This is a bit of a brief post, I went here a few months back, wrote my skeleton thoughts when it was still fresh in my memory but then didn't get round to fleshing it out. Unfortunately the detail was lost from my mind when I went to write it up properly. I did consider just deleting my notes, but hey, this is a blog not a proper publication. I also wanted to publish the post as I had a great time, this place had some attention at one point but then seems to have slipped off the radar for a lot of people and deserves to be better known. That said, it wasn't struggling for custom, oh well, I've written it now...

This place is a very authentic feeling Izakaya sort of place on Gray's Inn Rd, not short of a Japanese businessman or two using it mainly as somewhere to get drunk. Fair enough. The décor is plain wood with Japanese posters and lanterns on the walls, fit for purpose and comfortable enough. When we went on a midweek evening there was a busy atmosphere and service was friendly from the word go. All the staff smiled constantly, were always around to get another beer but never intrusive.

It was clear from the menu that it would be possible to let the bill get out of control here, but by exercising a little self control we ate well and reasonably. This appears in Time Out's 'Cheap Eats', and on london-eating, reviews range from 'very reasonable' to 'a bit steep'. I'd have to say I'd side more with the latter, we had to order pretty carefully to keep within our stated aim for the night of 'cheap and interesting'. (As ever london-eating is utterly useless due to not having a feel for any of the writer's tastes, as another example, reviews for this place also range from 'I'm Japanese and this is the most authentic Izakaya in London' to 'I lived in Tokyo for 5 years and this is nothing like the real thing', but I digress).

We started with a delicious tempura, which contained various vegetables including aubergine and courgette, both of which avoided bitterness or sogginess. There was also prawn which was not overcooked, but was delicate in flavour and really very good.

We then had something which was new to me but I'm very glad I tried it. I didn't write the name down, just the ingredients, but a bit of internet research suggests it was Ochazuke and apparently it should be eaten at the end of a meal to prevent hangovers. No matter, it did very well as a shared starter. Basically it was rice in a sort of tea broth with pickled plums. The tea was weak and therefore not overpowering but the plum had a very strong flavour. The plums were sometimes sweet, sometimes sour and always compelling. This was very different but really moreish.

I then had great ubon noodles, the texture was lip-smacking and very slurpy and they came in a good tasty broth with no shortage of chicken and vegetables. I'm afraid I really can't remember what my friend had, but I do remember she was happy. We enjoyed a fair few beers as we were eating, which seemed to be the done thing, but kept the bill at just over £20 a head. Clearly it could very easily creep up, but we really enjoyed what we had so it was no chore to order carefully.

On the subject of cost it was nice to see service at only 10% suggested, I know its normal to have none in some Japanese restaurants, but hey this is Britain not Tokyo and I thought this was very fair (remember when it was always 10%- howcome after the introduction of the minimum wage its virtually everywhere gone to be suggested at 12.5%, and increasingly, 15%?). Also refreshing was that there was no attempt to fool you into leaving a second gratuity on the chip and pin machine. This, along with the happy atmosphere, cheerful staff and the good food all contributed to a very enjoyable experience. I will definitely be going back.

(Although obviously I haven't, so little time so many restaurants, I'm hungry though, sod it, I'm going there for lunch...feel free to imagine the sound of a door slamming, running steps fading away, a pause, running steps getting louder, door being unlocked...)

Went back for lunch with a friend and we both had the set tempura and sushi at £11 each. The tempura again was excellent, the star again was two big prawns, sweet and perfectly cooked, along with various veg. The sushi unfortunately was a slight disappointment, the rice was ok, but the texture was a bit hard and a bit cold. The salmon and tuna were fine, well cut but lacking any real depth of flavour. There was however also a piece of mackerel nigiri which had much more going for it, great melting texture and lots of flavour. There were also a couple of california type rolls which were fine. On the side was a bowl of very good miso soup, not overly pungent or cloying but with a good delicate flavour.

Just to be clear there was nothing particularly wrong with the sushi, it was fine and reasonable value. But its in the warm dishes that the real interest lies at Aki, and for those I can heartily recommend it.

Having been reminded recently of the merits of Charles Campion's Restaurant Guide I used it for a lunch recommendation when in Ealing for work. It was a solo lunch so I didn't give the menu an extensive workout and so this'll be a fairly brief post.

The menu is slightly odd, listing, I think, special dishes, chefs specials and Nepalese specials. Monty's then are of the opinion that all their dishes are special. I stuck to the Nepalese specials, and given that is in theory a Nepalese restaurant, there weren't that many of them, perhaps 5 or 6, one of which was green chilli chicken so the menu alone isn't sufficiently different to be worth a trip.

I was asked if I wanted a Poppadom, which I didn't really, but for reasons I can't adequately explain I answered yes. This makes me very irritated at myself (I feel like a tool, the person who the question, 'would you like to supersize that?' was invented for). Obviously I recognise its my own fault. The Poppadom was fine, the raita was good, the chutney was green pepper but really quite mild and tasteless. The mango chutney tasted like it was bought-in gloopy stuff with some extra mango chopped up in it to make it look better. All fine, but I've had much better.

The popadom also came with a large plate of salad/crudite, of the type (large barely chopped vegetables) more usually associated with a lebanese. At the best of times I'm not sure what the point of these are. In this case I suspect I had not been the first person to have looked at that particular plate of salad and been unable to see its purpose. The lettuce and cucumber was markedly not fresh looking, the cucumber especially was rubbery and had seen much better days. Very unimpressive.

