The Sea, The Sea — Restaurant in London

This one had been on the radar for a while before we visited. However, we were left far from impressed. The fish is obviously good quality but that's really where it stops. The dishes are very expensive for the little you get (...and we're very used to sharing concept restaurants). I think the first langoustine dish we had was around 15£ for a thumb-sized portion of chopped langoustine which was seriously under-seasoned (if at all) - sacrilege! It was also accompanied by sour grapes which overpowered the delicate taste of the langoustine. I'm sure the menu also mentioned caviar... that was no where to be seen.

Anyway, we persevered, thinking things could only get better. They didn't. Dish after dish (and 150£ later) we were continuously left unimpressed. Bland, same-y dressings, under-seasoned pieces of fish and tiny servings. One positive was that they managed to cook the lobster pretty well (that's the second star; the first being the use of quality fish).

I understand quality fish is expensive, but the prices should also justify some knowledge of preparing and bringing the best of out of this great produce! I'm not even saying you have cook it... some fish is best left raw (contrary to the opinion of the chap below) but please at least season and dress it (N.B. using the same edible flowers / micro herbs on every dish to try win points here doesn't count).

A great fish alternative not too far would be St Clair in Clapham. If you're prepared to go further afield, Brat in Shoreditch has some great fish (sharing and grill). For something in a similar vein to The Sea, The Sea, Bar Duoro in London Bridge or Sabor in central are also worth a visit. All these also have a good selection of wine too.

So, visit as a fishmonger, not a restaurant.

P.s. if you leave just as disappointment as us make sure you grab an ice cream at Parlour down the road. The cornflake ice cream was the best thing we ate...

Probably the worst dinning experience I had since a while. The male staff who greeted us was absolutely terrible, looking annoyed and frustrated since the beginning. We asked which wine is less dry, he replied “the first one” impatiently. Even my local restaurant would give some recommendations and explain their wine selection! I moved on to make the order, I said let’s start with the oysters, he looked upset and left. I was still holding and pointing at the menu because I wanted to order more!!! My friend and I were left puzzled. He came back with the wine and left quickly again. He saw us still looking at him and said do you need me, frowning! What kind of customer service is it???

We were already not happy but we really needed to eat so we order two more dishes. The oysters were ok but definitely not worth the price of £26, there were quite a bit of small shells inside! The potion was tiny literally two bites. The fish with rice taste okay I could taste scallion in the oil, the rice was too dry, not the best texture. We ordered the monkfish, tastes was great but totally overpowered by the shiitake. What’s the point of eating seafood if you could only taste the sauce? Never came to check on us until the end.

They charged £1 each for charity on the bills without telling you. We said we don’t feel like because it’s not about money we don’t like the feeling of being forced or pressured to donate, we would like to have it removed. The female staff changed her face and looking unhappy.

I walked passed this place a lot of time and was looking forward to try this place. It left me with such a bad experience that still give me an unpleasant feeling whenever I think about it. It was a total regret. If you want to charge for a fine dining price first you should offer the fine dining experience! I grew up with top quality seafood, they food you provided was just a mere....

Visiting London and decide to go to this place as my friend told me is one of the more interesting new restaurant in the city. With the recommendation, I was expecting something excellent. The experience turned out to be a complete disappointment. I ordered 3 dishes:

The Cured Cod was decent. The cod was fresh with perfectly balance sweat, sour and salty seasoning.

The Dressed Crab’s flavor was good, but nothing particularly standout ASIDE FROM a 5MM piece of crab shell showed up on my last bite. Wasn’t expecting a mistake like this, I noted the issue to the server. I got a “oh sorry” response and a server came up to try to make an excuse by saying they hand cracked the crab, instead of machines, so it is normal to find shells. I found it laughable. I have been to higher end and lower end restaurants which also hand crack their crab, but not finding any shell , let alone as large as 5MM. I understand mistakes happen, a sincere apology like ”we will be more careful next time” would have been suffice. Trying to throw out excuses simply the matter worse.

The Lobster Rice Sando is just bland. As a concept, it is appealing. The technique, using squid ink on the exterior of the sushi rice to create a layer that look like seaweed, is super interesting. Sadly, the whole dish is bland. The seasoning is lacking and the squid ink adds to nothing beside from resembling a sushi look and adding some crisps.

All in all, I was expecting excellent, but what I got was a mix of decent to disappointing food, sprinkled with some laughable excuses on...