I'm headed to London for a week in a few days, and I like doing a bit of food tourism, seeking out the best places across the city. Preferably at the cheaper end if the spectrum.
So where should I look for some good "best-of" lists? Note that I'm much more interested in critics' lists than something like Yelp or TripAdvisor.
TimeOut is kind of my default, but there have to be more that I haven't stumbled across yet.
Andy Hayler has a good list, but I don't know if he has cheaper end of the spectrum suggestions. I haven't looked at his webpage for a long time.
You could also try Square Meals. There's another similar to Time Out, but I'll be darned if I can remember it's name just now. Hopefully, someone will post it.
Andy's list tends to be mainly Michelin places, IIRC.
As the OP is interested in the critics, I suppose the easiest way to find what they like and don't like is to Google some of their names. Even when writing for national newspapers, they are all pretty much London orientated (with the occasional trip out to where most of us live). I'm thinking the likes of Fay Maschler, Jay Rayner, Charles Campion, Marina O'Loughlin and the like.
Yes, it would take some work, but it's probably the best idea.
Not just michelin - Andy ranges pretty far and wide in a London. I always cross check his site for ant restaurants as he tends to be fairly critical and immune from PR influence. Most other critics like Rayner, O'loughlin, Coren etc don't have best of lists. Tony Naylor in the Guardian's on line food pages often does top tens and focuses on cheaper food.
"Cheese and Biscuits" and a "Rather Unusual Chinaman" are two quite good blogs for newer places.
Im visiting there sortly and have gathered a numer of sources, some blogs, some lists. I have found that the newspaper website have what appear to be good lists (though some outdated). Time Out is ok, but seems so bloated that it is really slow to load and constantly gets hung up. So here re several sources for lists I have found.
http://www.standard.co.uk/lifestyle/f...
http://www.theguardian.com/lifeandsty...
http://londoneater.com/
http://www.thelondonfoodie.co.uk/
http://londontastin.com/
http://www.londontown.com/restaurants/
http://www.london-eating.co.uk/occasi...
I respect and have done well with Katie Parla's suggestions for Italy/Rome so this list was particularly helpful when doing research for our upcoming trip to London next month.
http://www.parlafood.com/my-london/
Unfortunately her London app which was supposed to be released at some point during the summer has been delayed.
Edit: just realized you asked for critics' lists. Katie is a food blogger, but her credentials are impressive.
Focusing on vegetarian dining, here's a few that came up in a Google search:
http://www.standard.co.uk/goingout/re...
http://www.timeout.com/london/restaur...
http://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/andre...
http://londonist.com/2012/05/londons-...
http://www.stylist.co.uk/life/recipes...
http://www.londontown.com/restaurants...
http://www.theguardian.com/lifeandsty...
londonist.com has some good lists, and a few pub crawls too. The lists on Time Out tend to be a bit hit and miss I find.
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