Medlar

Serene, thoughtful, upscale twist on British food.

Absolutely wonderful! Gorgeous food, lovely staff, such a pretty restaurant. We selected the set menu (three courses for £35) and were rewarded with a feast! Crisp salads, delicious steaks, sumptuous puddings… course after course was sublime. Highly, highly recommended– best meal I’ve had in a good long time.
Ideal for a celebration (we were toasting a friend’s birthday), but also perfect for a family meal or a dinner a deux.

I love everything about this restaurant. Literally everything. It is one of my top restaurants in all of London.
The décor is adorable and very comfortable whilst being sophisticated. The service is top notch. The menu is exciting — traditional and modern at the same time. The food is excellent. I have never had a bad meal or experience at this establishment.
It is hard to say what the best thing here is, the menu does change with some regularity. One thing they always have on the menu is the steak, escargot and fries which is amazing, and probably what I order the most. They once had venison done 3 ways which was also incredible. Basically you cannot go wrong with whatever you order here.
I recommend that everyone come here for a special occasion, or just a random Tuesday lunch.

Delicious meal at Medlar. The service was sincere and top notch and the food was perfectly executed. I recommend going on Monday when there is a 20% off your total bill offer if you mention when booking :) I was blown away with the duck heart appetizer I had and hope to return on our next trip to London.

With a occasion to celebrate, my friends and I decided to treat ourselves to another one of the 50 best restaurants, according to time out (as we speak, I’ve done 4; 46 left to go).
After an hour of deliberating, we chose the Medlar.
And it was perfect. They have a 3 courses set menu for £35 (lunch) and the quantities are just right so you’re still hungry for desert (my usual weakness is to be too full by the time the desert cart arrives).
I would give an extra point/​golden star to the desert: very very light and not too sugary. It was really hard to choose but that’s the good thing about going with a group of friend: you can take several and try them all: Chocolate tart with the texture of a fondant, Cheesecake melting in our mouth, the most fruity passionfruit ice cream and the grand finale: Pear beignet to dip in chocolate.
Wine is a bit expensive — the minimum for a bottle is £30.

Perfection. Second time here in two years. Just wonderful. Going back next week. Food is stellar and sommelier friendly and knowledgable.

Overall it wasn’t a great deal of difference compared to my last visit, as expected, some very classical western European flavours with a small modern touch, service was really friendly and charming too. Personally I think this is the best restaurant in the Chelsea neighbourhood for under £100 per person, I took the Monday offer advantage to get 20% off on my entire bill, I would say it was money well spent (£50) for this kind of quality cooking. Not to mention they have an excellent cheese board with some very special cheeses that are a must to try for any serious cheese lover.

One of the best meals I’ve had, and best ever for London. Service, ambiance and other intangibles were spot on, and I really enjoyed the menu scheme — a healthy 6 – 8 choices from each of the three prix fixe categories. At our table of four, we all chose different dishes on almost every course, so were able to sample about half of the menu in one evening. Everything was great — starters were fun and experimental, ranging from soups to raviolis. Lots of good uses of duck eggs and fish/​seafoods in these options. Mains were more meat-​focused. My pork dish, though, was not heavy at all despite containing three different preparations of the meat. For dessert, I had the honeycomb ice cream, which was creamy and not overly sweet — memorable bites all the way through. Had we not been so stuffed, we would have gone for a cheese course as well — we’ll save that for another time!

Exceptional customer service.
Great food.
Romantic atmosphere.
Great London restaurant.

This is the best meal we had in London. The service was gracious and the food was superb. We had the tuna tartare and crab raviolo to start. Both amazing. Good Albariño to go with them. The under blade main course was perfect and medium just as ordered. Finally, for the dessert course, my husband got cheese and I had ice cream and palmiers. The cheeses were out of this world. So was mine. Really enjoyed everything. Sunday is a great night for the prix fixe. If we didn’t live an ocean away, we’d be back often!

Fusion British and French. Like their private dinning area upstairs, good for celebration with privacy.
Compared to other fusion restaurant, food is average as it is a bit lack of imagination on favour, texture and plate display in main course.
Starter and desserts have better texture and display.

Recommended by a friend based in Singapore, we decided to give this restaurant a try and booked a dinner for 2. Expectations were high having heard its good reputation for food. Overall we found the food above average but not fantastic (and we compare with Michelin star quality food). Location was quite out of the way from the nearest tube station, ambience was good except we were put in a corner of a smallish room with 3 other large tables packed with groups of 4 – 6 which made any type of dinner conversation difficult.

