Café Boheme is, like the sex shops of Walker's Court and strip joints of Rupert Street, a stalwart of the Soho scene. For twenty years it's stood on the corner of Old Compton and Greek Streets, apparently open all hours, its pavement tables always occupied - one of the hottest spots on a street where people-watching is a competitive sport.
But despite my having haunted the streets of Soho for a similar period - arriving in London from the sticks at around the time Café Boheme opened for business - until recently I'd only ever been past, not in; many's the time I've sipped and supped at Soho House upstairs, but I've always found negotiating the phalanx of drinkers outside Café Boheme itself too like running the gauntlet for comfort and hurried on elsewhere.
When I finally did decide to go in a couple of weeks ago, lured by a new menu defiantly retro in its simplicity and remarkably kind in its pricing, it quickly became apparent why Café Boheme has remained so popular and for so long. The attractive room is classic Soho House (who bought Café Boheme along with the rest of the building when they opened in 1995); design details that will be familiar to anyone who's eaten at sibling sites Dean Street Townhouse and Hoxton Grill are all present and correct. To the uninitiated this means dark red leather on bar stools and banquettes, wood panelling, lots of crystal and a statement zinc-topped bar at the heart of it all.
While sipping an excellent Martini, dinner date Eliot and I shared some eggs mayonnaise - I said the menu was retro - which were great, especially piled onto some good fresh bread. I also ordered moules marinieres which were textbook; the wonderfully sweet, small mussels used resembled clochinas, popular in Valencia but unseen anywhere else, making for a welcome treat.
Main courses were nothing to get over-excited about, but then café food generally isn't and it was none the worse for it. Eliot's grilled chicken salad with tarragon mayonnaise was well-executed, simple stuff; the ratio of leaves to protein was perhaps a bit skewed towards the greenery but it was a generous helping of good-quality poultry nonetheless. My steak - a decent-sized rib eye, served blue and full of flavour if a tad over-salted - came with fantastic frites, hot, crisp and oil-less as they should be.
We skipped desserts in favour of a couple of glasses of Sauternes (as you do); together with a glass of Pinot Noir from the all-French list - which also offer s good choice of 500ml pichets - and service the bill still only worked out at about £35 each. You could eat well here for even less; steak frites start at just £10 for rump (my rib eye was only £16, the selection peaks at £19 for filet), and main courses average £12-£13.
Being a café, bookings aren't taken but given that it's open eighteen hours a day, opening for breakfast at 8.30 and only closing at 2.30am, it should always be possible to drop in and get a seat. With food of this quality, at these prices, in such stylish surroundings, it's easy to see why Café Boheme has been such a lasting success. What's harder to understand is why, with food of this quality, at these prices, in such stylish surroundings, anyone would ever want to eat anywhere else.
Cafe Boheme, 13 Old Compton Street, London W1D 5JQ Tel: 020 7734 0623 http://www.cafeboheme.co.uk
Posted by +Hugh Wright
As an eternal optimist however I never lost faith that, as the old adage goes, with this much crap around there had to be a pony somewhere. Sure enough one day Drink, Shop & Do trotted into my life and the gloom was instantly lifted. On first walking past the dove grey shop-front on Caledonian Road, which stood out from the surrounding kebab and sex shops (by which I mean two separate types of shop, not shops selling both kebabs and sex, though if they exist anywhere it would be around here) with its bold, fresh graphics and canary yellow interior, I thought it was just a cool craft shop because of the window display of textiles and shelves filled with hand-made cards, sewing kits and vintage tea sets. But then I began to wonder what the 'Drink' part of the name could mean, and made the very fortuitous decision to step inside and explore further.
What I discovered was a smart little enterprise that's genuinely new, run with passion and really rather exciting. Passing through the Shop (making a mental note to treat myself to a quarter of something from the jars of classic sweeties lining one wall) I found myself in a bright, buzzing cafe-bar, flooded with natural light from a soaring glass ceiling, its walls decorated with patchwork quilts, framed origami and knitted samplers. These it would transpire are the fruit of the 'Do' part of the name; regular craft workshops are held here covering pastimes as diverse and productive as 'Play with Clay', t-shirt printing and card making. The atmosphere was instantly warm and welcoming; I resolved to come back when I had company.
