food – Family Traveller

Where and What to Eat in London

London caters well for fussy and adventurous eaters, with reliable chain restaurants and ethnically diverse street food.

THE WEST END

In the West End, themed restaurants are thick on the ground. You can’t go far wrong with the US flavours and rock memorabilia at the original Hard Rock Cafe, where Eric Clapton’s and Pete Townshend’s guitars are part of the decor.

For a more exotic atmosphere, head into the jungle, complete with waterfalls, animatronics and sudden storms, at the Rainforest Cafe.

Zédel is an enormous, buzzy, could-be-Paris brasserie with a big enough menu to satisfy most tastes (including the excellent French fries). Sunday lunch is popular with families, especially since roast chicken is the plat du jour, and it’s yards away from Piccadilly Circus.

SOHO

Soho is the best neighbourhood forsheer diversity, with lots of Italian bistros plus scores of Chinese eateries on Gerrard Street, the heart of London’s Chinatown. Family Traveller’s recommendation is the friendly Cafe TPT, located on the Piccadilly Circus end of Wardour Street, opposite the W Hotel.

For more cutting-edge Asian style, where you order everything by the touch of a button, try Inamo.

WEST LONDON

In West London, there’s Rolling Stones heritage on the menu at Bill Wyman’s Sticky Fingers, which serves ribs, burgers, chicken drumsticks and shakes, plus cocktails for the grown-ups.

Julie’s Restaurant & Champagne Bar in Holland Park operates a crèche every Sunday (except in August) for two- to 12-year-olds, as well as a children’s ‘FUN’CH menu.

LONDON BRIDGE

London Bridge is at its most animated on a Saturday. At Borough Market, you can sample the best of the produce by strolling from one outlet to the next – a great place to stock up for a picnic.

EAST LONDON

East London’s Brick Lane is the epicentre of London’s curry houses, the street lined with mostly Bangladeshi restaurants. Bengal Village is one of the most popular.

CAMDEN TOWN

If you are planning a trip to Camden Town market and can resist the food stalls, continue north for 400 yards towards Chalk Farm to Marine Ices. As well as serving some of the best ice cream in London, there’s an Italian restaurant, too.

TOP CHAINS

Combine bowling with classic US fare, including southern fried chicken, burgers, steaks and ribs, at All Star Lanes; it has branches on Brick Lane, Bayswater and Holborn, and is close to the British Museum.

The Breakfast Club: Superb breakfasts served until late plus a range of other dishes.

Wagamama: Communal tables, a huge range of Pan-Asian dishes, great juices and kid’s menu.

Yo Sushi: For the fun of picking Japanese dishes off the conveyor belt.

My Old Dutch: Both sweet and savoury pancakes and waffles.

Giraffe: Very family-friendly with a broad range of dishes.

Pizza Express: The pizza and pasta chain found all over town, and mostly in interesting buildings.

Gourmet Burger Kitchen: Quality burgers, with mini versions for children.ns for children.

DID YOU KNOW?

Wormwood Scrubs, a name synonymous with a men’s prison (one that famously hosted Pete Doherty), is one of the best places for picking blackberries. On the surrounding common, of course, not the exercise yard.

When feeding children with particular palates, sometimes the simplest option is the best. My sugo di pomodoro sauce hasn’t failed me yet.

INGREDIENTS

2 tablespoons olive oil

2 cloves garlic, finely chopped

1 large onion, finely chopped

2 teaspoons tomato purée

8 large ripe tomatoes, peeled, deseeded and chopped

or 2 x 400g tins of good tomatoes

Pinch caster sugar

Freshly ground black pepper

Handful basil, roughly chopped

Handful grated parmesan

In the summer, fresh tomatoes can be substituted for tinned, which make the sauce tiptoe, rather than stride across the palate. Just make sure they’re ripe, and have a decent whack of taste, rather than those sorry, billiard ball-hard specimens that lurk in the supermarket refrigerator.

If using tinned tomatoes, do buy the very best quality. Those budget versions might seem like a steal, but they lack heft and the resulting sauce becomes insipid.

I cook my onions until they are soft, but not caramelised, and throw in the basil right at the end just after turning off the heat. Then I add a handful of fresh Parmesan at the same time. This not only creates savoury magic, but salts the dish, too. As to the pasta; well, purists would argue the fresh version demands a delicate partner, spaghettini for example, while the sauce made with tinned tomatoes cries out for chunky, ridged shapes, something like penne. But as long as the children are happy, then so am I.

METHOD

Heat the oil and soften the garlic and onions for 10 minutes, then add the tomato purée. Cook for a minute, then add the tomatoes and sugar, and stir. Grind in the pepper. Simmer for 40 minutes. Take off the heat, mix in the basil, then stir in a handful of grated Parmesan.

Serve with baby pasta. Makes 16 portions.

Buy: From Let’s Eat by Tom Parker Bowles, Pavilion Books. Buy at Amazon

WHY IT’S GREAT

Its ingredients are the quintessence of simplicity, just a few tins of tomatoes, a brace of chopped onions and a clove or two of garlic. A splodge of tomato purée adds depth, a handful of torn basil brings a verdant whiff of sun-drenched shores. But proper tomato sauce – sugo di pomodoro to use its correct Italian title – is a concoction far greater than a mere sum of its parts. It thrills and delights in equal measure, a rare dish you can feed to any child without fear of sullen faces and grating whines.

Apart from the fact it’s packed full of goodness, tomato sauce’s other great quality is that it can be made anywhere in the world. I’ve cooked it in 17th-century Sicilian kitchens; outside over a smouldering fire; even on a boat in a cramped galley. It’s the culinary equivalent of Savlon, a reliable cure-all for starving kids. Sometimes, if I’m feeling particularly pious, I might hide a few diced carrots within, though my children are usually quick to spot my subterfuge, painstakingly picking out every single piece.