Rate my Bistro

You can’t miss Rendezvous in Leicester Square with its green neon sign and the big ice cream cone at the front of the entrance! Although Rendezvous is in the heart of the West End and in one of the tourist spots of London, it wasn’t that busy when we went there. They have a huge range of ice-creams and frozen yoghurts, all displayed in the front counter fridge.

We had the waffle with kiwi frozen yoghurt and banoffee ice cream. The waffle was quite disappointing as it was just microwaved. I’m not sure if it was because the waffle was stale or if it was because it had been over microwaved, but it resulted in it being very chewy. After a little while, it was way too hard to even cut.

The ice cream and frozen yoghurt were both good! The banoffee ice cream definitely tasted of banana and it had swirls of toffee through it. The green kiwi frozen yoghurt was fairly refreshing but not too sharp!

Rendezvous do coffees, teas and hot chocolates. The latte was creamy and tasted good. The hot chocolate is quite rich. It’s nice that it is made from the liquid chocolate and not drinking chocolate powder like some places.

The staff and the service were nice and friendly. They let us take our time when we couldn’t decide on the flavours of ice cream to choose! The only thing that we were concerned about was the hygiene levels. One of the staff coughed and didn’t wash his hands before serving the food and drinks.

Rendezvous has quite a big outdoor seating area in Leicester Square. It also has the outdoor heaters to keep you warm on the cold days!

Rendezvous, 48 Leicester Square, London, WC2H 2LT

Our Rating:

Rocca di Papa had such a warm and welcoming feel. It made a refreshing change to other restaurants. What was striking was the original brickwork walls, big canvas pictures and high ceilings. This building used to be part of Christie’s auction house.

The waitress was really friendly and didn’t mind me waiting for a while at the table for my friends to arrive. It made a nice relaxing start to the evening. I did notice that there were a lot of tables reserved but we were lucky to get a table without making a reservation. The service was quick, efficient and the waitress made the effort to recommend items on the menu and to make conversation with me.

I wanted to try a couple of things from the menu as quite a few of the dishes sounded really nice. So, I went for some starter dishes instead of one main meal. The homemade minestrone soup was great. It had plenty of chunks of potato, carrots and celery and other vegetables. It was more of a broth based soup rather than tomato and it also did not have any pasta pieces.

To accompany the soup, I really enjoyed the Perdi Tempo pizza bread. It was not a huge portion but a good size to go with the soup. The pizza bread was topped with tomato, rosemary and rock salt and the quality was definitely there.

I would highly recommend Rocca di Papa if you are in the South Kensington area. Great Italian food and they have a menu that they change with seasonal dishes. If you have space for dessert, then you have to try the amazing Oddonos ice cream! Rocca also have a heated outdoor seating area!

Rocca di Papa, 73 Old Brompton Road, South Kensington, London, SW7 3JS

Our Rating:

Leon is quite a small casual restaurant! I liked it and think it would be good at any time of the day! On this particular occasion, I was there in the evening. It had quite a quirky feel to it. When I first entered, I wasn’t really sure what to expect and didn’t know if they would have much seating.

The waitress was really friendly and recommended lots of things on the menu including the Moroccan meatballs, sweet potato falafel and the original superfood salad! Although it was a busy time in the evening, there were a couple of tables free. I chose to sit in the middle part where they have the high chairs and this particular area separated the two halves of the seating area.

It was very dimly lit with some tealight candles! There were random books on the shelves, which I’m not sure if they were there just for decoration. It felt quite cosy and was the perfect place to warm up on a cold rainy day together with some hearty food! The atmosphere was very relaxed and there was some good jazz like music playing in the background.

I was more peckish than wanting a full blown meal so I was happy to see that Leon had a Kids menu! Some restaurants have age restrictions on their Kids menu but this was not the case with Leon.

The Leon Gobi was really good and as it was from the Kids menu, it was served with rice and peas instead of with fresh slaw. The Gobi was like a curry and consisted of chunks of cauliflower and sweet potato. The taste of the coconut milk definitely came through in this dish with the flavours of the spices being milder. The nutty taste of the brown rice was great and it went well with the peas, edamame and green beans! Even though it was a smaller portion than a main meal, I found that it was quite filling.

Leon is good if you have dietary restrictions. They specify on the menu which items are gluten free, wheat free, dairy free, low GI, vegetarian and low animal fat.