For my main course I had Gurkhali Dhal chicken. The dal was like a north Indian dhal in style with kidney beans as well as lentils but was much less thick than a Makhani dhal. As a result it managed to be simultaneously both heavy going and to have a fairly watery texture. There wasn't much of a chilli kick to the dish, though there was some. The chicken was not memorable, but there was quite a lot of it. In fact the most memorable thing about the dish was the huge portion, which would easily have served two, as perhaps it should do at over £8.

On top of the huge portion of curry, I had ordered both a Roti and a stuffed Paratha, not because I thought I would need that much, but because Mr Campion had specifically recommended the bread. Well it was fine and again huge, the Roti in particular much larger than it usually is. It was quite good, clearly freshly made and cooked, but a little too charred and not as fluffy as really good Roti. I'm not quite sure what the paratha was stuffed with, but it was fairly bland and again was fine.

My view might have been more charitable if Monty's was cheap, but actually my meal for one with a very small glass of slightly flat diet coke came to £15.60. OK, I ordered more bread than I needed but the waiter never told me that, and I didn't have a starter or dessert. It felt expensive because there was no reduction at lunch and Ealing is hardly the West End. What I ordered left me stuffed and for lunch would probably have served two, which would be a reasonable price, but that's hardly relevant because if your alone there is no option to get a smaller portion, and if you are with friends there's nothing on the menu to indicate that the portions are suitable for two. Its licensed so even in the evening the cost of alcohol could make it surprisingly expensive for the location.

I was very disappointed with Monty's as it gets a great write up both from Mr Campion, (who you will have gathered is generally my favourite critic), and on several online review sites. In my view its definitely not worth any sort of a trip, it might be a good option if in the area in the evening or in a group, but at lunch which is when I'm likely to be in Ealing and alone to boot I won't be going back.

Another day, another trip to Harrow. Somehow it had managed to escape my attentions that a restaurant rated as one of the best for Dim Sum in London (if this is to be considered London) was located up here. I heard about it on egullet and looked it up, finding that not only is it a favourite of Campion but also rates a 4 in the Good Food Guide, pretty rare for a Chinese restaurant. I got out of work at about three and needed a late lunch, so I crossed my fingers and headed over, hoping it was still serving. As luck would have it, it was a Thursday, as it serves Dim Sum till 5pm Thursday and Friday (3pm on other days).

I had some difficulty getting in, the automatic door not appearing to work and a waitress looking straight through it and ignoring me. I thought it was shut after all, but eventually worked out how to open the door. Pretty embarrassing, I do wonder how I get by when so many day to day basic skills appear to be beyond my reach.

From there on in, service was impeccable. I mention this as usual, as again there is a raft of online comment complaining about service. I believe in the importance of good service, and honestly think I'm probably a bit too demanding in that regard. In fact I'm a bit of a grumpy git, so how come I always seem to get decent service in places where others don't? I hardly think my blog with its 3.5 readers is going to have got my picture on every maitre'd's noticeboard, and I don't sit there taking notes (hence the sometimes Winneresque vague nature of the reviews). What are you people doing in restaurants to piss everyone off?

The interior has been described as sleek, I'm not sure I'd go that far. I was taken into a large bright room, filled with large circular tables for families, and just a few two-tops. The chairs were the metal frame type usually reserved for wedding receptions. All of the tables had linen and some flowers making it a pleasant space. Well I say all, mine had a paper cloth- perhaps they had heard about my eating habits in advance? Despite the relatively late hour, the restaurant had a pleasant bustle, with several tables occupied with local families, mainly Chinese, and an Indian couple on a bizarre date that seemed to consist mostly of complaining about their respective former spouses.

I ordered several Dim Sum from an extensive menu, and the first to arrive was good old pork puffs. The pastry was excellent, just a hint of greasiness accentuating that they were a guilty pleasure. The filling however, was a little odd, not bad, in fact very enjoyable, just odd. It had far more onion and a far more liquid sauce than I am used to, meaning it had more than a hint of a mince and onion pie to it. Of course, the meat was barbecued pork and the 'gravy' was quite sweet. Whilst this was clearly made by them and not in a factory, overall I think I prefer the less oniony and liquidy examples.

Next up was the Prawn Ha Gao, described on the English menu outside as crystal prawn dumpling. The first one I picked up fell apart, but apparently this is because you should leave them a minute or so for the translucent wrapper to solidify. The wrapper on the others was close to perfect, perhaps the tiniest bit thick, but certainly not much. Thin enough to see the content clearly and obviously shaped by hand. The texture gave just a hint of chewiness and actually felt dry on the tongue, really very good. The filling too was first rate, the prawn sweet and bouncy and the portions not at all stingy, excellent.

Whilst eating the dumplings the owner, or at least a lady of some seniority, gently joshed me about my chopstick technique. (In fact she complimented it, not showing off here, Its pretty ropey and at the time I was struggling manfully to deal with my fallen apart dumpling and she very much had a twinkle in her eye, but it was friendly and good natured banter) I mention this to simply highlight that the service was not only efficient and cheerful, it went beyond that.

I finished with scallop dumplings, again the wrapper was good but a little thicker here so a little further away from perfection. The filling had more fresh tasting prawn, alongside a generous amount of scallops. The content was all well cooked, not overdone despite their time waiting for me to get to them in their steamer basket.

There were a whole host of other tempting treats on the menu, for which I'm eager to return, but on this occasion, I was trying to keep it light for both my wallet and waistline. The total with tea and service was less than a tenner, well in fact it was exactly a tenner as that's their minimum charge for a card and I had no cash on me. Still a bargain for food this delicious, amongst the best Dim Sum I've had.

