Riverside Kawa Pan Asian Restaurant — Restaurant in London

We decided to go to the restaurant based on the good reviews from the past. Unfortunately, we overlooked the most recent ones that mentioned the decline of this place in the last months.

During our whole stay at the restaurant, we were the only people there. The waitress was very nice and friendly but we noticed that she wasn't trained well for the job due to some mistakes and a general unsureness.

Even tho we were the only people there, we had to wait quite some time for our food. The prices were much higher than stated in earlier reviews and we took the kids menu.

After we got our food, which was okay-ish but not nearly as good as the price would indicate, we tried to enjoy the atmosphere and the nice view of the Themse. Sadly, this was not possible because the music was far too loud and the cook watched the Olympics on his phone which was on speaker and incredibly loud and annoying. He was at the far other end of the restaurant and we could hear the commentators. Also, it would have been nice to get some soja sauce for the sushi without asking and we also had to request salt cause there was none on the (cold) edamame.

It also didn't help the ambiente that the counter was full of utensils, plates and bowles. This seemed very unprofessionell and uninviting.

Lastly, when we requested the bill, I noticed the price was even higher than assumed because the receipt priced our food higher than the menu. When we pointed this out, the waitress was confused but after phoning the manager she told us that they had apparently raised the prices (again?). We stated that we would only pay the price that was shown on the menu and after asking the manager again, that was approved.

We also had to tip 12% for the service! This was included in the receipt and there wasn't an option to refuse tipping. While I do like to tip someone for good service that wasn't the case here and not reasonable.

All in all, we paid a lot for nothing. Sadly, I cannot recommend this place at all and I simply have to leave this review as a warning to others, to not let yourself be blinded by the good older reviews.

I'm sorry to leave such a negative review but we have to be honest. This place could be great but not the way it is run...

Based on their reviews and the pictures I’ve seen, I feel like perhaps we’ve caught them on “one of those days” or perhaps a bad time.

I have worked in hospitality before and I can understand, but perhaps getting a heads up to make more of an informed decision would have been nice.

They let us put our bikes inside (at the time we were alone in there), which was convenient. Service was friendly, but some interactions felt a bit confusing.

The whole meal was a bit mediocre, but the sushi was what was most disappointing. The “sushi lover” which has many dishes and is meant for two people had most, if not all the pieces in odd numbers. It was very poorly made as well, to the point where some rolls weren’t actually rolled, as in the nori wouldn’t go around the roll and it would crumble when handled. Also some were cut in very irregular shapes, some tiny, some massive. The balls of rice of the nigiri were really big and my partner struggled to eat them.

I feel like with other types of foods it is ok to cut corners or have a newbie making it, but with sushi is more miss than hit and from a customer’s pov, to be paying certain prices for certain standards hurts a bit.

Dishes also came one by one quite slowly, so the rhythm felt a bit off, as well.

They did give us some edamame at the end, on the house, which was nice. Also, it was very clean!

Based on this meal alone I am not sure I’d repeat, but I am quite happy to think it may have been just a bad day and wish them...

This was one of the worst meals I’ve ever had in my life. We ordered the seared salmon dish (which was barely seared), the miso grilled aubergine dish (which was one of the two saviours of the night), the chicken yakisoba (the other decent item even though the chicken was extremely dry) and the sushi lover platter which came with two maki rolls (which was somehow fishy despite there being such little fish in the roll), sashimi (which clearly the chef didn’t know how to slice) and nigiri rolls (which came in such a huge ball which was as big as a golf ball and they clearly did not prep the rice properly with the vinegar and kombu like proper Japanese restaurants). We also ordered the lychee martini which was £14 but felt like it came from a can and topped up with extra vodka, and a matcha green tea where they served us black tea instead. When we recommunicated that we wanted the matcha green tea and not the black tea, the waitress said they didn’t have that on the menu (even though it was). Management must have changed but the photos we saw online form other reviews did not look like what we had in real life - awful meal. The bill came to a total of ~£130 however they did give us 50% off the food luckily due to an offer, which we weren’t aware of beforehand. We’re not one to waste food so a lot was eaten which sounds very hypocritical but I would definitely not come here again nor recommend...