Started the meal with complementary champagne. Never a bad place to start! Disclaimer — my friend is a chef here so we got hooked up. We brought our own bottle of wine but they have a fantastic wine list and the #1 sommelier in London.
Tried the following: duck egg tart, tuna tartare, roast coquelet, grilled halibut, blood orange sorbet, mango millefeuille. There are a few dishes that came our way that aren’t on the menu and so I can’t remember them exactly… whoops!
Maybe the food isn’t my normal fare so I’m not the right critic, but these are complex dishes with a lot of flavor and some just weren’t for me. The duck egg tart with sauteed duck heart was mouth-​watering but the grilled halibut didn’t have the same harmony. And the blood orange sorbet was drowning in gin, taking away the tart of the fruit and making it quite bitter.
The experience was amazing and it’s a great atmosphere, but just didn’t wow me on all levels.

Having heard from almost everyone I knew that London food sucked, I wanted to try a nicer restaurant to see if the dining really was subpar.
Medlar is located in Chelsea and it took me an hour to get to from the Latimer Road tube station. I was running late for my reservation, but the restaurant was gracious enough to hold my table. Upon entering, I was immediately greeted, offered coat check, and sat without any delay.
The menu is a 3 course prix fixe for £45. If you don’t order a full dessert for your third course, they charge you £38 for 2 courses. The duck egg tart was my favorite. The dish was interesting, flavorful, and the duck heart garnish tasted delicious (I’m usually not a fan of organs). The crab raviolo and under blade fillet were also solid (the chips that came with the fillet were amazing). The dish I would not order again is the braised ox cheek. The taste was fine, there was just too much meat and some of it could have been more tender. The dessert of passion fruit meringue tart with coconut ice cream was outstanding. Though I was full to almost bursting by this time, I somehow managed to eat the amuse bouche of marshmallows and truffles. The sommelier recommended a lovely 2009 Cabernet Sauvignon to complete the meal. Very happy with the selection.
The service was prompt, professional, and knowledgeable. I felt perfectly comfortable asking a lot of questions and never felt rushed to finish my meal (though by 9 PM, the place was packed).
I would definitely come back to Medlar for a celebratory dinner, special occasion, or an evening out with close friends. This restaurant deserves its Michelin star.

They also offer desserts,
teas, and after dinner drinks. High quality foods at very reasonable price.
Great service, relaxing atmosphere, delicious and high quality foods, and good
value to your money. This is Medlar all about.

I had a Saturday lunch here with friends, and I have to say, it was good, but slightly disappointing in some ways (considering that it is now on the list of Michelin restaurants in London).
I’m going to start with the positive — their desserts are great, and definitely the highlight of the menu. I can highly recommend the lemon curd ice cream, which had a perfect combination of creamy & icy and also tasted incredibly fresh and lemony. All desserts we ordered were not too sweet — the sugar never overpowered the flavours of other ingredients.
Bad things — I love it when chefs are experimental, but I would say it’s probably a good idea to taste what you put on a customers plate before you put it on! Both my friend and I had rabbit, and as a side, there was a rabbit liver pâté on toast. I had never tasted rabbit liver before (chicken and duck only), but the overpowering taste of gastrointestinal juices nearly killed the rest of the dish. My friend and I both agreed that it tastes like the acid leftover in your mouth after you’ve thrown up. It was sooo sooo disgusting. I mean really, very disgusting.
The service was also rather frosty. The staff had a very «we are a boring and snobby Chelsea establishment» feel, despite the décor, which was very simple modern, and quirky. No one was really willing to banter about the food or talk to us about where it was from. Terrible really, I’ve never been to a Michelin-​level restaurant where the staff wasn’t excited to talk about the food with you. It just felt like you were in any old restaurant where the waitress’ only job is to take the food from the kitchen and put it on your table (except you are paying more for the non-​existent experience).
Worth a try, but probably only for lunch. And remember, avoid that rabbit liver.

OK, after some debate this gets 5 stars. If I was comparing with the other Michelin starred places I’ve been this would get a 4 but in comparison restaurants in general in London the experience easily deserves a 5.
I think you should go to this restaurant — it felt suitable for many occasions (Sunday dinner with the girlfriend, losing your Michelin virginity, work celebration, etc.) so you have no excuse.
The 2 biggest positives for me were the main course and the price. We went for dinner on a Sunday and had 3 courses for 30 quid — in terms of value I would challenge someone to find a decent restaurant in the city for this much, let alone one with a star. This on it’s own probably warrants a visit.
The poussin was the star of my meal. I’m a big fan of having things served different ways, and the 3 pieces of poussin on my plate were delicious, as was the sauteed spatzle which seems to be very popular at the moment. My girlfriend’s lamb was equally impressive and any diner would be happy with both.
The starter and desserts for me were ok, but not as memorable (I had to refresh my memory from the menu). The crab raviolo (I like their attention to grammatical detail), and the cannele were very good intricate cooking, but I just didn’t find them to be up there with the all round quality of the main course.