Whilst out in West London I had time for lunch and had it narrowed down to two options on King Street in Hammersmith, either the above restaurant, heavily recommended by Timeout and Campion, or Agni on the same street which gets a decent write up from Campion but also has a bib gourmand from the tyre people. I was meant to be saving money but I have a bit more faith in Bib on Indian than others seem to so my preference would have been the latter. In the event it seems that Agni aren't open for lunch so my indecision was cured, and I'm glad it was.

Sagar specialises in the food of Karnataka, though in truth you won't spot many differences between this and the other South Indian specialists in London. The restaurant doesn't look much from the outside, and indeed the whole of King Street is a surprising place to have a choice of top-rated Indian options. Inside however, the restaurant is clean and modern, with lots of light wood. In the wood walls there are alcoves with models of Hindu gods subtly lit. There were also roses on some tables, though not mine so I couldn't see whether they were real. Overall though the ambience was surprisingly civilised, this is not one of those places where you have to forego all aesthetics for an authentic tasting meal.

There was a lunch special which promised an unbelievable sounding quantity of food for £4.95 and as it pretty much toured the menu it didn't take me long to opt for that. The other reason was I was a little tight for time, and guessed (correctly) that the items on the special menu would be being knocked out at a decent rate. On a similar note, service was friendly, helpful and efficient throughout

To start came pappadam with chutneys, the pappadam was warm and perfectly fine but worthy of a mention were the unusual chutneys. There was a good mango chutney which packed a lot of flavour despite looking quite commercial, so far, so fairly ordinary, but the other two chutneys made a real change. There was a lemon chutney which was hot enough to give the desired adrenaline buzz but not so much as to be inedible. The sharpness of the lemons really worked, as did the texture of the lemon skins, this was so good I ate the lot, forgetting the volumes of food to come. Finally there was an apple chutney, sweet and delicious, a great contrast with the spicy chutney and an enjoyable change from Mango.

Next up according to my menu was a onion bhajia, though when it arrived it looked so little like what I'd expected that I thought there was a mistake. Looking nothing like your ordinary big red onion bhajis, these were discs of finely chopped onion coated in gram flour and coriander seeds. OK, I know that other than the seeds that is what all bhajis are, but these were discs so almost like onion cakes with the gram flour therefore smooth and even on the outside. This made the outside very crisp, but the interior still meltingly soft. The onion was also very sweet and came with some coconut sambar, and also another similar but more savoury, almost bready dip which I didn't get the name of. It was all delicious.

Then came the Thali which had a simple but delicious aubergine curry, not too oily and with the sweetness emphasised but with a good zip of heat. There was also rice which was well cooked, a simple combination with some peas, carrots and saffron, but the vegetables were not overcooked and the rice was at the point where it had bite and each grain was separate.

The piece de resistance was a masala dosa. The dosa rice pancake was perfectly crisp on the outside but remained soft on the inside and as a result was pliable and could be used to eat the potato and onion curry filling that had been served separately. Whilst a simple dish, the dosa here was noticeably a notch up on others I've had, and the onion and potato curry again had the combination of sweetness balanced with spice that seems to be the hallmark of the cooking here. More samba came as part of the thali, and its worth noting that it was not as excessively coconutty as those in some other dosa specialists, which for me was a good thing.

Finally came dessert, advertised as dessert of the day on the menu. Before the thali arrived I would have put good money on gulab jamun, which would have been ok, being on the more tolerable end of the Indian sweet spectrum. However, on the last section of the tray was a dense concoction that I had eyed with suspicion throughout the meal. Needless to say I was pleasantly surprised, the mixture was mainly a mix of semolina and banana, mashed together into a fairly smooth paste, but with the graininess of the semolina preventing it being just a mush. Stirred in were some cashews and raisins, and the combination of flavours was delicious. As the sweetness came from the banana it also avoided being too sweet or artificial and this was a really enjoyable dessert, even if in appearance it still has some way to go to beat French pastry.

Sagar has my wholehearted recommendation and as a bonus my meal with a diet coke came to £6.55 before the tip. This is even better value than Dadima, slightly better food overall and is more convenient for most. If you're even more cash strapped there is a lunch box special for £3.25 of two curries, raitha and fresh bread which is probably a very good option.

NB

I went to the Sagar on Percy Street near Tottenham Court Rd with friends when I learned there were other branches. The décor was identical as was the menu and the service again was excellent. I forewent the thali deciding to go my own way, and as ever this was a bit of a mistake, a friend had the large Udupi thali and seemed to enjoy it all, another friend had the dosa and was as happy as I had been in Hammersmith.

I started with a Special Upma, made with 'cream of wheat', this proved to be semolina, which I suppose is accurate. The texture was a bit gummy and mouthfilling, and I didn't enjoy it hugely, but suspect it was good of its kind. It came with cashew nuts which enhanced the expectation for it to be dessert when it wasn't, but this was countered with a fiery chutney to go on top. An interesting rather than great dish, but thats more down to my taste than the execution.

For my main course I had, Vegetable Khootu which was essentially vegetables in a coconut and yoghurt soup. The yoghurt gave the dish a real fresh tang, but the vegetables were a bit soggy and indistinguishable and the dish was sweet from the coconut but lacking a bit of kick to balance that. Again though it was interesting, and I had this with perfectly decent chappati. My friend didn't want her dessert with her thali, so I polished it off. It was another semolina based number, also with nuts, but this time it was sweet. It wasn't as good as the banana dessert I had had for lunch in Hammersmith but it was still enjoyable.