For my first visit I took along my all-too-occasional lunch companion Scott, and we ordered a piece each of savoury tart - there's two to choose from every day - with salad, then shared a generous wedge of chocolate tart. The savoury tarts (£5.50) were beautiful, one sweet potato, spinach and feta, the other pea, broccoli and Parmesan, both satisfyingly dense without being heavy and each accompanied by a goodly serving of tasty herb salad in a zesty vinaigrette. The chocolate tart was a cracking pud, its thick ganache filling complemented by pastry almost as sweet and crumbly as shortbread. On a further visit with a work colleague we shared a piece of tart - this time blue cheese and broccoli - and a plateful of cute, crusts-cut-off sandwiches (£4), half cheese and pickle, half smoked salmon and lemon, exactly like my mum used to make for my lunch-box and just as delicious.
With time to kill after work one evening before an event nearby, Drink, Shop & Do was the obvious choice for an early cocktail. From the short, witty list I chose a Ruby Shoes (perfect for a Friend of Dorothy), a generous tumbler-full of a refreshing, potent blend of orange vodka, raspberry liqueur, sour cherry, fresh lime and ginger beer. Then on my most recent visit, with Twitter pals @jezmd and @juliannabarnaby, I enjoyed a Coal Dust - a jet-black gin-based fizz made with coal dust sherbet - before we all tucked into big bowls of a fantastic, salty chorizo and chickpea stew with a couple of bottles of the perfectly decent house Merlot. While some of our fellow patrons embarked on a workshop making accessories out of recycled bicycle tyres - and why not? - we played a boisterous game of Scrabble, one of the dozens of old school board games freely available to all. I'll let you work out which words were mine...
I love Drink, Shop & Do. It's original, inclusive, friendly and great fun. The staff - all spiffing gels in vintage frocks apart from one extremely dishy chap - are all clearly having a hoot-and-a-half and want their customers, of which on every visit there have been deservedly plenty, to do likewise. Some of the prices are a little cheeky - that quarter of sweets, sherbet pips since you're asking, was £1.50 - but generally it's cheap and superlatively cheerful. Everything you see, from the mismatched furniture and vintage china food is served on to the handicrafts on the walls, is for sale, so if you like your teapot, or cake-stand say, you can take it home with you. I haven't found a new opening as refreshing and exciting since Dean Street Townhouse, and as with there I go back as often as I can and am never disappointed.
So impressed have I been, in fact - and please excuse me this shameless plug - that I've featured Drink, Shop & Do in my first column as travel editor for new online fashion magazine Fashion Salade. I very much hope that you'll find it in you to visit both.
Drink, Shop & Do, 9 Caledonian Road, London N1 9DX Tel: 020 3343 9138 http://www.drinkshopdo.com
Located in the lobby of the ultra-hip Hoxton Hotel on Great Eastern Street, Hoxton Grill is an all-day affair opening at dawn's crack for brekkie and closing only when the last hotel resident or asymmetrically-coiffed visitor has disappeared into the night. It's visually appealing with ample red leather banquettes (echoing its first-cousin-once-removed, Dean Street Townhouse), dark wood furniture and the bare brick walls considered de rigeur for this part of town. The breakfast menu reflects the style of the lunch and dinner offerings, namely familiar Brit and European staples done stylishly and well at premium but still good-value prices.
On the first of two recent visits, both with my sister (who, incidentally, makes a Full English of such stupendous quality that any restaurant would be proud to serve it) I tried the eggs Benedict royale, which were excellent - good eggs and muffins, lovely sharp Hollandaise and ample butter-soft slices of delicious salmon. On visit two, needing something salty and substantial to counter an unexpectedly severe hangover, I wolfed down a plateful of superb corned beef hash, using the superfluous but very welcome toast it came with to make a sandwich of the accompanying fried egg. Sis on both occasions ordered and enjoyed creamy scrambled eggs on toast with bacon, declaring it all good except, first time around, for the unnecessary sprinkling of chives (which she likes about as much as Reeves & Mortimer's mate Les).
Service is efficient, fast and nicely formal, respecting the likelihood that valuable business might be being conducted over the granola and fruit platters. It's a nice contrast to the forced over-mateyness which blights so many of the area's eating spots. The price reflects the quality, location and attention to detail - tea is served in smart individual silver pots with strainers, juices are freshly squeezed from primo fruits - but is far from expensive; on both occasions our bill came to about £12 each including food, tea, juice and 12.5% service.
My time with my sister is limited and therefore precious; our breakfast get-togethers came about as a way of making sure we see each other on her increasingly less frequent days working in London. It follows that where we spend that time has to be somewhere a little special, that adds a sense of occasion to the otherwise fairly mundane practice of breaking our fast. After several trials and errors, I do believe we've found it.
Hoxton Grill, 81 Great Eastern Street, London EC2A 3HU Tel: 020 7739 9111 http://www.hoxtongrill.com/ 