Visited Medlar on a Sunday and it was not very busy. I was a bit surprised as I heard good things about the place before and that it was popular so asked about it but they said that it was very busy all the other days of week but Sunday’s were a bit slow.
The starters were very good (duck tart and foie gras) and the wines recommended went excellent with it. The mains were not as great especially the under blade fillet was a disappointment. Perhaps it was the expectations that it would be great (it is one of their signature dishes) that was part of it but the meat was neither tender nor flavorful. The roast duck breast with confit was however better but my partner was not entirely impressed by the potato terrine.
The desserts did however deliver excellent quality again, the Pear Bignet was excellent and my partner loved the Cheesecake. Coffee was however very disappointing — either they are not skilled at operating their espresso machine or they use poor quality beans. Would expect it to be the skill to the problem as it does not seem like a place that would buy poor quality coffee beans so perhaps some practice can make the coffee drinkable.
All in all an enjoyable experience with good food but a bit uneven. The service was also a bit slow (and it was not due to them being busy as there were only 4 tables)

A very welcome addition to the neighbourhood and fairly-​priced, to boot. The décor is nice although I am not a fan of the green ‘sculptural’ light fixtures which seem at odds with the muted shades of the wallpaper and furniture.
Disappointed that the restaurant do not serve prosecco by the glass. The sourdough bread was very good, the focaccia less so (lacking the big, air bubbles that make a foccacia)
My dining partner and I very boringly chose the same starter and main. The crab raviolo was delicious. Silky smooth pasta skin filled with a generous crab filling, served on a bed of leeks (a few too many thus lending too strong an allium flavour to the dish; perhaps my only gripe) and a beautiful reduction that required ‘slurping’ up with the fish spoon. For main we had the pork chop dish: a perfectly done chop served with braised pig cheek, jus on a bed of celeriac purée. It was all very good, if a little on the salty side (the jus and the braised cheek)
For pudding, I chose lemon sorbet with vodka as the generously portioned starters and main had filled me up. The two generous globes of sorbet served with a slightly less-​than-​generous dribble of vodka was just the ticket to cleanse the palette and aid digestion. My dining companion chose to have cheese from the very well selected cheese trolley. I was surprised to see that the only accompaniment to the cheese, aside from some rather bland quince jelly, was a plate of Carrs water biscuits. It might have been nice to have a selection of two or three crackers.
Overall a great meal. The service is friendly if a little disorganised. Our starters were served before the wine, the cheese plated up a long while before my dessert arrived and we had to ask for the dessert wine twice (Canadian ice cider– excellent!) On the plus side, there were small welcome touches like asking us if we would like tap water (rather than pushing another bottle of mineral water) after we finished our bottle. We will be back.

Yeah, this place is fantastic.
The atmosphere is upscale but laid back. The food is British but somewhat French-​influenced. The French influence is clear from the sauces, which tie each dish together. They even bring you extra bread, encouraging you to mop up more sauce.
The service is friendly and attentive.
I started with the veal — thin slices of meat with potatoes, rocket, paper-​thin slices of parmesean, and dollups of creamy sauce. Everyone else feasted on crab ravioli which was supposed to be excellent.
Next for me was the rabbit — beautifully soft accented by purée and an interesting potato dauphinoise with grilled onions.
I’ve had a lot of panna cottas in my life, but their buttermilk and strawberry version was quite incredible. They finished it all off with some grand mariner truffles. Delicious.
Ah, yes, and the wine. We had a Priorat — excellent. And a white Port.
They let us linger well after closing at the table, happy to bring this or that. We finally left, very happy, stuffed with food.
Truly delicious. You must try it.
Gluten-​free notes: Wow, it’s treatment for a queen here. I said in my reservation that there was a gluten-​free diner, and unlike any place I’ve seen before, I arrived to find one menu already marked up with notes on what was already or could be made gluten-​free — which was nearly all of the dishes. And then they served me the best gluten-​free bread in England. No, it wasn’t Genius. Apparently it’s from Whole Foods. Magical.