I can't compare like for like as I didn't eat the same items, and indeed, it will be apparent I wasn't paying quite the same attention on Percy St but for me Hammersmith edged it. The ingredients just seemed to sing more and the spicing to be more precise. Still, I enjoyed Percy Street, its a good and very reasonable central Indian, with a great meal plus beers and service coming in at less than £20. I believe they also have a venue in Twickenham which based on the other two, is probably worth a go.

There is a Best Mangal and a Best Mangal 2 on the same road, and owned by the same people. I point this out as a friend invited me to dinner at Best Mangal. She had given the address of Best Mangal 2 but the name Best Mangal, so while myself and another friend sat in one, the person we were meeting sat in the other. If something of a pain, it was resolved and does at least mean I can tell you that the menus are virtually identical but with a couple more items at BM2. The décor in BM2 is attempting to be more upmarket and has the feel of a proper restaurant, where as the original is essentially a very small caff. The prices are the same at both, which would seem to make BM2 the obvious choice. I'm not so sure though, the extra menu items weren't terribly appealing (prawn and avocado salad in a Turkish kebab house anyone?) and the original had a certain authentic charm lacked by its notionally posher brother. That said, we were only in BM long enough to have a small beer before the confusion was resolved (thank God for mobile phones) and we then all trekked across to BM2 so I can't comment on the food in the original.

So focusing on the restaurant were we actually ate, the décor was in the standard misguided ethnic goes upmarket idiom. Particularly memorable was a fake garden visible through a window at the back. This consisted of one of those twee wooden wishing wells available from garden centres, alongside a sun painted on a concrete wall and some stone chippings. The lighting of this feature only worked for some 3 seconds in every 30, whether through an intermittent fault or an attempt to hide what was a fairly poor effort I cannot tell you. (Turkish restaurants seem to go in for this type of thing more than most, I have hazy memories of a good restaurant in Green Lanes with a rockery and waterfall on the back wall).

In the authenticity stakes, I did notice what in Turkey seemed to be a de riguer accessory- a glass fridge with a rotating rack containing only a couple of rice puddings, which I took as a good sign. Even more promisingly was a large charcoal grill, though not as prominently located as in its sibling restaurant, the cooking was still clearly visible.

I over ordered as I was in something of an odd mood, only just being persuaded not to order kidneys by friends who know I only like them in small quantities with steak in a pie. Otherwise, even in notionally good restaurants I have found the hint of ammonia off-putting. What I did order was Iman Bayildi (stuffed aubergine), Ciger (liver) with sumac and some muska boregi (cheese pastries). The Iman Bayildi was a really good example, sweet and oniony with a good non-bitter aubergine flavour and enough oil to mingle the flavours together without being greasy. It was served more as a salad than a stuffed aubergine but was delicious.

Also successful was the liver, packed with flavour, a bit more overcooked than I would like but this is normal in Turkey, the offal taste was clear but not overpowering and the sumac and paprika gave a real savoury tang. This was another good dish, not quite as well executed as the aubergine. Much less successful were the boregi, the pastry was fairly greasy and oversized, nor were they as warm as they might have been. The cheese and parsley interior was fine, but had nothing to lift it, overall I have had much better.

I had also meant to order patlican ezmi, the white aubergine puree, but had forgotten. This was a good thing as the volume of food would have been getting silly, and in any event it was on one of my friends mixed cold meze starter. The patlican was not a great example, being very much on the bland side, too much yoghurt and not enough of either the garlic or the aubergine. Again fine, but not special in any way. As a side note the mixed cold platter was ordered by two of my friends, and whilst overall there was an excess of food, it did seem a little on the mean side between the two of them and I think it would make sense when in a group for everyone to order a dish or two and share the more interesting options. I should add that another friend had grilled halloumi, which she loves. It tasted like grilled halloumi, which I daresay is the aim.

With the starters done reasonably well, we moved on to what should be the star of an okcabasi restaurant, the grilled meats. I had ordered quail in keeping with my slightly odd mood. It proved a mistake. In many ways my own fault as I know quail, especially at these prices, will be farmed and bland. What there's not much excuse for is it being thoroughly dry which this was. In case the problem was only with my quail, I nabbed some lamb sis from a friend's mixed kebab. Unfortunately this too was on the dry side, the cubes being too small and it was pretty bland lamb, neither as tasty or juicy as you might reasonably expect.

I had assumed the main courses would come with some rice which they didn't. But that said there was plenty of bread and no shortage of food in general. Its just that I really like the turkish way of doing pilao so it was a pity not to get a spoonful with the kebab. The bread was the standard poppy seed covered light Turkish stuff, warm and good, though I think reheated rather than completely fresh, but pretty decent all the same.

I didn't have room for any baklava or the aforementioned authentic looking rice puddings and so we settled the bill. Because I had completely over-ordered mine came to £30, ordinarily a meal here would be £20-25. I should point out that includes beers, Effes at £2.75 a glass, which sounds a bargain, but they seemed to be very small glasses, they may have been 330ml but they didn't seem that way.

Overall this was a bit of a disappointment, it was chosen by a friend not me, but when I looked it up online I was enthused. All I can say is that the number of people giving it a 10 on London-eating is dodgy to say the least. Best Mangal 2 does some things well but it lets itself down in a lot of areas and overall is no better than OK. If it was in my neighbourhood I would go as its not bad, but don't be fooled by some of the online suggestions that this is one of the best Turkish restaurants in London.

