London restaurants: food or service?

Added: 12/18/2005

Sky high views, intimate dining rooms, original Picassos on the walls, Madonna at the next table or a traditional Caribbean snack when you're on the go -- whatever your palate, you'll be catered for in London. As London is one of the most culturally diverse cities in the world, no matter what type of cuisine you wish to try out, you can find it here, for every taste, desire and pocket. But what do we usually pay for? Is that a good food, or rather interior and service?

London! A mixture of languages, nations, faces. And as a mixture of nations means that of cultures, the capital of Great Britain swarms with various culinary fads to satisfy the fussiest connoisseurs. London visitors have a great choice. There is a plenty of restaurants offering cuisines of all continents. You will find a traditional Italian cuisine, exquisite French dishes, oriental delicacies, exotic Asian and African dishes. Vegetarians can also eat well at many London restaurants, but there are still relatively few places that offer a completely vegetarian menu.

Prices are also in a great variety. In London you can find luxurious restaurants with porters and trained servants where you are not allowed to enter without a tie. But there are a lot of places where you can just have a snack. Unfortunately, the sum of money you are going to spend in London restaurants doesn't always guarantee you a fine food and a high-quality service. Good restaurants are traditionally expensive, but you cannot be sure about the food to be served. Fish and chips, a customary London food, can be found everywhere and at a reasonable price; yet, its quality is also often doubtful. In this case, Indian and Chinese restaurants usually serving good meals at lower prices and available in abundance all over the capital of Great Britain will come forward to help.

London could be a world gourmet capital, but for the service level. In fact, the latter is supposed to be better. Some of the capital's most famous restaurants were drubbed by their customers. They complained that the service is slow and, what is more, the servants behave arrogantly and surly. Some London restaurants were lambasted as snobby and unfriendly. But the managers of those London restaurants contend that their stuff is an extremely professional team providing a fast, efficient service. Still, as the saying goes, 'make no fire, raise no smoke'.

Londoners consider their restaurants absolutely fabulous, expect the only aspect: they are accustomed to be happy with inefficient staff as long as they are charming, and charmless staff as long as they are efficient. If you go to Paris, it is a very rare day that you don't get very good service in an A-class restaurant. So, when in London, you will make sure that French restaurants don't lose their outstanding service even in the UK. Thus, many tourists who have already learned the value of London restaurants tend to eat at an oriental or French ones, little cafes or pubs. It depends on the capacity of the pocket. And it's not rare when we are ready to pay just for pleasant treatment instead of luxurious dishes.

None the less, there are many places in London where you can get efficient service and be sure that you will have no problems with your stomach. And you may be lucky to find them. Traditionally, London wasn't considered famous for its food. But in the past decade this has really turned around, and London can now rightly consider itself one of the culinary capitals of the world, with a huge range of very good restaurants catering for every appetite and budget.

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