Hotel restaurants used to be afterthoughts, today they’ve become destinations in their own right. These are some of the best in London right now.
No longer designed as an option when there’s nowhere else to go, hotel restaurants are today some of the most sought-out places to dine – many of them world-famous brands, and helmed by chefs with Michelin-stars. As well as a global feast of exquisite food, the settings for these restaurants are usually pretty spectacular too.
From the grand and historic to the earthy and plant-filled, there’s a hotel restaurant for all tastes and style of get together: date night dinner for two, catching up with a group of friends, power lunches or a fashion week fuel stop – with or without the overnight stay. Here’s our pick of some of the best in London.
Mauro Colagreco, Raffles London at The OWO
Traditional interiors and theatrical dishes meet at Mauro Colagreco’s eponymous restaurant that opened in September 2024 at Raffles London at The OWO, one of the capital’s splashiest hotels – where stately high-ceilinged rooms start from £1000 a night. It’s the fanciest of nine restaurants in the £1.4bn development and overseen by the legendary Argentinian chef of three-Michelin-star Mirazur in Menton. Buttercup-yellow sofas, chairs, drapes and carpets, soft tablecloths, and low lamps depart from the masculine wood-panelled Old War Office setting where Winston Churchill once worked. Multi-course tasting menus begin with warm bread – made to Mauro’s grandmother’s recipe – and Menton olive oil infused with geranium. Colourful bite-sized amuse bouchés hide in beds of verdant wheatgrass. Artful main dishes come with illustrated postcards singing the praises of the star ingredient and a poem. It might all sound a little pretentious and formal, but friendly staff ensure the experience is relaxed and fun. It’s worth noting that for two nights only this week (18 and 19 September) – and in celebration of London Fashion Week – Colagreco’s other restaurant at the hotel, Saison by Mauro Colagreco, is presenting a bespoke lunch and dinner menu in collaboration with Raf’s New York. A must-book if the in-demand NYC favourite has been on your wish list.
Dante Mayfair, Claridge's
London’s most talked-about hotel restaurant arrival is a storied New York import: Italian bar and restaurant Dante, a century-old Greenwich Village institution founded in 1915, which recently traded its pop-up status for a permanent home inside Mayfair’s slickest hotel, Claridge’s. Here, old-world grandeur and downtown NYC swagger collide underneath a beautiful Art Deco ceiling in the pillared pastel-hued dining room where giant vintage photos lend nostalgic flair and a towering floral centrepiece takes centre stage. The playlist is retro – Bowie, Rolling Stones – and the menu reads like a love letter to classic New York dishes in smaller, more refined portions than across the pond. Think: tuna tartare, fiery chicken alla diavola, chunky NY strip steaks and the now-cult Dante Smash Burger presented on Claridge’s signature crockery. But it’s the bar that runs the show: the Negroni flight – four mini servings of its signature tipples – and the smooth Dante martini, poured tableside and finished with drops of lemon bitters, are worth your time alone.
Brasserie Max at the Covent Garden Hotel
Tucked inside the Covent Garden Hotel, one of the Firmdale Hotels group’s flagship properties, Brasserie Max reflects the brand’s signature English country house style – bold, colourful interiors with a distinctly British sensibility. It’s classic and unpretentious: upholstered dining chairs, warm wood panelling and soft lighting create a setting that suits all occasions from casual meetings and lazy lunches to pre-theatre plates and dinners worth lingering over. The food is proper, produce-led British cooking done with confidence: Atlantic prawn and avocado cocktail or smoked salmon and sourdough for starters; seabass with roasted tomatoes and fennel or Angus fillet steaks with triple cooked chips (and worth the visit alone). For another, more novel, reason to visit, book in for Afternoon Cheese, a savoury spin on afternoon tea built around British cheeses from Neal’s Yard Dairy, paired with English wines from Gusbourne (£56pp).
Henri at Henrietta Experimental, Covent Garden
Steps from Covent Garden Piazza but a world away from its tourist bustle, Henri inside the Henrietta Experimental is an intimate, casually buzzy take on the Paris bistro, reimagined with contemporary flair by designer Dorothée Meilichzon – terracotta-red and blue velvet banquettes and marble-topped tables line a narrow, candlelit space where staff in floaty cream uniforms work with relaxed efficiency. Cocktails are complex, like the aromatic and bright Alain: Cognac, Amaro Montenegro, Campari, RinQuinQuin à La Pêche. While Chef Jackson Boxer’s menu leans into French classics with twists: spiralised carrot râpée dusted with spicy seeds, steak frites with sauce Henri (big on mustard and anchovies) and charcoal-grilled roast duck breast with blood orange and green olives. Save room for the sticky toffee madeleines, baked to order and served with roasted vanilla ice cream.
Kettner’s, Soho
Kettner’s is one of Soho’s grande dames – a French institution that opened as a restaurant in 1867, when chef Auguste Kettner (rumoured to have cooked for Napoleon III) first threw open its doors. Today, under Soho House’s watch, it’s also home to a 33-bedroom hotel, while the revamped dining room leans into its faded grandeur: Grade II-listed plasterwork, dark wood, ornate mirrors and candlelight lend an illicit feel, with an adjoining Piano Bar keeping things lively courtesy of a resident pianist. The kitchen swings back to its French roots, with confit rabbit, steak frites, sole meunière and côte de porc in Café de Paris butter leading the main course section. Elsewhere in the building, a separate 1920s-style Champagne Bar offers its own crescent-shaped marble counter for something more intimate, and an afternoon tea trades fussy finger sandwiches for a lobster vol-au-vent and a Brie de Meaux croffle – a ham and Brie croissant pressed in a waffle maker until crisp.