On a final note I haven't mentioned the service which was friendly, efficient and unobtrusive. Which makes a change!

Just a quick note on a place I popped in for a lunch after yet another morning in Harrow. (Its getting silly now- I'll have to change the name of the blog to eating out in North West London.)

I have just bought a copy of the Charles Campion Restaurant Guide having not owned a copy for several years. I've mentioned before that I have limited faith in Time Out but the reverse is true for Mr Campion, who is undoubtedly my favourite critic. It looks like there's plenty of places still for me to try up in the grim north west, but on the down side, I'm unlikely to get through them all and start heading to un-heralded places anytime soon.

Anyway, I digress. I tried out Sanghaman before getting my copy of Mr Campion's guide, on the basis of a “critics choice” red star in Time Out. I know now that its also well regarded by Charles Campion so is very much on the beaten path in Wembley terms. This is only a short description as I had lunch alone so didn't have the opportunity to try a lot of the fairly extensive menu.

My waiter was very friendly but there was a bit of a language barrier so I wasn't quite sure what I'd ordered. This wasn't helped by the structure of the menu which rather assumes you know what you're getting. I ordered what I thought was a starter called Channa Battura, from a menu section called “Traditional Tops”. When it arrived I realised I'd had it before in India but forgotten the name. It isn't a starter but is a curry with an enormous puffed up bread, eaten often as a breakfast in India and substantial enough to be a main course. No matter, I ploughed on.

The bread gets puffed up by being deep fried, but despite that was light and not at all greasy. The bread is used to eat the chick pea based curry. The curry was strongly spiced and finished with a lot of freshly made garam masala. There was no shortage of chilli heat and the clear flavour of jeera but unfortunately the dish was a bit oily and the texture not quite as thick and chunky as it might have been. This was a good dish with strong fresh spicing, but it wasn't in any way exceptional.

I'd ordered a salt lassi, resisting the temptation of a lager at lunch and it came quickly along with tap water. The lassi was unadorned which isn't necessarily a bad thing. It was a bit on the thick side and slightly oversalted for a cold winter day, but was a perfectly workmanlike accompaniment to the fairly hot food.

I was already pretty full when my main course arrived, a dish of Dingri Mutteer which the waiter had recommended. The waiter had told me it was a pea and baby corn curry, which is exactly what it was. Oddly though, a bit of internet research tells me the name normally refers to pea and mushroom. As I say, the waiter had told me and I can't pretend I knew it should be mushrooms so no complaints on that score.

The curry was strong on turmeric, and was flecked through with a lot of finely diced red chilli. This gave it a kick but it wasn't too hot and the fieriness was tempered by fresh coriander and the aforementioned lassi. This was a good dish, plenty of peas that somehow had not been overcooked. The same can be said for the baby corn which had a satisfying crunch.

Essentially this place delivered good food, freshly made. The bill was £7.50 and the service was friendly. But its not as stand out as Dadima with nothing really exceptional and it wouldn't be worth a trip out on its own account. That said if your in the area and have already tried Dadima, its certainly worth a look, though there are many promising alternatives, on which on current form I'll be reporting in due course!

I really don't know why it took me so long to go to this place, its near where I work, is well priced and has been famous since I was so young that I would have been happy with any food that came with Ketchup. I'm glad I've finally gone but regret all the missed opportunities. I guess that tells you what I thought of the place...

First things first, The Eagle is famous as the first Gastropub, with a food focus since 1992. Thats right - 16 years, which is pretty impressive. I expect there are pubs that would dispute the claim, but it has everything we now associate with the genre- miss-matched cutlery, miss-matched rickety chairs, bare floorboards etc. All of that can be a bit irritating, but its seems more acceptable when your in the original, not in a copy.

I know it has changed hands since the original owners, and based on the fact that their blackboards said “Why not try the Anchor & Hope or Great Queen St?” I suspect there is now a connection, though I haven't ever read that elsewhere. It does have a bit of the feature that makes Anchor & Hope so irritating, namely tables that aren't really designed to eat off, a long wait to get a seat and an atmosphere so noisy you have to shout to be heard by dining companions.

Somehow though I found all that much less annoying than I do at the Anchor & Hope. I thing there are two reasons for it, firstly the wait wasn't anywhere near as long so I didn't get utterly trashed at the bar. OK it was a Tuesday night but it was prime time and even Tuesday's are a nightmare at Anchor & Hope. Secondly I was less concerned because of the prices. If the original Gastropub ideal was about good value, good food then I'm not sure Anchor & Hope meets the first of those demands. Prices there are firmly restaurant, whereas prices at the Eagle are largely less than a tenner for a main course. Maybe its a little hypocritical but I'm not sure, I think I'm justified in being happy to put up with more hassle and less service in a place where I can eat and drink well for less than £20 a head than I am in a place where bills are frequently double that.

Anyway, all of the above would matter not a jot if the food wasn't up to scratch, but as you can tell from the overall tenor, it was. The food here is heavily Mediterranean influenced, there's a lot of grilled fish, all fresh, simple but good. I seem to remember a lot of places like this being quite Italian or Spanish influenced, before everywhere went all Modern British. Its nice to see there's still room for both.

The Eagle is still a pub, serving well kept Charles Wells beer which went down a treat whilst we waited for a table. Its worth noting at this point that the barmaid who served us was happy and helpful throughout, and I had no complaints of the waiter who found us our table and served our food. I only mention this as service gets a bit of a kicking on some of the review sites, and even Charles Campion describes it as “with attitude”. There was no checking from the waiter how we were getting on, and no opportunity to check the wine, but hey this is a pub charging pub prices. At least the wine came with wine glasses!

