Old Street.
Ironically, it’s home to a lot of new restaurants.
And while Shoreditch is just around the corner with its own bumper crop of restaurants and bars, there’s plenty of spots orbiting Old Street roundabout that shouldn’t be overlooked – especially given their proximity to Nightjar, one of the best bars in London.
So here they are – our pick of the best Old Street restaurants…
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St. Leonard’s
This restaurant’s hot and cold in a good way, combining open-fire cooking with a slick raw bar to bring you a menu ranging from cherrystone clams with ginger vinegar to porterhouse steak with bone marrow and red wine sauce. It’s all down to the harmonious combination of chef-founders Jackson Boxer and Andrew Clarke, who between them have manned pans at Brunswick House and The Square…
Details: Open Tues-Sat, 12pm-12am | 70 Leonard Street, EC2A 4QX
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Daffodil Mulligan
Richard Corrigan is one of the Emerald Isle’s most successful chefs in recent decades, having scored Michelin Stars at three different restaurants, won Great British Menu three times, and been awarded London Restaurant of the Year four times in a career littered with culinary accomplishments.
And now he’s opened Daffodil Mulligan, an Irish restaurant with a grill and an oyster bar, as well as a snug subterranean bar with individual drinking booths…
Details: Open Tues-Sat, 12-3pm & 5-10.30pm | 70-74 City Road, EC1 2BJ
Gloria
Gloria by name, glorious by nature, this all singing, all dancing Italian trattoria is guaranteed to give you something you’ll remember. Even if that’s a mild, cheese-induced heart attack the next day. Giant cocktails in loud, maximalist glasses; a ten-layer lasagne; and a wedge of lemon meringue pie standing over half a foot tall. It’s the kind of place you’re going to want to visit at least once (or so say the queues around the block).
Details: Open for lunch and dinner, daily | 54-56 Great Eastern Street, Old Street, EC2A 3QR
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Blacklock Shoreditch
This handsome, exposed-brick, moodily-lit spot is all about the meat. And the beef-dripping chips. And the bone marrow squid rings. Oh, and the £5 cocktails served from a trolley.
Details: Open weekdays 12-3pm & 5-11pm, Saturdays 12-11pm, Sundays 12-9pm | 28-30 Rivington Street, EC2A 3DZ
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Pachamama East
Pachamama – the ancient Peruvian goddess of fertility – has, in her eternal generosity, granted us a second incarnation of the Marylebone restaurant.
It’s been given a suitably East London makeover, with tiled floors and brutalist wood and metal accents offsetting the delicate presentation of Chifu dishes, the little-known crossover of Chinese and Peruvian cuisine that arrived with East Asian migrants in the 19th century…
Details: Open weekdays 12-11pm, Saturdays 11am-12am, Sundays 11am-11pm | 73 Great Eastern Street, EC2A 3DT
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Ozone Coffee Roasters
By day, Ozone is a huge, two-level, industrial coffee shop serving cups of their in-house roast alongside eggs every which way, vegetable fritters and granola. By night, it turns into a candlelit warehouse, in which you can unwind with Modern European dishes, cocktails, and a possible appearance from a dog in a gold lamé jacket.
Details: Open weekdays 7.30am-4pm, weekends 8.30am-4pm | 11 Leonard Street, EC2A 4AQ
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Padella Shoreditch
Padella might not blow their own trumpet, but they do knead their own trompetti. The handmade pasta spot started out in London Bridge, and quickly won itself an army of fans prepared to queue for hours for their mouthwatering dishes (each coming in at under a tenner). Suffice to say their second spot is worth checking out – especially now they’ve got al fresco seating round the back. Download the WalkUp app to queue virtually while you get a drink elsewhere.
Details: Open daily for lunch from 12pm, dinner from 5pm, takeaway on weekdays 12-4pm | 1 Phipp Street, London EC2A 4PS
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Fare
It’s the brain child of Sager + Wilde’s Michael Sager and his mixologist-turned-business-partner Marcis Dzelzainis. Together they decided to open this super slick, all-day Italian in Old Street, offering stone-baked pizza alongside bespoke coffee, cocktails, and over 250 bottles of wine. READ MORE.
Details: Open Mon-Wed 2-9pm, Thurs-Sat 2-10pm | 11 Old Street, EC1V 9HL
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Leroy
An intimate, unusually shaped restaurant serving Michelin-starred small plates on a set menu of £45. A reincarnation of its successful London Fields forebear, Ellory, this time around the menu’s been given a Parisian accent, and the wine’s been given the spotlight.
Details: Open for dinner Tues-Sat, 6pm-12am, plus Friday lunch 12-2.30pm | 18 Phipp Street, EC2A 4NU
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Officina 00
Sating the appetite for fresh pasta in Shoreditch is Officina 00. Dressed up in the standard industrial-style Shoreditch uniform, their USP is slightly unusual pasta dishes – things like cavatelli (small, shell-like pasta) with padrón peppers, almond pesto, and crispy coppa; or corzetti (big, disc-like pasta) with wild mushroom, fennel, sausage, and parsley. For starters they’ve got cacio & pepe ravioli (a definite must-have), whilst sweets take the form of both lemon and chocolate profiteroles (again, difficult to turn down).
Details: Open Mon-Wed, 12-3pm & 5-10pm; Thurs-Sat, 12-3pm & 5-11pm; Sun 12-9pm | 56 Old Street, London, EC1V 9BW
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Oklava
Tucked away in the back streets behind Old Street, Selin Kiazim’s critically acclaimed Turkish restaurant is your new go-to spot for pomegranate & sumac martinis; fresh pide bread with medjool date butter; and pistachio sponge with barbecued quince. In fact, it may be the only spot for that.
Details: Open Tuesday-Saturday, 5-10pm | 74 Luke Street, London EC2A 4PY
Last Updated: 4th January 2021 | Main image: Pachamama East
Venturing further east? Check out the Best Restaurants in Shoreditch