Platform

Great atmosphere! Decently priced drinks and you almost always get served quite quickly.

Great little place. Independent, a little rough around the edges but cool and trendy nonetheless.
Friday/​Saturday nights in here for boozing is top. Amazing atmosphere, with a variety of people in here from professionals, students and young-​hipster types. The bar staff are good, with a large selection of cocktails, some with a bit of a ‘Platform twist’ on them. The drinks aren’t too badly priced either. A pint, a Guinness, a large glass of wine and two cocktails came to £32.something… Bargain for London prices. I’ve no idea on the food here though, never eaten here.
I would recommend this to almost anyone!

The first thing you notice when you enter Platform is an absolutely gigantic disco ball — I was sold already. My friend is a big time regular here and it was really nice to see how warmly greeted he was by all the staff, who were awesome. They also introduced me to a drink they invented called the Jaeger Royale — a shot of jaeger inside a glass of red bull inside of glass of champagne. Dangerous.

I have never eaten here, so my comments are only about the drinking experience! It’s a really well thought out bar, with fantastic décor and really interesting combination of white tile, art deco print wall paper, a wooden and mirrored bar and a beautiful giant disco ball hanging overhead.
There are two floors, but upstairs always seems a little dead, with the atmosphere really concentrated downstairs. The bar staff have always been engaging and efficient — it seems really easy to get served here and they help people like me who find it difficult to make drink decisions!
The loos could really do with being updated and the seats are surprisingly old and tatty compared to the rest of the décor, so they loose a point for that. However, I got cucumber in my Hendricks and tonic (huge bonus) and it’s a fun place to hang out when waiting for a train (or deciding to take the next one!)

A relatively new addition to the Tooley street line up, Platform is one of the new breed of gastrobars hitting London. It’s about 2 years old now (hence the relatively part) and is proving to be very popular as a drinking spot and moderately intriguing as a place to dine.
The menu is mostly British with a slight European influence. It’s not terribly extensive (or expensive for that matter) but it has sufficient variety so that everyone can find something to suit (even my picky housemate!). I opted for the deep fried pig’s cheeks in order to keep to the goal of trying something new and usual if it’s on the menu. The waitress’s enthusiastic endorsement of the choice further enhanced my excitement for trying this out. For my main, I opted for a seared chard with polenta cakes and a creamy mushroom sauce. I had no idea what chard was but more on that later.
Unfortunately, the pigs’ cheeks turned out to be the McNuggets that don’t make the cut. Small pieces of dark meat, they are battered in plain flour and deep fried to an inch of their gastronomic life. All flavour was sucked out and even the creamy sauce they were served with seemed to lose its taste to the oil soaked void of the batter. I couldn’t even finish the small serving I had from sheer boredom and the feeling each bite was taking 6 months of my life.
The mains arrived and I discovered to my surprise and disappointment that chard is a vegetable. Why oh why didn’t I google this first? Still, undeterred (and very hungry) I dug in. I’ll admit, the chard and polenta were actually quite good and filling. It probably needed a bit more salt (and a lot more spice) but that’s more my personal taste. Despite the lack of meat, I did enjoy this dish and would recommend it, especially to my veggie friends. The chicken my housemate had looked pretty damn good and the thick cut chips were deliciously crunchy.
Other thoughts: The old fashioned was excellent but the bellini the housemate had tasted like Miller Lite. So it’s hit or miss on the cocktails apparently. The atmosphere is nice with the dining room being sufficiently high to allow for conversation. The soft rumble of the trains overhead is not much of a distraction until you realise that means many tons of metal are right above you and you hope they got the strength of the roof right!
Overall, pretty good value especially for the location. I think I’ll opt to stick with the drinks and head to Suchard for my food fixes when in the area!

Went there for our office Christmas lunch and really felt short-​changed by the whole experience. Stingy portions, average food. I couldn’t recommend the experience and won’t be going again.