We'd gone for a bottle of wine with our food from a small wine list chalked up. It may be small but I guess its changed fairly often. It also offers exceptional value and whilst not perhaps terribly exciting, it did have some items of interest and based on our bottle was well chosen. We'd plumped for a Valtorto 06 from the Douro for a bit of a change. This was a very upfront, no oak, plum and cherry mouthful of a wine, it had a bit of complexity on the finish, was good fun and a bargain at £14 in a pub.

There were no starters as such but there were items marked up as tapas that could have been pressed into service. We launched straight into the main courses instead, and I opted for a Rabbit Cacciatoria. Now I looked up that term and found a definition on “Gourmet Britain” (no I hadn't come across it before either) that said it meant huntsman style and in essence denotes the inclusion of wild mushrooms. Wikipedia has a similar definition for al Cacciatore, so I assume its accurate. My version didn't have any wild mushrooms that I noticed but it was delicious. What it did have was tomatoes, anchovies, olives and a bit of heat. It was like a very mild arrabiata but it tasted fresh and went superbly with the rabbit, which I hadn't really expected. The rabbit was wild and would have been a bit on the dry side but the sauce prevented that being a problem. The plus side of it being wild was it was packed with flavour. This was all served on a bed of serviceable mashed potatoe, making it a massive, hearty and altogether successful dish.

My friend had gone for Napoli sausages which came with green lentils. This was more sourcing than cooking I guess, but the sausages were perfectly grilled, crisp on the outside and moist in the middle. They were very spicy and the lentils worked well in taking the edge off. A simple but good dish, again served in a massive portion.

The only dessert on offer was pasteis de neis, the portugese egg tarts. We were both full and we decided to leave them and so we only had a main course. Thats great though, we left full and happy and including the bottle of decent wine we'd spent £17 a head, not counting a couple of beers beforehand. The beers incidentally were less than £3 a head, which believe it or not is pretty good in central London.

This is not haut cuisine, but its tasty, interesting well sourced and well cooked. Its a noisy crammed place but at these prices that makes it a “buzzy atmosphere” rather than bloody annoying. If you haven't been, go here because its cheap and good, if you haven't been for a few years go to remind yourself why we all fell in love with Gastropubs in the first place.

As noted below, having never been sent to Harrow, since going there of my own volition to try Masa, I have been sent there twice. On one of those occasions, having finished early and seeking lunch I walked past Masa. I was happy to see the same waitress still there, but having not tipped at all last time, I was slightly embarrassed and decided against going back in so soon after. [A note to my surprising number of American readers, we have a minimum wage here so there really is no obligation to tip at all for actively bad service, I'm sure I was in the right, but will admit I was still embarrassed].

There are a whole host of places in Wembley I've been meaning to try and as its only a couple of stops on the central line I decided to head in that direction. Arriving in Wembley is a whole lot cheerier than arriving in Harrow, obviously at lunch it was daytime which I take into account, but nonetheless the place had a real vibrancy, with the arch of the new stadium visible and a whole host of interesting shops and restaurants on the road to Dadima.

Dadima is a bit of a walk from Wembley central, I think there is a nearer tube – Alperton, but if your there in the daytime the walk is worth it. There are loads of Indian and Sri Lankan restaurants on the way, most of which have escaped the attention of the guidebooks. Nonetheless, a lot of them were full of happy looking diners and if I was in the area more often I imagine they'd be well worth a go. I especially fancy the Sri Lankan efforts, having enjoyed Sekara and needing something to compare it to. Quite a lot of the Indian restaurants advertise both Indian and Chinese food, a common thing on the subcontinent, and if their true to the form shown there, the Chinese will be less than great but the Indian pretty good.

Dadima's itself has been recommended in several publications, or of course I wouldn't have heard of it, and on this occasion I walked past the other restaurants and aimed for my original destination. The cuisine is Kenyan/Gujurati, but in any event it is very good. I ordered the special Thali which at £5.99 represents probably the best value food in London. For that tiny sum, I had a samosa (recorded as a farsan on the menu, which I think just means snack), 3 vegetable curries, a dahl, chappatis, rice, raita, a poppadom, a gulab jamun and a salt lassi. None of the food was poor, and some was properly great.

I should probably mention the décor, but I don't think there was any. This is a large unadorned room with cafeteria chairs and tables, and that authentic feel coupled with the local ethnic makeup and the host of nearby vegetable and indian cookery shops (about which, more later) meant that when my friendly waiter brought (unasked) a glass of water, my brain took half a second to compute that the water would be safe to drink!

Shortly afterwards my lassi arrived, and it was deliciously refreshing, with a small amount of cardomon on top that lifted it, and otherwise nothing fancy and just salty enough. At the same time my poppadom arrived, this was warm which was nice but it had been bought in and was one of the spicy type. This was probably the least good item of the meal, but it was still perfectly fine.

Shortly afterwards the thali arrived. The samosa was very good, the pastry was not quite as crisp as it might have been but it was grease free. The filling was different from the norm with a multi layered flavour, but I'm afraid I couldn't tell you exactly what was in there. Alongside a real savoury quality it finished with a decent chilli hit and was overall very impressive, though not quite the best I've had. [As a side note, the best samosas I've had in Britain have been from the Amaya Indian sweet shop on Drummond street- very crispy, served warm, packed with flavour and at 60p each, the best lunch option near Euston, not withstanding the all you can eat buffets on the same street!]

