Tag: Eating

11 Places To Go For A Not Too Spendy Midweek Dinner with Your Mate

Arranging catch ups with your mates can feel like a bit of a task. Finding a date you can both do, identifying the WFH situ, and a part of town, and finally a place where you both want to actually eat.

But it is a good way to occupy your evening, especially because someone recently observed that once you reach your 30s, all social events are actually birthday drinks, to which I offer the counter argument that ‘no! social events are also housewarmings, baby showers, engagement parties and Christmas!’, which isn’t depressing at all.

It’s not that the concept of the mid-week accidental boozy dinner totally goes away when you get past your 20s. But there does come a point in adult life when midweek evenings become watching Netflix, weekends are the domain of Family Events, and catching up with mates is relegated to 10 minutes of rushed speed-dating style Q&As conducted while following the host into kitchens, gardens, toilets, or towards front doors; batting away other guests trying to say goodbye, and trying to find out what they’ve been up to in the two months since you saw them last.

So midweek dinners, then: dinners are the one. A few hours on a Wednesday night to sit down with one or two mates and have conversations that don’t begin with ‘so, what are you doing with yourself these days then?’ or ‘what is it you do again?’. Somewhere nice, but not too spendy. Nothing you’ve got to queue or book ten years ahead for. Just somewhere you can rock up after work, where the food’s decent, a bottle of wine doesn’t cost £30, and the service is included but you don’t really mind because you’re pretty sure the waiter just gave you a cheeky smile. Bobs your uncle, Fanny’s your aunt, everyone’s in bed by 11:30pm.

But the eternal question: where?

1. Caravan, Exmouth Market

You’re pretty much good to eat anywhere on Exmouth Market – but shout out to Caravan in particular because the burrata is delicious, and they’ll almost always find you a seat if there’s just a couple of you if you just walk in on the night. It’s also a bit less shouty than the Kings Cross branch.

caravanrestaurants.co.uk

2. The Port House, Strand

I once took not one, but two vegans here for dinner on a Thursday night after an extended happy hour, after which neither were either sober nor, indeed, strictly vegan. One of them did, however, declare this place the best fucking tapas I’ve ever had – and the other one has been here so many times on various dates before that she doesn’t even need to look at the menu any more. It’s great. Low lit little booths, sharing plates, and G&Ts as big as your head. On. The. Strand.

porthouse.ie

3. Dim Sum Library

Absolutely feels like you’re walking into a hotel restaurant, but is ten times better than that because the menu is almost entirely dim sum and you can order as little or as much as you want. Me and a mate went here recently after work and it was easy to get a booking, and everything we ate was delicious.

Dim Sum Library

4. The Eagle, Farringdon

Oh good god, the food in this place. You might have to angle around a bit for a table if there’s more than 3 of you, but it’s a pub, so you can always kill time outside or at the bar. This is a good place if you don’t want interruptions – order at the bar from whatever’s on the blackboard (it’s above the chefs) that day. The pasta is banging, but lots of people also rate the fish and massive steak sandwich. It’s good value, delicious, and because it’s a pub, you can hang around for as long as you like after you’ve eaten.

theeaglefarringdon.co.uk

5. Brutto, Farringdon

Negronis for a fiver. Excellent pasta. Seats at the bar. Music. Red and white table clothes. Did I mention negronis for a fiver? I had eight. Love it.

https://msha.ke/brutto/

6. Kin, Leather Lane

After Leather Lane’s food market shuts down for the day, Kin’s just there with its Asian Street Food, chilling, waiting. It’s pretty small in there, but the pad thai is excellent and the service is quick. It can get busy, so book in advance.

kinstreetfood.com

7. Gallipoli, Upper Street

The best thing about Gallipoli is 1) the mezze and 2) that there’s about 80 (alright, three) branches along Upper Street, so if one’s busy, you can just keep trotting up the road until you find a branch with some spare tables. Stuff your face with hummus and stay there as long as you want.

gallipolicafe.co.uk

8. Viva, Kingsland High Street

Mexican tapas is a bit of a minefield in London – and I’m not saying you’d make a proper beeline for this place from south London, but if you find yourself in Dalston in need of good cocktails, very good picky-bits, and chorizo in red wine that genuinely melts when you eat it, this is the place.

