London's best no-booking restaurants
Left it too late to book? Find great restaurants in London that don't take bookings
Struggling to book somewhere for dinner tonight? You might have to queue, but London's top first-come, first-served restaurants are all worth the wait. Enjoy great food in the capital without a reservation. Do you agree with the choices? Use the comments box below or tweet your suggestions.
10 Greek Street
- Rated as: 5/5
There’s no flashy name, no flashy decor. Yet this small Soho newcomer punches well above its weight, delivering exceptional cooking in relaxed, buzzy surroundings. At face value, the menu – Modern Brit via the Med – seems fairly straightforward, but the results are impressive.
- 10 Greek Street, W1D 4DH
40 Maltby Street
- Rated as: 4/5
- Price band: 2/4
There’s a real charm to sitting in a railway arch on a Southwark back street, trains trundling overhead, a skip of construction detritus your view through the window (this is an‘up-and-coming’ area), while enjoying great wine and food. 40 Maltby Street is not a West End dining experience – and is all the better for it.
- 40 Maltby St, SE1 3PA
Albion at The Boundary Project
- Rated as: 3/5
- Price band: 1/4
- Critics choice
It’s hard not to like somewhere that makes its own jammie dodgers and bourbon biscuits: a bit of oven art for under a pound. These are on sale in the shop portion of Terence Conran’s Shoreditch gastro-palace and hotel, through which you reach the Albion, identifying en route any of the picnic-style goods you’d liked to be served to your table (at a supplement), notably the fine range of own-made biscuits, and cakes.
- 2-4 Boundary Street, E2 7DD
Anchor & Hope
- Rated as: 5/5
- Price band: 2/4
The Anchor & Hope has dominated Waterloo’s gastronomic scene for over a decade, and is still among its highlights. The well-known ‘no reservations’ seating policy doesn’t seem to deter punters, meaning that diners wanting to sample the robust seasonal British cooking must often wait in the pub area (separated from the restaurant by a heavy drape) until a table becomes free.
- 36 The Cut, SE1 8LP
Barrafina
- Rated as: 5/5
- Price band: 2/4
- Critics choice
Any preconceptions about tapas bars being pleasant but unmemorable places with routine menus are dispelled by this slick offshoot of Fitzrovia’s Fino. Barrafina is very much a bar, the only seating being stools around an L-shaped bar in gleaming steel, behind which chefs display their skills in grilling seafood and assembling complex salads with stunning panache.
- 54 Frith Street, W1D 4SL
Begging Bowl
- Rated as: 4/5
- Price band: 2/4
Missing from the Begging Bowl’s colourful contemporary interior are the orchids and pictures of the Thai royal family typically on display in a neighbourhood Thai restaurant. This is less surprising once you know the owners are not Thai. Interestingly, two of Thailand’s most famous street food dishes – pad Thai and som tam (the spicy green papaya salad from the north-east) – are absent; instead there is a far more interesting selection of less usual stir-fries, salads, curries and grilled dishes.
- 168 Bellenden Rd, SE15 4BW
Bibendum Oyster Bar
- Rated as: 4/5
- Price band: 3/4
- Critics choice
There’s an irony in the corpulent form of Bibendum, the Michelin man, looking down upon the stick-thin ladies lunching at this relaxed seafood café in the tiled foyer of the Michelin building. Oysters are what to order, with four varieties offered, including a seasonal treat of six native Colchester No.2s for £19.75. Elaborate plateaux de fruits de mer are available, but we were delighted with a large crab (in the shell) with a mustard-rich mayonnaise.
- Michelin House, 81 Fulham Road, SW3 6RD
Busaba Eathai
- Rated as: 4/5
- Price band: 1/4
This is a perfect spot for munching before or after hooking up in the West End. The classic Busaba dishes are consistently interesting, and well executed at all branches: smoky duck breast with tart tamarind sauce; pandan chicken; sen chan pad thai (with crab meat); green curry fried rice with chargrilled chicken.
- 106-110 Wardour Street, W1F 0TR
Burger & Lobster
- Rated as: 4/5
- Price band: 3/4
It isn’t hard to decide what to eat at Burger & Lobster, as there are only three choices – burger, lobster or lobster roll. Which focuses your mind on the other variables, such as where abouts in the room you would like to perch. Propped up against the bar on high stools? Ensconced in one of the two tight-fit banquettes in the back, with their view of the kitchen pass?
- 29 Clarges Street, W1J 7EF
Capote y Toros
- Rated as: 3/5
- Price band: 2/4
Sit against the wall at Capote y Toros and you can view the bar, barrels, bottles and the Old Brompton Road; sit facing it and you see so many pictures of bulls, bullfighters and other loads of old bull, it’s all hard to take in – though the hanging ‘bulls’ heads’ are of basketwork rather than the real thing.
- 157 Old Brompton Road, SW5 0LJ
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