The Dairy, Clapham: Smart, casual

I’d heard good things about The Dairy, not least from my son Will (of Hawksmoor*), one of whose favourite restaurants it is, but being south of the river it took me a while to haul myself down there.

In fact even longer than I’d anticipated. It was a tube strike the day I went so I had to take a bus which progressed in sedate and leisurely fashion from Marble Arch to Clapham Common, a not disagreeable experience on a sunny spring evening. As I was trying to avoid the rush hour and was early I also managed a brisk walk on the common to work up an appetite, a strategy I can strongly recommend.

The restaurant is much smaller and more rustic than I’d imagined, more like a gastropub or bar than the fine dining set-up you'd expect from an establishment with a tasting menu. Thankfully they don't impose that on you - you can also order dishes individually which is what we did. There’s some ambitious cooking though, no doubt about that.

The most memorable dish which has had me obsessing about it continuously since my visit was chicken oysters with a couple of little stacks of crisp deep-fried chicken skin, wild mushrooms and asparagus. It obviously looks a great deal more enticing than this shockingly bad photo. Make sure you order your own portion. Don’t share.

Other great dishes were a cracking chicken liver mousse (oddly on-trend at the moment) with rhubarb and apple, broad beans with smoked ricotta, house lardo and whey (at least I think that’s the version we had), a gorgeous dish of rooftop carrots (presumably grown in their 'urban garden') with goats cheese, oat granola and buttermilk, and Galician octopus with tomatoes, fried bread and rooftop herbs. We also, I see from our bill, had some squid. I can’t remember for the life of me how it was cooked. It was a catch-up meal with an old friend and we were yammering too much.

We also found room for two desserts: salted caramel with cacao and malted barley ice cream and that chocolatey 'soil' you see everywhere which I found a tad rich but I probably wouldn’t have bothered with dessert had we not felt we *should* do the menu justice. And something more refreshingly rhubarby - also good I seem to recall but which has vanished into the mists of time. And some warm madeleines or maybe that was somewhere else.

As is usual with small plate restaurants it’s easy to work up a fair sized bill without realising it. A modest drinks tally of one cocktail (a deliciously refreshing Fennel and Apple Hendricks, below), one ‘virgin’ version and two glasses of wine came to £28.25 + service - almost a third of the total £100.40 bill.

You could easily do significantly more damage to the short but appealingly quirky wine list which is divided up by style and mood (textured, intricate, mouth-filling whites and dark-toned, fleshy, energetic reds, for example). On the other hand you could drink beer - there’s a short but well-chosen list - and eat rather less or stick to the bar snacks. And there's a 4 plate lunch for £25 from Wednesday to Friday which is a steal.

Is The Dairy worth the detour? I’m not sure it is if you’re based the other side of the river. Not that it’s difficult to get to but if you're only in London for a short while there are plenty more central alternatives. But it's a fantastic place to have on your doorstep if you’re a sarf Londoner like Will or my lucky friend. I might just have to scrounge a bed for the night to re-taste that chicken.

The Dairy is at 15 the Pavement, Clapham Old Town, London SW4 0HY. Tel: 0207 622 4165

* never resist an opportunity to give the family a plug ...

5 of my favourite French restaurants in London

For the past few years French food has been eclipsed by more fashionable Italian and Asian but there are still some great places to go if you want a taste of Paris without having to cross the Channel.

In no particular order:

Casse-croute - Bermondsey

I struggled to get into this tiny bistro when it first opened and even recently only managed to score a 6.30 reservation but if you’re a Francophile you’ll absolutely love this kitsch little dining room. Given the size of the operation the menu is sensibly short - 3 choices for each course - but you can also dip into the bar menu. Mains such as (a very good) bavette gratin sauce dauphinoise and pig’s cheek with sauce moutarde mash are also well priced at £14-£14.50: desserts like tarte tatin are just £4.50. A short list of simple French wines from small producers, available both by the glass and carafe completes the picture. (The menu changes every day - check the restaurant's Twitterstream @Cassecroute109 for updates.)

