Lupita, 13-15 Villiers Street, Charing Cross

A recent survey found that less than 30 percent of Mexican restaurants in London are any good. Admittedly, the survey was of me, and conducted by me, and I haven’t been to that many, but I’d be very surprised if I was wrong. Really, there’s Wahaca, that burrito place on Portobello Road, and not much else. And unfortunately, the brilliantly-located Lupita does nothing to redress the balance.

It’s not that the food is bad, exactly. Ceviche seems authentic (though my experience is of Liman, rather than Mexican ceviche). It’s been long-marinated in citrus, chilli, onions and other treats. The fish is rather chewy, but it’s nice and spicy, clean and simple.

Quesadillas are pleasantly soft, filled with a mushroom concoction, like a mushroom chocolate mole, that I love but Cute Letts hates. Huiltacoche it’s called, and it is at least interesting enough to divide opinion.

Because the problem with most of the food at Lupita is that it’s just so boring. Refried beans, stingily portioned next to packet tortilla chips (at least, I hope they were from a packet), are flavourless and so long-cooked that they’ve completely turned into a paste. There’s not a lump in sight. Pork carnitas is dry and dull, which for this most desirable of Mexican dishes, is criminal.

We also try some arrachera tacos, described on the menu as a ‘classic Mexican cut of beef, tenderised and marinated in our own special recipe.’ It’s a little hard on the teeth for something that’s been tenderised, while I can only assume the special marinade is not described in full because it’s not very special at all. Again, it’s not exactly bad, rather just woefully uninteresting.

Worst of all is a prawn and nopalitos (cactus) salad, which consists of an array of eight ingredients, from jalapenos to avocado, tomato to lettuce. Never has so much tasted of so little. It’s bland, underdressed and very disappointing, especially since at £7.80, it’s a couple of pounds more expensive than anything else we order.

The beer's nice, the service ok if a little terse. All together, the bill creeps in just below £40 pounds for two. It’s not a bad price for the area, or for the quantity of food. But with Wahaca about 300 yards away, I can’t imagine why you’d want to.

Phil Lett’s take: 3/10

Apologies for the lack of photos. Darkness, as ever, intervened.

The Anchor, Walberswick

Walberswick. What a thoroughly satisfying word that is. Go on, try it. Try rolling it around for a minute. It’s like a fine wine, with that lovely, open-mouthed wal, the puckering ber and then that gorgeous finish, swooping and stiffening into the k, full of rigour and chutzpah. 

I imagine the people of this coastal village absolutely adore it. I certainly did. There’s the sea, the beach, the river and the beer, to name just four. And for a fifth, there’s The Anchor.

Few things afford more delight than walking into a pub and not only seeing some of your favourite beers on tap (Meantime and Adnams), but also receiving a beer menu, listing more than 20 bottles, carefully sought and sourced from the great brewing nations of the world.

First impressions count, and The Anchor could hardly have made a better one. We drank for a while, enjoying the comfortably comfortable atmosphere, then took our seats. The menu is fish-heavy, as you’d expect, and each dish has a suggested beer match as well as wine.

I started with confit cod cheeks, alongside a glass of San Franciscan Liberty Ale. The cheeks, meaty and rounded in both senses, were notable for their richness, playing off a perky tomato, fennel and leaf salad. It was a marvellous start. Three of us had the cod cheeks, leaving just one to branch out with chilli squid, superbly cooked and sweetly sauced. 

Mains continued mostly fishy. Mine, a simply cooked whole lemon sole in butter and lemon, melted on the tongue, fresh and a lot naughtier than fish should be. It was hardly an unusual combination, but still provided a reminder of just how brilliant it is to take something very healthy (fish) and render it superbly unhealthy (lashings of butter). Battered cod and chips did something similar, the crispy batter undermining all the good work of that chunky cod fillet. 

One of us went for meat: short rib of beef on a truffle mashed potato. The rib had been slow cooked, stripped and remoulded into a little patty, texturally satisfying and pretty tasty too. The truffle mash, an oily, buttery number, was a good as it sounds. Flying Dog Gonzo Porter was a brave beer choice, but proved somewhat foolhardy. At 8.7%, it rather ruined one of our number for the rest of the evening, though we could occasionally make out approving noises through his drunken babbling. 