Found this place randomly by being a london tour guide for a northern monkey. Serve the famous momouth coffee which I hear is one of the best (the same as the coffee shop you can find in the Borough markets area minus the mega line). Knowledgeable antipodean aussie cocktail expert made me a real treat of cocktail. Great atmosphere and for some reason just didn’t have the numbers of people for a standard Saturday morning.

visited on a thursday evening mid december, for a night out with Clients. It was very very busy and the tables all crammed full, mostly set up to cater for larger parties that night. Table we got wasn’t the greatest and I had to perch on the edge, though staff apologised without any prompting, and offered to move us once another table became free. In the event we decided to stay put although the offer was made again to move us. Food was excellent and very good value for money, as was the wine and beer. We all loved starters which included some unusual dishes involving various cuts of pig, pates, terrines, and shrimp dishes, and my main of red mullet was top notch. Puddings went down well with a nice glass of dessert wine, and a nice touch of mince pies and coffee offered FOC by the Manager, although we were stuffed and heading out to a bar so had to leave these behind. All in all we felt well looked after and would definitely go back, and recommend this place — ideal for office parties or client entertaining where you want a buzzing atmosphere and reasonable bill…

Went here as a bar rather than a restaurant after work yesterday. I like it to drink in, its spacious, nice atmosphere, good selection of beers.
I left early yesterday but on previous visits this place has still been open until at least 2am making it the late drinking venue of choice for the area

Please see also

So there is one major problem with Platform, a new restaurant close to London Bridge tube station. It is very loud. I mean ‘you can’t understand you own word and have to shout at your opposite’ loud. ‘Having no voice left afterward’ loud. ‘Having no way to attract the attention of the waiter’ loud. I think you got the idea.
Located in one of the railway arches, the dining room upstairs is spacious and light and would be really attractive if it was not for the bar downstairs which is half open towards the dining area. And the owners must have underestimated how the voices, clicking of glasses, etc. carry in a room with acoustics like this. The background noise is unbelievable and you start thinking that Platfrom might be for entirely the wrong reasons a very appropriate name We went there on Thursday evening and it was relatively busy in the bar, so maybe it’s absolutely fine during the week or during the day on weekends I don’t know.
I did not enjoy my visit very much and this might have less to do with the food than with the atmosphere. The food actually was quite nice. Until the end of August they have a 50% off offer on Toptable, which makes it incredible value for money.
The food is very British and I am admittedly not terribly keen on things like pig’s ear or trotters or offal in general, fortunately there were apart from these still some nice sounding starters to choose from. The Neil’s yard goat’s cheese salad with beetroot and pears (5.50) was really rather good. No culinary epiphany but solid and nice.
I also liked the second starter: Chicken ballotine with prosciuto, foie gras and apple purée (7.5). I love the combination of foie gras and fruit, it worked rather well with the apple purée which was not too overpowering and the foie gras was lovely.
The mains were less convincing. The pan-​fried seabass (13) was nicely cooked and well seasoned, however it came on yellow long beans which were just not cooked enough. I absolutely love beans and I hate them overcooked, but this was just a little bit too raw even for me.
We were intrigued by the beef on offer some back rib piece with red wine jus and parsnip chips (13). An enormous piece of meat. I mean gargantuan. Only about half of it was eaten, that always feels like such a waste. It was ok but did not blow me away at all. The meat itself was nicely cooked but there was something with the sauce that did not quite please my palate. It came with some horseradish butter thing which did not taste of horseradish at all. When we pointed this out to the waiter he told us that their horseradish is very subtle. Yes. that’s fair enough but shouldn’t it at least taste a bit like horseradish if advertised to do so? There somehow just doesn’t seem to be much point otherwise.
Anyway, these are details, I really don’t want to be too harsh on the food as I thought the quality of some of the ingredients was outstanding (many of the them, as for example the beef, is supplied by their own farm) and there was definitely some promise to be seen. However, the biggest problem is the noise pollution. I don’t even think I can objectively judge this dinner as it was for this reason impossible to enjoy.