Brasserie Zédel - Piccadilly

A brilliant reincarnation of the classic Parisian brasserie by those ace restaurateurs Chris Corbin and Jeremy King of The Wolseley fame. The food isn't totally consistent (though that's also true of Paris) but the prices are ridiculously good and the room is just dazzling. Amazingly given its central location (just off Piccadilly Circus) there’s an £8.95 prix fixe menu though I’d pick your own entrées myself. Carottes rapées (£2.95), Céleri Rémoulade (£3.25), Tarte aux Poireaux et Gruyère (£3.25), Oeufs durs mayonnaise (£3.75) - you wouldn’t do better on the Left Bank. There’s also a plat du jour for £12.95 and three different types of choucroute, the house speciality.

Racine - Knightsbridge

A great tribute to bourgeois French cooking by Francophile Henry Harris, this smart little Knightsbridge bistro is a long-term favourite. You’ll probably go for the well-priced prix-fixe lunch (£17.75 for two courses, £19.50 for three including, currently, Middle White pork rillettes, grilled Iberico pork with Morteau sausage and white beans and Poire Belle Hélène) but end up being tempted to stray onto the à la carte (grilled rabbit with mustard sauce and smoked bacon (£17.75), tête de veau, sauce ravigote (£17.75), braised lamb ‘à sept heures’ (£19.50) or, for a real splash-out, the Côte de boeuf (£78.50 for two), the ideal way to enjoy one of the best bottles on Harris’s excellent wine-list.

Le Gavroche - Mayfair

For classic old-style French dining and service to match there’s nowhere to beat Michel Roux’s family-run Le Gavroche. Prices are now so steep they don’t even put them on the website so stick to the three course ‘business lunch’ at £54.60 which sounds a lot but includes a half bottle of very decent wine (French, obviously). The menu changes regularly but the website currently shows dishes such as calamars sautés en persillade et risotto a l’encre de seiche, la piece de boeuf, grillée echalote et sauce au vin rouge and soufflé glacé aux noisettes. If you do stray onto the à la carte (don’t say I didn’t warn you) don’t miss the soufflé suissesse - a featherlight cheese soufflé with double cream.

Green Man, French Horn - St Martin’s Lane (Trafalgar Square)

One of a number of French-inspired restaurants and wine bars run in partnership with natural wine importeres Les Caves de Pyrène (others are Terroirs just round the corner, Brawn in Hackney and Soif in Battersea). GMFH theoretically serves food from the Loire region though many of the dishes, like andouillette, can be found elsewhere in France - if you're lucky, these days. The French influence is not slavish - many dishes like leek, crab, egg and horseradish (£9.75) and gurnard, monk’s beard and shellfish vinaigrette (£19) are given a modern twist. There’s a cheaper lunch and pre-theatre menu for £14.50 for 2 courses. Wine from £4 a glass though spend more and you’ll be rewarded.

The Brackenbury: a rather nice restaurant

My father, a sweet man who was never unpleasant about anyone had a phrase for people or places about which he couldn’t summon up much enthusiasm. "Rather nice."

The Brackenbury is rather nice. The food is nice. The wine is nice (actually very nice). I just can’t get quite as excited as I feel I should about it.

That’s partly due to the burden of expectation I brought to my first visit last night. Back in the '90s, when it was run by Adam and Kate Robinson it was one of the most popular restaurants in London. To hear that it had been taken over by Ossie Gray former manager and wine buyer for the River Cafe (and son of the late great Rose) and the well-qualified Humphrey Fletcher who had also cheffed at the River Caff, Kensington Place and all sorts of other worthy places promised a return to the good old days

The food is certainly hard to fault kicking off with the stylish little ‘plate of savouries’ we ordered while we were trying to decide what else to eat - olives, capers, a very good egg mayonnaise and a couple of mini bruschetti, topped with softly cooked onions and anchovies.

My starter of vodka-cured salmon with roast baby beets and a punchy horseradish dressing was delicious. My host had a generous scoop of very well made rillettes and celeriac remoulade. Classic.

We both opted for fish as a main course, in my case a satisfyingly chunky piece of Skrei cod which broke into beautiful pearly flakes. It came with salsa verde, radicchio and (very slightly underdone) potatoes. My friend had a nicely cooked (drat that word keeps creeping in) fresh lemon sole with braised peas and lettuce

He had cheese - a slice of well-matured Lincolnshire Poacher, home-made chutney and oatcakes. I went for Yorkshire ginger pudding with butterscotch sauce - basically a gingery sticky toffee pudding. Ni... No, I’m not going to say that. Perfectly fine though I think I should have ordered the rather more glamourous iced Paris brest, a giant profiterole with hot chocolate sauce which I spotted sailing past.