ABC Kitchens at The Emory
Overlooking Hyde Park from Belgravia, ABC Kitchens sits inside The Emory, London’s first all-suite hotel and sixth property from the team behind Claridge’s, The Connaught and The Berkeley. The restaurant is French chef, Jean-Georges Vongerichten’s first foray into the UK – a mash-up of three of his New York restaurants (ABC Kitchen, ABCV and ABC Cocina) rolled into one glass-walled dining room, with day-to-day cooking led by chef Ben Boeynaems. The contemporary space is warm and glowy: floor-to-ceiling windows flood the room with light, russet and bronze tones give it a sci-fi, retro-futurist feel, while a fire roars at one end of an open kitchen. Slide into a curved booth opposite the park and watch the traffic drift by while working your way through the excellent selection of small plates made for sharing. The menu splits across farm-to-table, Latin-inspired and vegan sections. Don’t miss the English pea guacamole to scallops served shell-on over ice with kohlrabi. Come 8pm, it’s fun to be here when the metallic blinds lower and the room shifts into low-lit evening mode.
Pavyllon At Four Seasons UK
Chef Yannick Alléno’s first London venture at the Four Seasons Hotel opened in summer 2023 and gained a Michelin star soon after, firming up his position in the London dining scene. Discovering this plush haven of experimental French fine dining off the hotel’s somewhat dated lobby is a delight. In terms of design, the carpeted dining room is formal, but has a chic, 60s lounge feel: oval-shaped tables dressed in white, low lighting, statement pillars, waves of copper bead curtains, and voluptuous blue velvet seating. Nab a stool at the bar overlooking the open‑kitchen counter for a front‑row view of the chefs in tall white hats – all surprisingly unflustered – in action. Reimagined classics made using innovative techniques are Alléno hallmarks. Expect to let out an audible gasp when your steamed Comté cheese soufflé drizzled in vivid green watercress coulis is delivered, and when the poached ‘Badaboum’ egg is sliced in half tableside revealing golden egg yolk brimming with caviar. Red, white and rosé French labels are wine list mainstays and dining on sweet French pastries during afternoon tea here is a luxurious daytime treat.
Charlie's at Brown Hotel
London’s oldest luxury hotel was established in 1832 by James and Sarah Brown – former staff of Lord and Lady Byron. Now it’s the setting for this landmark restaurant in the heart of Mayfair, named after the late Lord Charles Forte, who bought the hotel in the 1970s. Inside the spacious historic dining room, creaky oak floors and rich wood panelling are comforting reminders of its heritage. Teal velvet banquet seating and statement botanical wallpaper added by Sir Rocco’s sister and design director of the group, Olga Polizzi, add the family stamp and bring it up to date. Staff in black trouser suits serve British plates like thick-cut toast, steamed Cornish turbot, and grilled new season leeks, presented on fine porcelain. When it comes to wine, these folks know their stuff, so take the sommelier’s steer on the best pairings – you won’t be disappointed. Weekdays and nights buzz with locals and business diners, while Friday and Saturday nights are surprisingly quiet. Come Sunday, tables fill up again when roast is served and the restaurant heats up for jazz night.
Berners Tavern
What’s particularly special about the Berners Tavern at the London EDITION in fancy Fitzrovia is its surroundings. Curved wooden khaki-leather-clad booths line walls crammed with framed art, under the stately gaze of an ornate Baroque ceiling hung with dazzling chandeliers. It’s a hint that you’re sitting in what was once a ballroom at the former Berners Hotel which opened here in 1908 across five Georgian townhouses. Led by powerhouse British chef, Jason Atherton, ‘the defining restaurant of the decade’ opened here in 2013 – the same time as the EDITION – and is still going strong, churning out winning contemporary British dishes from breakfast through to dinner. Highlights include the velvety Berners Tavern mac and cheese and succulent grass-fed steaks – and, of course, the Champagne trolley. It’s well stocked with big-name labels like Veuve Clicquot and Dom Perignon, and Bloody Mary ingredients come with Sunday brunch service. Finish on the raspberry Alaska, a decadent whiskey-laced sugar-fest to share.
Dovetale
A London hotel restaurant with a Knickerbocker Glory trolley is worth a few hours of anybody’s time – watch as the deluxe, nostalgic British dessert served in a sundae glass is whipped up at your table, exactly how you like it. If you’re not a sundae kind of person, the salted caramel tart and white miso ice cream offers a ‘lighter’ sugar fix. Compared to its low-lit, plant-filled 1 Hotel setting, Dovetale – which opened in 2023 – channels a different, similarly stylish but more business-like aesthetic. Natural light streams in from roof lights in the lofty ceiling, and furnishings have a mid-century Scandinavian, rather than cream-toned earthy feel in the rest of the hotel. It all works to complement Michelin‑starred chef Tom Sellers’ modern European à la carte menu, rooted in sustainable, seasonal ingredients from British growers and fishermen. Starters include a raw bar of Orkney scallops and Cornish crab. While comfort food lovers will adore the English Wagyu pappardelle bolognese. Vegans are well catered for, too. Make sure you start with a cocktail and a spot of people watching at the hotel’s stylish Dover Yard bar next to the restaurant.
Lead image credit: Dante Mayfair at Claridge’s
Ellie Seymour is an award-winning travel and culture writer living by the sea in Brighton, England, specialising in the USA, unsung Europe, hotels and food. Her bylines include BBC Travel, Condé Nast Traveller, The Independent, The Times and The Telegraph. She gets very excited about hotels, especially those with history and great restaurants, and loves seeking out places with character away from the tourist crowds. She’s written four books, including Grand Hotels of the World, a love letter to the world’s most glamorous.
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