From Gate to Plate A New Dining Concept at Platform — Pics at The London Foodie
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Restaurateur Tony McKinlay and farmer friend Barnaby Butterfield have joined forces to create Platform, a newly opened restaurant in London Bridge that promises to bring us the concept of gate to plate dining.
This partnership between farmer and restaurateur is novel and has potential benefits. In addition to cutting out wholesalers and hopefully passing on these savings to diners, it also guarantees that the consistent quality of their meat is maintained. Barnaby’s animals are free-​range reared, butchered in-​house and supplied exclusively to Platform.
The concept also minimizes waste as whole carcasses are made available to the head chef, Jake Tutill, giving him a greater choice over the cuts he can use and helping him to create a more varied and unusual menu.
The restaurant is located beneath an old railway arch on Tooley Street, below platform number one of London Bridge Station. Once a lap dancing club, it occupies two floors with the bar taking over the entire ground floor while the upper floor houses the dining area.
The restaurant is spacious and light with large glass windows, exposed brick walls, and an oversized mirror ball hanging from the arch above. It has a casual and non-​fussy feel about it which I found reassuring.
Accompanying me on the evening was Denise, The Wine Sleuth who partnered the wines with the dishes we tried.
We started with Potted shrimps, with lemon and toast £6.50. The potted shrimps were deliciously buttery with intense flavours of mace and nutmeg, and a dash of heat from the paprika. I thoroughly enjoyed this dish and felt that at £6.50 it was very good value.
The Asparagus and hollandaise sauce @ £8 was the better of the two starters. The asparagus tasted fresh and was perfectly cooked.
The hollandaise sauce had been freshly made, and was rich but well balanced with tartness from the lemon juice. I rarely get excited about asparagus but this seasonal, English crop was sensational.
For main course, I had Goose skirt steak, mushroom, tomato and bearnaise sauce @ £14. I am a big fan of skirt or onglet beef steak, but had never tried it from goose. Skirt is the animal’s diaphragm, a working muscle and therefore with a tendency for toughness if not properly cooked.
The meat had been quickly seared and served rare; it had a dense and rich flavour which was well balanced by the slight sweetness and aniseed flavours of the tarragon in the bearnaise sauce. To accompany the steak I also ordered a portion of hand cut chips @ £3.50 which were delicious, crisp on the outside while fluffy inside.
The star of the evening was, undoubtedly, the Devonshire Ruby Red Jacobs Ladder beef @ £15. An old fashioned cut that is hard to come by (there are only two in the whole animal), it is a row of five or six ribs cut off the top to the fore ribs.
As with most meats cooked on the bone, the Jacob’s Ladder was utterly delicious the meat was sweet, falling off the bone and the portion was enough to feed 3 – 4 people. I came to Denise’s rescue but we both struggled to get through the whole piece. I now understand why this cut is sometimes called the oven buster as it apparently swells as it cooks.
To finish off, we shared a couple of desserts Bakewell tart with clotted cream £5.50 and Chocolate fondant, pistachio ice cream £5.50. These were equally delicious, although after the Jacob’s ladder, I was starting to throw the towel in.
Our waitress Carolyn, whom we had met on Platform’s opening night, was a delightful hostess. She remembered us from the hundreds of people that were there on that busy launch; she was very friendly and knowledgeable about the menu and made our experience at Platform very pleasant.
I felt the wine list was well thought out, showcasing a range of different grapes from both new and old worlds starting from £17.75. For a full description of the wines tasted on the evening, check The Wine Sleuth site.
The food menu changes daily depending on available produce and has about six options each of starters, mains and pudding. Two-​course and three-​course menus are available for £18 and £22 respectively which I believe to be excellent value.
Cost: this was a complimentary meal but I have quoted prices of all dishes we tried. I estimate that a 3-​course meal will cost in the region of £25 (excluding drinks).
Likes: unusual and flavoursome cuts of meat, good value and well thought out menu, expert cooking, good location, and very charming service.
Dislikes: the entrance and ground floor areas give the impression of a crowded City boozer like hundreds of other nearby establishments.
Verdict: Non-​fussy, good quality food, beautifully cooked and at very affordable prices in Central London. An ideal place for an unusual but delicious cut of meat, fresh and organic