We ordered a glass of pinot bianco (impeccable) and a classy bottle of Selvapiana Chianti* which would probably have cost at least a tenner more at the River Café.

So what’s the problem? I guess it’s that the restaurant, so fondly remembered for having bags of personality just doesn't have much. The rooms, painted off-white the way TV experts advise in order to sell your house, feels designed to cause minimum offence. There are no pictures. The lights are too bright.

The service while perfectly competent lacks warmth and thoughtfulness. No bread is offered with my salmon, an extra spoon would have been welcome with the pud. It would have been sensible from the restaurant’s point of view to offer a glass of dessert wine. They just don’t go the extra mile.

Maybe it’s simply that it’s not the old Brackenbury but. be honest, who else cares 20 years on? The locals clearly love it and I don't think Gray has any ambitions other than to create a good neighbourhood restaurant. That he's done. I would undoubtedly go regularly if I lived on the doorstep but I’m not sure it’s worth crossing London for these days.

The Brackenbury is at 129 Brackenbury Road, London W6 0BQ. Tel: 020 8741 4928. We spent about £136 but did choose quite an expensive bottle. I reckon you could get away with £40 a head on food.

* an odd choice with fish you might think but it was a light elegant wine which went perfectly with the cod and salsa verde

Worth the detour: Mayfields, Wilton Way

If you’re not familiar with London Hackney sounds a heck of a long way to go for dinner. But believe me Mayfields is worth it.

And it’s actually not that far. Take the Victoria Line to Highbury & Islington, change onto the overground, a couple of stops to Hackney Central and walk 7-8 minutes. Or jump on one of the many buses that pass nearby*

When you see the restaurant you might not think it’s that special. It's really quite small, more like a café or a chic Parisian restaurant that only insiders know about. The menu’s short too but interesting - REALLY interesting. It’s hard to make a decision about what to eat - always a good sign.

How to describe the food? It’s hard to pin down. Some Asian influences, some Italian ones - if I had to choose one word to describe it it would be bold. Big flavours, no shrinking from offbeat combinations or unusual tastes and textures.

We ordered a number of small plates which came in random and not totally logical order - a feature that will no doubt irritate some who like meals to proceed in a more orderly fashion. I don’t mind, myself.

Barely cooked mackerel and squid come in a vivid green watercress sauce. Fine silken slices of scarlet venison carpaccio with an intriguingly smoky flavour are anointed with grated horseradish, perched on rough sourdough toast and cubes of pear.

A brilliant veggie dish of salty monk’s beard (almost like samphire) is partnered with earthy sweet turnip, mealy beans and bottarga. Super-fresh dab tempura with dashi. Incredibly rare, almost raw duck breast with Jerusalem artichoke, carrot and rhubarb is the only dish that doesn’t quite work. Too rare, even for me.

We have to have the chocolate mousse and kaffir lime ice cream which is even better than it sounds - a smooth, warm, velvety chocolate goo, with the fragrant ice-cream melting over it. But the cheese isn’t too shabby either. A really well chosen Abondance and Cathare goats cheese - the former particularly good with a Jura Chardonnay.

The list which is put together by Borough Wines opposite will make anyone who’s into organic and biodynamic wines very happy. Everything is available by the glass. As well as the Jura (Philippe Vandelle’s Blanc l’Etoile) we had a glass of crisp, refreshing St Esteve Blanc de Blancs sparkling ugni from the Luberon (£6.50 a glass), a glass of Thierry Germain’s ‘Soliterre’ Chenin (£6.25), good with practically everything but the duck, and shared a glass of Chateau des Moriers Moulin à Vent Beaujolais (£6.75). It’s a rewardingly offbeat list.

If you don’t go mad you could get away with around £25 on food and £14 for wine a head, so just over £40 with service which is more than fair for an exhilaratingly good meal. I just wish it was on my doorstep but even if it isn’t on yours, go. Go ...

Mayfields is at 52 Wilton Way, London E8 6GG. Tel: 020 7254 8311. The menu changes regularly so you may get offered something quite different - but hopefully that kaffir lime ice cream.

For a full list of buses see the Find us page of the website

I ate at Mayfields as a guest of the restaurant.