vivadalston.co.uk

9. Josette, Clerkenwell

Sometimes you just need to gaze into the eyes of your mate over some good, solid, French food and say those immortal words: you gonna drink that moules marinere sauce or can I have a bit? This place also does, joy of joys, RACLETTE. Order a day ahead.

mamiegood.com/josette-clerkenwell

10. Okan, Southbank

In 2016 I went to Japan for the first time, and this place was the closest I’ve come to finding somewhere even close to the low-key but delicious comfort food that is Okonomiyaki. One of my favourite places to meet a friend for dinner, but isn’t the one for big groups. The truly amazing thing is the location: tucked away behind the London Eye.

https://www.okanlondon.com/okan/south-bank/

11. Flour and Grape, Bermondsey Street

Pasta. Fresh pasta. Delicious little plates of pasta. Get a few and share them. You can book, but you also may need to queue.

https://www.flourandgrape.com

Is there anywhere you absolutely love for a lil midweek dinner? Where’s your go-to? Lemme know.

Updated Feb 2026

11th February 2026
SheLovesLondon.com Round Up of the Year (i.e. Buses, Meat, Canals, Daleks etc. The usual)

We’ve had bank holidays a plenty, Royal shindigs, Olympic funtimes and the rise of no bookings policies in restaurants. Also, 2012 was the year I moved to Dalston and started a blog about London.

This blog was never going to be about covering the openings and events and fancy cultural goings on, and more about the stuff you notice every day. I hope I’ve stuck to that, and that you’ve enjoyed reading it so far.

If you haven’t, I can’t promise that 2013’s offering will contain any less references to vomit on buses and chucking ping pong balls at peoples’ heads – so you should probably try the Londonist instead. It’s much more informative.

Anyway, true to form, these are the highs and lows of 2012…the SheLovesLondon way.

Going up…

After years of wondering exactly how you’re meant to get from Dalston Junction to Peckham Rye without ageing 30 years, the answer came in the shape of London’s latest transport upgrade which completed its full circle in December this year. Now that’s progress (as long as you don’t fall asleep).

If you do one thing in 2013, make sure it’s rocking up to your favourite independent cinema in your pyjamas and staying there until 7am the next morning. You should probably check they’re staying open first, though.

Ah, and so cometh the year when we all stopped booking, started queuing, turned our attention to burgers, hotdogs and lobsters, began calling macaroni cheese “Mac and Cheese” and greasy junk food “sliders”. Then along came MEATLiquor, which is always such a good idea until you’ve consumed your weight in beef patties with onion rings, and rendered yourself incapable of speech.

As it turns out, having a couple of million extra people in our city means everything gets quieter and London gets to work on time. Transport for London’s summer of chaos was the best yet. Can we do it all again next year, please?

Gone are the days of tables for two in dimly lit restaurants. Now we stand around communal piles of giant prawns, dine on eight courses of Vietnamese in stranger’s living rooms and watch drag queens reenact the birth of baby Jesus between courses. The times, they are indeed a changin’.

Going down…

I don’t care how hot it is, I don’t care how inviting the water looks, I don’t care how many drugs you’ve taken, or how many cans of Red Stripe you’ve consumed. It will never be ok to swim in the Regent’s Canal (a.k.a The One With All The Severed Heads), and especially not at the Camden end.

That’s “Jo” with one “o” and no “e” – short for Joanna. Not Joanne. Not “Jhoo”. Or, as my housemate called me eight months into our flat share, Josephine. Come on, EAT and co. You can do better than this.

Ok, Londoners. Group effort: let’s quell that urge you have to photograph your food before you eat it. If I have to sit in one more restaurant among the strobe effect of flashes going off around me, I’m going to start throwing things – starting with your iPhone. The only place you need to upload your meal to is your mouth. Got it?

If there was a gold medal for the ugliest, most uninspiring, un-sport related mascot for a sporting even, it would probably be a one eyed alien called Mandeville. You couldn’t even climb on them. Feel-good fail.