Desserts followed, as is their wont, sweet and sticky. Ever the unorthodox, I plumped for a cranberry and walnut tart with cranberry ice cream. I have no idea why. I don’t really like cranberries, and I certainly have no truck with desserts that carry the stench of virtue about them. I shouldn’t have worried. This was not in the least bit virtuous. The tart cranberry proved an ideal mediator, moderating and translating the rich caramel and walnut of the filling.

I didn’t try the other desserts. They looked good, if that’s any help – a chocolate pudding with coconut and a something-or-other panna cotta (I lost the receipt, so can’t remember what it was). Coffees all round brought the bill to about £40 per head. For what we ate, and especially for the quantity and quality of delicious beer, it was excellent value. We returned the next day for lunch, when beef rib and Yorkshire puddings reached a similar standard. 

You may never go to Walberswick, but if you do, visit The Anchor.

Phil Letts’ take: 8/10

The Dock Kitchen, 344 Ladbroke Grove, Portobello Docks

You know the kind of people who collect trainers? Those people who surf eBay for original Air Jordans, grow scraggy beards as soon as they are able and generally annoy everybody by being younger, thinner and so very much cooler than everyone else? They’re not quite hipsters, though they’re not dissimilar. They tend to have real jobs, normally in advertising or (well-paid) charity, and a love of tight woolly hats. You’ve probably heard them, aged 27, with their dubstep. 

The Dock Kitchen feels screamingly in love with this kind of customer. Above a fancy furniture shop? Check. On the canal? Check. In a not-particularly-but-still-a-bit edgy area? Check. A former pop-up that became permanent? Check. Pretentious, self-indulgent, haphazard menu? Check. Really good food? Um, yes.

And that’s the problem with The Dock Kitchen. Despite every cell in my body wanting to hate it - for its attractive waiting staff, its impossibly youthful team of chefs, for how pleased it is with itself - I just couldn’t.

‘Forced Scottish sea kale and agretti with bottarga’ was superb. Not just a little bit good, not just good because ambitious and unusual, but actively, challengingly excellent, all asparagus and coastline flavoured and saltily refreshing.

  

‘Egyptian’ garlic, roasted with thyme and served with goats curd on toast was similarly inspired. A ludicrously straightforward dish, it involved getting a long-roasted head of garlic out of the oven, drizzling it with olive oil, and spreading some curd on toast. In this instance, simplicity was a virtue. 

Main courses were less dazzling, but still pretty good. A fish stew of cod, octopus, red mullet and brown shrimp lacked a bit of oomph, despite its Vermentino and fennel. Chicken with a Persian pomegranate and walnut sauce proved a textural (though not a visual) delight, meltingly cooked with a slight crunch from the walnut. Alas, accompanying broad bean pods in tomato sauce were lukewarm and uninspiring. 

For dessert, a saffron rice pudding with blood orange combined sweet and bitter to great effect, while a Seville orange tart was competent rather than spectacular. Add a smart open kitchen, great lighting and engaging waiters to the mix, and this is a pretty winning operation, especially since they sell Paxtaran liqueur to finish. 

  

The kitchen seems to rely on food that requires very little cooking on the night – most dishes we ate would have been prepared earlier in the day. This allows the staff to maintain a sense of unflappable control without actually having to do all that much cooking. But you can hardly complain about a smart kitchen. After all, if there’s one thing any trainer hunter knows, it’s that it’s not cool to be seen to be putting any effort into anything.

Our a la carte meal came in at just over £40 per head for three courses with a glass of wine, a liqueur and coffee. For slightly more, you can eat the restaurant’s set menu, four or five courses that change, supperclub style, depending on the whims of the chef, or what punning title they’ve thought up this week.

The Dock Kitchen treads a fine line between making its customers feel trendy and causing them (or me, anyway) to harrumph curmudgeonly at the smugness of it all. But the food, which is always what these things come down to in the end, is good enough to pull it off.

Phil Letts’ take: 7/10