One of the three curries was very watery, in fact it was entirely liquid and appeared quite unpromising. Appearances can be deceptive though, and in fact this was possibly the best dish. It wasn't at all oily, and the tomato sauce was spiked with a strong but not excessive hit of liquorice and star anise. When some rice was stirred in to add substance and this curry was eaten with the decent warm chappatis, the overall effect was delicious.

The second curry was a potatoe based dish and this was overall a bit of a disappointment. Leaving aside the question of whether more carbs were called for in a meal that already contained rice and chappatis, the curry was just a little too oily. That said the spicing was clear and you probably wouldn't complain if your local curry house was at this standard. Things improved again with the third curry, a dense, liquid free mix of green beans and green peppers and chillis. The heat was not as fierce as you might expect but it certainly had a kick, but the flavours of pepper came through cleanly and it was an excellent dish.

The dahl was also noteworthy, it wasn't different in style from a everyday dahl (unlike say Sekara). However, it was in the thick style of dahl, and a little unusually had been made with black eyed beans. It made an interesting change and had a strong nutty flavour. It was an excellent accompaniment to the other dishes, as well as providing some much needed protein.

The sweet was gulab jamun. I've said previously that I'm not a big fan of Indian desserts and this was not going to convert me. However, it was fine of its type, not inedibly sweet and the centre of the sweet wasn't dry as it can be.

The service had been excellent, unobtrusive but thorough and happy throughout. Perhaps because I still felt a little guilty about Masa and perhaps because the meal was so cheap, I left what in percentage terms was a decent tip. I still only spent £10 on what was a superb lunch. Obviously I had the advantage of being in the area, but I would say if you like authenticity and incredible value then it is worth the trip out.

As I walked back to the tube, I went into several wholesale/retail suppliers of rice and vegetables and can say this would be a great place to shop if you like cooking Indian food (though I couldn't partake, it wouldn't have looked great going back into work). I then went into some great cookware shops, which had everything from authentically rusty karahi dishes (they'll be fine after proving) to £400 robo-coupes, suggesting that at least some of the kitchens are equipping on a pretty high level.

I resisted the temptation to buy a 50” karahi and an outside gas burner to put it on, though given the authentic surroundings I was happy to note it had a CE safety approval label on. I also resisted the option to buy swastika bedecked incense burners, reasoning it might be misunderstood! I had seen these in India but was surprised to see them in London, but glad too, it felt thoroughly authentic and why shouldn't Hindus reclaim their symbol outside of the subcontinent. I am pretty sure I'll be going back to Wembley, even if work doesn't oblige.

Just a quick post, I thought I would try and make this more blog-like than wannabe restaurant reviewer!

For lunch when I was arriving back in Euston station at the rightish time, but too late to take advantage of all you can eat curry offers I had amazing pakora and samosas at Ambala Indian sweet shop on Drummond Street, by Euston. This has been touched on previously but is here in a little more detail-

I had hot samosas with a very crispy pastry, there was a delicious simple but spicy vegetarian filling, I'm afraid no more detail but they were definitely good. I had these with a mountain of pakora of a massive range of veg, amazingly these were not soggy despite being kept warm. A truly great and massive lunch for less than £2.

And of course I then had an obligatory piece of carrot halwa which I quite like, though here I found it a little greasy and then as a glutton for punishment, or just as a glutton I had A.N.Other Indian sweet which as usual I find too sweet or texturally too grainy. (Actually, it occurs to me that as i can never remember the name of the ones I don't like, I may just be having the same 2 unpleasant sweets over and over, a la Groundhog day. But somehow I doubt it). Still a great lunch bargain.

Buyoyed by this experience I deliberately set out to have similar Pret/Eat beating lunches and headed to chinatown (not on the same day, come on, I'm not that fat) to try some of the cake shop places I had noticed there.

Golden Gate on Macclesfield Street, just off Gerrard St. is my favourite in the area I think and I ended up going there several times. The pork pastries are delicious, juicy pork tasting as it ought, with a sweet and gooey barbecue sauce. Pastry is flaky and fine, the meat tastes as it ought. The only drawback is they are cold, there may be a microwave but I have not yet summoned the courage to ask the rather scary lady at the till. Still a bargain at 80p each.

They also have good custard pastries, I love the unctuousness of chinese custard, so mouth filling, its like uber-birds, which works for me. I'm not a fan of the red bean paste sweet pastries, but suspect I just don't like the texture rather than them being particularly bad here. A good cheap central lunch with plenty to interest.

Finally at the end of Gerrard Street is Kowloon, a buffet I have never tried but which doesn't tempt, but also with a cake shop. When I went here I had a warm pork puff and thought maybe they kept things warm as policy which would be great. Actually, though I had a cold curry beef puff so I must have just got lucky and had one out of the oven.

Unfortunately, the pork smelt really high or offally, ok in its place but not what I'd expected. There was also very little pork compared to the amount of pastry. The curry beef puff also had a lot more pastry than filling, and the curry was pretty bland. Not bad exactly, and if it was the only option it would make a change, but no point when there are better within 2 minutes walk.

Any other ideas for non-chain but snacky style lunches? More Indian, Chinese or any other ideas welcomed...