You can’t discover the joys of London buses without also experiencing “this bus is on diversion”, or yesterday’s blinder, “sorry, you all have to get off because someone’s been sick on the lower deck.”. That’s Christmas, folks!

And finally, going up…

There’s a time and a place for Dr. Who inspired graffiti, and the London Underground’s posters are just that.

Well done, London. You done good this year.

Happy Christmas and I’ll see you on the other side.

21st December 2012
Social Arithmatic: Wok + Wine = Meet Nice People in London

In London, a city with infinite possibilities and over 8,174,100 people, it’s strange how easily most of us content ourselves with waking up at the same time each morning, brushing against the same people on the bus or tube to work, and following the same routine until the weekend, when – if we’re lucky – we’ve got two days* to mix it up a bit.

(*less than that if, like me, you tend to spend your weekends in bed, watching Mad Men and writing to-do lists full of things you’ve already done so you can cross them off and feel productive. It’s just easier that way)

But by my estimation, there’s probably a 4-5 hour window after work that most of us aren’t making the most of.

What if – instead of going to the pub, or straight home to watch ~~Eastenders~~ University Challenge – you went somewhere new for a change? Somewhere you could go alone or with mates, stuff your face, have some good wine, get to know a load of new people outside your social circle, and still be in bed asleep before 11pm?

And where does such a place exist?

I’m guessing that’s probably what Peter Mandeno thought when he came up with Wok+Wine, an event I found myself at a couple of weeks ago after getting a heads up from a friend that began…

ladies, I can’t go to this but I have heard GREAT things about it

The concept of Wok+Wine is simple: get 40 people in an unusual space, serve up 40 bottles of wine, put 40 pounds of shrimp on a table throughout the course of an evening, and see what happens.

Lay your prawns on the table

There are no chairs, no formalities; no plates, knives or forks. There are also, I expect, no OCD sufferers or people allergic to prawns – it’s probably safer that way.

And despite the name, the point of the night isn’t actually the Wok or the Wine – but the people you meet when you’re consuming them.

Peter’s friend-making concept has travelled all around the world from New York to New Zealand helping locals in different cities get to know other like-minded folk, who then tell their friends and spread the word; an approach which means you’re a lot more likely to find common ground with the people you’re talking to.

I didn’t know quite what to expect before rocking up at Club.Workspace Kennington with a colleague and an old friend from uni. But after a warm welcome and a glass of wine (the first of many), the three of us soon split off into different conversations, before delving into a communal pile of expertly flavoured giant shrimp that was poured along the length of a table.

Which leads me to the next point about Wok+Wine: it’s about getting a bit messy. Literally. This is communal eating for people who don’t mind getting their hands dirty – although granted, the introductory handshakes reduced significantly after the food came out.

In fact, it’s the perfect choice of food and drink: picky prawns with their heads on, the removal of which requires a bit of a tutorial from Peter beforehand. The food’s a talking point without stealing the limelight; it provides all the “how do you eat yours” and “Ooh, want a top up?” you need to start off a conversation.

As a result, you find yourself chatting away to the sort of people who aren’t at all phased when the stranger they just started talking to accidentally flings a rogue prawn in their direction.

In short, that’s me, and that’s my sort of person, so I loved it.

As someone who finds herself shrinking into Awkward Bored Chat Mode at work networking events, and avoiding the obligatory small talk that ensues when drunk randoms make their advances in pubs, it was refreshing to find myself in a situation where wandering up to people and starting a conversation didn’t feel contrived or geared towards getting something out of it, or worse – work.

Anyway, in case you hadn’t guessed, I highly recommend it if you’ve got a spare evening and £35 to spend. The next one is on Friday 19th October, and it’s their 100th event – you can reserve your spot here, or register to find out about future events here: http://woknwine.com/join.

And if you go and end up with a new work contact, someone to go boozing with, Googling the pub someone suggested you look up the next day or even just a belly full of giant prawns – then mission accomplished: the routine of the same-old-same has been shaken.

If you’ve been, are going, or know a good way to meet interesting Londoners, holllllaaaaaa below.

11th October 2012