Le Bar - Cocktails, Wine & Bistro — Restaurant in London

In summary, if you're going to go for lunch, have the set menu. If you don't fancy the set menu, go somewhere else. My colleague had the set two course lunch for £10 with a 'glass' of wine for an extra £3. I didn't fancy the set menu so chose to order from the menu. The waitress recommend I order 3 dishes (it's tapas style).

The duck doughnuts were a bit of a non event, with the accompanying "spicy sauce" lacking in both quantity and spice- it was basically some sort of hoi sin reduction, but there was barely enough to be able to tell what the flavour was. The French cheesy mash and ham dish (the real name escapes me) was pleasant and the black pudding and ham burger was miniscule for £8 and lacked any depth of flavour past the black pudding. I ordered a glass of house red, which was the same wine as my colleague's, the same size (125ml) but more than double the price. It did not taste good in either of our opinions.

Ultimately my colleague paid £13 for an inoffensive lunch that filled a hole, but I paid £27 to be quite disappointed with the impact of the food for an establishment which is attached to a Michelin starred restaurant. I'm unlikely to return unless I like the look of the set...

We have a lot of fond memories of this place. It was always super-French and interesting, food-wise. And it was this time too. The bar is next door to its Michelin starred sister, Cellar Gascon in London’s Smithfields district. The unique dish we came for was Marmite Royale - a blend of foie gras and marmite served warm in a Marmite jar. Delicious. We ate charcuterie and duck donuts. We topped up with a cauliflower voluté and fish fritters. Now the issue was a lot of the dishes were over salted - although we ate everything. Btw I err on the side of salting my food so, I know when I taste too much salt. We quietly mentioned this to our server and we felt the mood changed. Didn’t want a discount etc. just wanted to pass on some constructive feedback. Paid and left instead of staying for a dessert or coffee...

Leaving three stars was a difficult decision. We had a really lovely meal here. Great food, amazing atmosphere, fairly decent service (though the waitress seemed a bit overwhelmed being the only server) - but as we left, my husband leaned in to thank the host, at which point he stopped us and said “I don’t believe you’ve paid.” (This being after they said they were having issues with Amex payments, but that is an aside.

Leaving a place after a fairly pricey meal to be stopped at the door and accused of dining and dashing leaves a bitter taste in one’s mouth. No pun intended.

Pity, as the rest was great and we would...