I recently had an excuse to drag a group of friends to a restaurant of my choice, and effectively had the option to either a) compel them to go somewhere more expensive than they would usually or b) force them to travel further than they would normally. Option b) commended itself at the end of January and so I mulled over where to go. I had read good things about Masa in Harrow from various sources and it had found its way into my to do list as somewhere to go should I ever get sent to Harrow for work. Having never been to Harrow for work in a year and a half, I decided to use this opportunity to make the trip out. (Of course, inevitably, I have since been sent to Harrow twice...)

Arriving in Harrow is pretty bleak, not helped at first by us taking the Harrow exit from the station. Tip- you need the Wealdstone exit! As eventually we got to the correct High Street, a group of young ladies threw a can at a group of young gentlemen. Unfortunately, their aim was somewhat off and it nearly hit us. As we walked down the High Street, we examined options for moving on later, and on balance decided against the self-proclaimed “cheapest pub in Harrow.” As a final obstacle in the increasingly heroic quest to get to this restaurant from SE London, there is a restaurant with a similar name on the same street. Here's another helpful tip- you want the one that doesn't look utterly shit.

The correct restaurant has somewhat bizarre décor, its been described as upmarket by several reviewers but I thought it was very odd. There is a huge chandelier, shiny faux marble surfaces that are very brightly lit and then, to top it off an enormous plasma screen, showing silent Indian movies.

A huge advantage of Masa is that its byo, and we had taken the opportunity to take some pretty decent wines with us, attempting to food match both a gruner veltliner and a good ribera del duero to the food, which we correctly understood to be a mix of Indian and Middle Eastern dishes. Thirsty after our epic journey, we asked for glasses immediately on arrival, but unfortunately it took forever to get them, rather setting the tone for the evening. I know it sounds a bit niggly to complain about a delay in getting glasses in a plcae that doesn't even charge corkage, but this was so long it was really unbelievable, with glasses going to several other tables in the interim.

As indicated above, the service remained poor all night, the waitress later told us it was her first week. I had sympathy for her, but it was a bit beyond, and really the restaurant should not have put her on a table for 7 on a Saturday night. In case you think I'm exaggerating the incompetence, some people had almost finished their entire meal before other people's starters had even been served. The waitress admitted that some orders had just not been sent to the kitchen and its difficult to excuse. Presumably she will have got better by now, but I do have more long-term concerns for a restaurant that's willing to use clearly inadequately prepared staff on a busy night. Also, I am aware that restaurants can have bad covers, but no effort was made to address the problem when we complained, the food is very reasonable and their margins must have been tight, but some token effort to acknowledge how poor service had been would have appreciated.

Moving on, the food, like the country, is between asia and the middle east. A non drinking friend ordered Doogh, clearly the Afghan version of a salt lassi, which had cucumber and cumin in. This made the drink very refreshing and the strong spicing was delicious but unfortunately it was a bit too salty, which would ave made drinking a whole one something of a task.

The menu, especially for the starters, was pretty big on aubergine. Fried Bourani, translated as fried aubergine, came covered in a tomato sauce with a really nutty savoury overtone. I wasn't quite sure what provided the nutty element but this was a very good dish. This was a good thing, as we seemed to have more than we ordered whilst other things may never have came (the haphazard sequence of arrivals made it a bit hard to tell what we had and hadn't had in the end, and in fairness, the incredibly cheap bill removed any need to work it out).

Bourani Afghani, as you will have no doubt worked out, contained more aubergine, this time in a yoghurt and quroot sauce. This was an interesting dish, I am still not sure what quroot is but the texture of the dish was quite mushy and the colour was pale. Much of the aubergine flavour was subsumed by yoghurt and this was overall worth trying but less good than the fried aubergine.

Moving on to the main courses, qabili rice turned out to be rice with a big lump of lamb shank, along with carrots and raisins. The lamb was impressively tender, but somewhat greasy and flavourless. Nonetheless, at the price this was a good dish, and the (to me) unusual combination of cold shredded carrot and raisins in the rice worked very well. The sweetness of both of them comparing well with the savoury rice and matching the sweetness of the lamb. This dish came with far too much rice but thats something of a non-complaint and overall it was very good.

Most of the other main courses were down the line middle eastern, Lamb kebab with challow rice came with lamb that was described on the menu as from baby lamb, certainly it was very sweet and tender and a massive improvement on the lamb with the qabili rice. In fact, its probably one of the best lamb kebabs I've had since I lived in Turkey. Challow rice is essentially a type of pilao, again it was good, very much like turkish rice finished with plenty of butter that really helps emphasise the savoury flavour.

There was one vegetarian in our group, who was very happy with the selection of starters, but a little less inspired by the choice of main courses. She opted for Sabzi Panerr, essentially the classic combination of paneer and spinach, the paneer was better than some but not great, being a little on the chewy side. The vegetarian who likes paneer rather more than I was quite happy with it however.

All dishes came with quite good warm nan bread, and we tried several other dishes, the details of which are somewhat lost but certainly all were above average.

We certainly didn't need more food but would have liked to try some of the interesting sounding desserts on the menu, especially as given the distance we are unlikely to go back. Amazingly though, they had run out of all of them. Bearing in mind we had not gone late, and whilst busy, the place was not packed out, this seems a bizarre lack of planning by the restaurant.

This restaurant was very good value, I should admit that I didn't pay but if the bill had been divided evenly between all of us it would have been about £15 each, even counting the cost of the trip out to Harrow this is insanely good value for London. If Harrow was not so remote from where I live I would definitely go back, and I would recommend this restaurant for the interesting food at great prices. But the terrible service really did take the shine off, and I do have concerns about the way the restaurant dealt with the problem.