Cocoro — Restaurant in London

A nice little restaurant just off of Oxford street on a relatively quiet street. It is cosy with good music and lots of seating which is quite conducive to dates and small group catch-ups with friends. Very typical of a Japanese style.

The pricing is spot-on for the location and the quality of food. I must clarify, based on previous reviews, you are NOT charged for wasabi with your sushi etc, you are charged for EXTRA wasabi beyond the generous amount of wasabi you are given. I believe this reflects the quality of the wasabi which is much lighter and fluffier than the typical thick, dark green wasabi that you have at Japanese restaurants.

The food is fantastic. I was able to try a wide range of dishes and will definitely return to try the ramen.

I cannot recommend enough the Beef Tataki and the Volcano rolls. Complex flavours and unexpected combinations which invite you to take your time enjoying the food, flavours and textures. The 5-grain rice was excellent and the sushi rolls were tasty though good quality sushi is not the rarest thing in London. The tonkatsu cutlet was lovely, don't miss out on the mustard they put on the side.

Great deserts with a wonderfully light mille feuille which is difficult to describe. It was light, flavoursome and masterfully made. You could pass your spoon through it, breaking off a clean spoonful without the cake squashing at all.

Everything was masterfully produced and they selection of drinks, both alcoholic and non-alcoholic was fantastic.

Service was fast and pleasant with event he chef giving her...

I want to say this place was 5. The food is utterly delicious. Like 6 if they had it - the scallop sashimi in particular was totally magic.

If you go - I’d really recommend asking for a table downstairs. Upstairs felt so bright and impersonal, downstairs is sat on cushions rather than chairs, while drapes from the ceiling provide privacy between tables.

Unfortunately, having got the hard stuff right, the experience was shattered by the noise. Sat next to a screaming baby that the parents and everyone else ignored (appreciate this isn’t the restaurant’s fault, but who brings a crying baby to a small room and then just lets it scream???), someone started hoovering the stairs 3 ft away during the meal and a machine in the back made a high pitch whine that they couldn’t or wouldn’t turn off…. I genuinely left with my ears ringing.

All made worse by the slow service. We had 4 plates at our table, 2 of which were sashimi yet were there nearly 2 hours. However delicious, it can’t take that long to slice a dead fish…. meanwhile it took 20mins to come back with the news that the Asahi beer tap was broken followed by another 10mins to determine the Kirin tap was off too… better have a bottle then!

All in all, despite the delicious food, we got the bill before our last dish arrived.

Whilst the food merited the £75 a head price tag, the service and experience was more like £7.50.

Fortunately they...

I recently dined at Cocoro in London, and it was an extremely disappointing experience. Almost every dish was overly salty, starting with the miso soup, which was surprisingly difficult to finish due to its saltiness. The takoyaki was similarly over-seasoned, making it almost inedible, and even the chawanmushi was far too salty.

The yakitori was another letdown, as it was clearly not freshly grilled and tasted stale. The only dish that was somewhat decent was the oyakodon, but that was far from enough to save the meal.

The most FRUSTRATING part of the experience was the issue with our tempura order. We specifically ordered prawn tempura, but were served a mixed tempura instead. After informing the waiter about the mistake, we never received the correct dish, and to make matters worse, they still charged us for the prawn tempura that we never got to eat. There was no attempt to correct the error when we paid the bill.

Overall, this was one of the worst Japanese dining experiences I’ve had in London. I cannot recommend this place to...