Mayfair's Sake No Hana is London's best new restaurant, according to The Good Food Guide London.
The stylish Japanese restaurant, dubbed "temple of cool", beat off strong competition from the likes of Mayfair's Wild Honey and Notting Hill's Café Anglais to land the coveted accolade.
Owned by restaurateur Alan Yau, who founded Hakkasan, Sake No Hana has produced more feedback from Good Food Guide London readers than any other recent new opening.
One described it as "pure and unadulterated joy for people who understand and love Japanese food".
"The restaurant's design is stunning; perfectly trained staff are ‘superb’ (the expert sake sommelier, in particular, has received more rave reader comments than any other sommelier in the country); and the kaiseki cooking is of a very high quality," The Good Food Guide London said.
"Sake No Hana is without doubt a special occasion restaurant and certainly not cheap."
Shoreditch's Viet Grill was named best budget restaurant, while the Carpenter's Arms in Hammersmith was crowned best gastropub.
Wild Honey took the title for best set menu, Primrose Hill's Manna landed the accolade for best vegetarian restaurant and Battersea's Tom Ilic was judged the best value for money.
In other awards, Knightsbridge’s One-O-One was voted best fish restaurant and Tristan Mason was named best up-and-coming chef.
Elizabeth Carter, editor of The Good Food Guide London, said: "All our award winners offer something more than just very good food.
"While décor ranged from downright simple to architectural high jinks, service was judged outstanding at all of them, and even at the very expensive end, readers felt they had value for money.
"Sheer enjoyment also played its part. In the end a good restaurant is one where you choose to go back a second time and we think all these restaurants will attract loyal customers."
- Sake No Hana, 23 St James's Street, London SW1 (020 7925 8988). Dinner for two, without drinks, costs £120.
The article Japanese restaurant wins London award originally appeared on 999 Today
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