It was more the noise of heavy foot steps came from the floor above. We found out that the kitchen is actually located above the dining area. Unusual, we must admit. We suppose, location is not the main problem, it's the sound proof that should be underlined here. Had the restaurant was not busy with customers, we would hear all the movements in the kitchen clearly and loudly, which can not be pleasant... 




Le Boudin Blanc
5 Trebeck Street, Mayfair, London W1J 7LT
Phone: +44 20 7499 3292
Website: www.boudinblanc.co.uk

El Pirata - Spanish Tapas Bar, London

It was a true delight when we found this tapas bar, as we have longed to taste real Spanish food. A little tucked away at from hustle and bustle of Picadilly but it's practically only a short walk from it, is where El Pirata located. Attractive looking establishment, rich with typical Spanish touch, Spanish waiting staff, Spanish style bar and of course Spanish only menu. On top of that, it opens all day long! Ah, we definitely found a spot that we can visit frequently. 

Like a couple who have not been eating for the whole week, we felt like we had to order so many food all at once. Just to show how keen we were to devour the food served. We started with Jamon Iberico - of course. We could not visit a Spanish tapas bar and not eating their fine cured ham. We followed it with Gambas al Pil-Pil, super tasty prawn soaked in olive oil, garlic and dried chili. Great to dunk the bread into it. Not forgetting Pulpo a la Gallega - thinly sliced octopus with a sprinkle of olive oil and paprika. All those tapas we enjoyed with perfectly chilled Spanish Rose wine. 

We did not stop just there though, we continued with fried Sardinas Fritas and Calamares a la Plancha . We returned all the plates clear, that was just to show how good the food were. We were full at that point, but we were not ready to give up as our Paella Valenciana was on it's way. Another beautiful dish delivered successfully. Struggled to finish it but we succeeded. We could even manage some Flan - Creme Caramel, a great dessert to end a great meal. And if you prefer to end your meal with cognac, we would recommend you to try Spanish version of it, Torres. We bet you will enjoy it, a good quality and smooth liqueur without a hefty price tag. 

We have visited this tapas bar several time now and not once we got disappointed. So consistency of quality has been maintained well. Prices also very reasonable. Service may not be the finest, but eh.. this is a tapas bar, it is not a michelin star restaurant that cost us an arm and a leg, the staff are definitely very friendly. We would definitely recommend this tapas bar to everybody!


El Pirata
5-6 Down Street, London W1J 7AQ
Phone: +44 20 77491 3810
Website: www.elpirata.co.uk

Babbo - Italian Restaurant, London

A quaint restaurant seats about 40 at most, only a short walk of busy Picadilly area that offers authentic Italian cuisine cooked from scratch and well presented. The restaurant itself laid nicely and bright with crisp white cloth on each table that looked very inviting. A few traditional ornaments on the wall to give the Italian touch, but what we love the most is the iron work on the stair case. It gives a nice character to the place.

As we were looking through the menu, a selection of bread was served. And of course we could not resist. What could be better than freshly baked bread dunked in extra virgin olive oil with a sprinkle of salt and black pepper?

So, we have decided to start with Calamari Fritti and Carpaccio di Tonno. Excellent choices. As they turned out very fresh, tender, melt in the mouth and tasty yet light. And as the main-course we shared a Branzino in Crosta di Sale - Wild Sea Bass in Salt Crust. It was not quite the one we were expecting, but it was rather good. The salt crust worked to keep the fish nice and moist. Although it would have been nicer to be served with some little vegetables instead of a generous portion of roast potato. We found it a little bit heavy all together.

The highlight of our lunch at the end were the desserts. We had pistachio creme brûlée and creamy Burrata Caprese style... True delight... Would not mind going there again...

Babbo
39 Albemarle Street, London W1S 4JQ
Phone: +44 20 3205 1099
Website: http://www.babborestaurant.co.uk

Iran Restaurant, London - UK

As you may already knew, Shepherd Market is a food paradise for both locals and visitors. From Iranian restaurant, Lebanese, Japanese, French to Indian and many more are there at your choice. You will be spoiled, as we did..


In the mood of trying something completely new, we popped in to this tiny corner restaurant that looked rather cute. As we had a reasonably nice weather at that particular day (rather a rare occasion being in England :)) we saw few tables set up outside for customers who fancy dining al fresco. But that did not temp us. We preferred to dine in. Observing the interior, we found it was nicely decorated.  Bottles of wine stacked tidily on the wall, clean and crisp table cloth, plus fresh carnations to add a special touch, chairs were reasonably comfortable too. Though we found the L-shaped bar was overpowering the whole lay out of the restaurant.

The menu. It was described in two languages, Arabic and English. No luck with the arabic menu, we went for the English version, that helped us a lot. So we decided to have Lentil soup as starter with freshly baked nan. As main course we had Khorest Ghormeh and Khorest Ghameh with a bottle of Veuve Cliquot Rose.

The lentil soup turned out well above our expectation, so tasty, yet light. With a few drizzle of lemon juice, it tasted even better. The nan bread was good too... not heavy or filling. Perfect starter to tease our taste buds. 

Khorest Ghameh is basically stew, in this case was lamb with split peas, tomato paste and of course herbs. The meat was melting in the mouth, the gravy was hearty but not too heavy even when we ate it with rice. Very impressed indeed.

Khorest Ghormeh is similar type of stew but made with spinach, dill, parsley, cilantro etc.. It may looked  less appetizing, but it tasted very good. With the amount of veggies in it, we assumed it was a healthier option to the khorest ghameh. 

The rice. It was a combination of white rice and saffron rice. No better combination than those stew and  the rice. On top of that, all the food went really well with our random choice of Veuve Cliquot Rose champagne. 


We were really pleased with out little adventure that day, average service, but excellent food. Next time we would go back there to try their caviar collections which were unavailable at that particular day. We would let you know how we get on.. 


Iran
27 Shepherd Market, London W1J 7PR
Phone: +44 20 7409 3337
Website: http://www.iranrestaurant.co.uk/contact-us