The way that it works in Leon is partly self service. Quite a few eateries seem to adopt this idea. The waitress gave me the menu and she also gave me a small paper with the menu on it. She told me that I just filled out my table number and specified which items I wanted. I should then take this to the counter and hand it there. I sometimes prefer this method as then you are not waiting around for the attention of staff and usually it is a quicker way to get your food! This was the case with Leon as in the food was served pretty fast!

Leon has a great range of salads, main dishes, wraps, snacks and desserts. They also do smoothies, juices, coffee and tea. The soups change daily and they also have a daily main special. In the time that I was there, the type of soup that they were serving, changed a couple of times! It’s nice that they have such a variety. All the food seemed really fresh and healthy and you can tell that Leon takes pride in its meals.

Leon, 73-76 Strand, London, WC2R 0DE

Our Rating:

Wahaca calls itself Mexican market eating! This restaurant is located below street level. It all looks bright with a turquoise colour theme, wood panelling and bare concrete walls.

First impressions definitely count for something on most occasions and for Wahaca, this did not work in its favour. When we arrived, the restaurant was fairly empty. We asked for a table for three people and the waiter showed us to a table that was clearly just for two people. So we asked if we could change to a slighter bigger table and he let us but wasn’t too happy with us doing so.

I’ll talk about the food and drinks first and then go onto the service. Two very different experiences! I decided on sampling the street food, so had the seasonal vegetables tacos. These were three palm sized soft corn tortillas topped with vegetables. The seasonal vegetables were the autumn ones which included winter greens, butternut squash, red onions, garlic, mushrooms and ancho chilli. The vegetables were chopped up into bite size pieces and were tasty. The kick of the chilli came through even though it was not supposed to be a spicy dish!

To accompany the tacos, the green rice was a good choice. This was rice with onion, coriander and garlic. The rice was not served that hot, it was more like lukewarm.

To have something different to drink, the Horchata almond and rice milk took my fancy. This dairy free milk was served cold with cinnamon. It was too sweet for my liking. I’m not sure if sugar was added to it. If it was, then it would have tasted a lot better without it.

Now onto the staff and the service. The food was served fairly quickly and we were told that the dishes were likely to be served at different times, depending on when the kitchen made each one. We were fine with that aspect of it.

What really got to us was that the waitress was really annoying and very abrupt. She kept coming over constantly and asking if we needed anything or wanted to order additional items. This is acceptable the once or the twice, but we found it very rude of her to keep doing it. It meant that we could not have a conversation among ourselves without being interrupted.

Also, we felt that we were not allowed to take our time to enjoy the food and drink. We were given the impression that the staff wanted us to order, eat up our food and leave. Wahaca did get really busy while we were there and there were so many people all gathered and queuing around the seating area. It all did not make for a good dining experience.

At the end, the waitress just cleared up our table and told us that she was bringing us the bill. Even if there was a queue of people waiting for tables, we should have been allowed to take our time to enjoy the food and the company of friends. We were paying customers who had come out for a dinner get together. It is a shame that we had such a bad experience with the staff. They need to learn some basic manners and about good customer service.

Wahaca, 66 Chandos Place, Covent Garden, London, WC2N 4HG

Our Rating:

Richoux had a French feel to it with it dark wood decor, deep reds and green seating. This is slightly strange as it describes itself as “the home of traditional English food”. It reminded me a little of Cafe Rouge.

The tea and coffee were both served by the pot. The tea was served in a ceramic pot and the coffee in a metal one.

Richoux has its own blend of tea. This was an average tea and I don’t think that it tasted very different to other black teas. It was nice to get quite a few cups of tea from a single pot!

You can go here for breakfast, lunch or dinner as the menu includes soups, salads, sandwiches, meats, fish, pasta and risotto. They also do afternoon tea and have quite a few pastries, cakes and ice cream sundaes for people who have a sweet tooth!

The service was a little slow and we were there for quite a while before any of the staff came to take our order. On the other hand, it was nice that we did not feel rushed while we were having our drinks, even though the cafe got quite busy at some points!

The staff were pleasant enough but they just seemed that they were there to do their job. The service did not feel very personal.

We were seated at the front of the cafe which meant that there was the constant opening and closing of the door. Also, there were always people walking past and queues of people waiting to be seated. I think that the busyness of Richoux had a lot to do with its central London location.

Richoux, 172 Piccadilly, London, W1J 9EJ

Our Rating: