Bob Bob Ricard

Bob Bob Ricard has been on Upper James Street since 2008, and the gimmick that made it famous, a gold button on every table marked press for champagne, is still there and still works exactly as advertised: press it, and a member of staff arrives promptly with a bottle. It is a good gimmick precisely because the restaurant behind it holds up on its own terms.

David Collins Studio designed the interior around the golden age of rail travel, blue leather booths, brass fittings, a sense of old-world glamour that few London restaurants attempt this fully. The menu mixes British comfort food with Russian dishes, a nod to the founders’ background, and the range runs from a shareable Beef Wellington to a classic chicken Kiev. The lobster mac and cheese has become something of a house signature and earns its reputation, rich and generously portioned. Humble Pie, a truffle and champagne pie, leans further into the restaurant’s love of excess and mostly delivers on it.

Service is a genuine strength, staff are attentive and well drilled without feeling stiff, and the booths give a level of privacy unusual for a Soho restaurant of this size.

It is not cheap on a standard evening, though the restaurant’s off-peak pricing, roughly 25 percent cheaper on Monday evenings and for Monday-to-Wednesday lunches, along with a £29.50 Sunday roast, offers a genuinely useful way to experience it without the full price tag. The theatrical, slightly over-the-top format will not suit anyone after understated fine dining, but that has never been the point here.

For a genuinely fun, indulgent night out with a bit of theatre attached, it remains one of Soho’s more distinctive restaurants.

A second site opened in Cannes some years after the London original, though the Upper James Street restaurant remains the one most associated with the brand and the button. Booths are limited in number and genuinely sought after, so requesting one at the time of booking is worthwhile if the private, compartmentalised feel of dining in a train carriage is part of the appeal. Weekend evenings book out well in advance, particularly around anniversaries and celebrations, which the restaurant’s whole aesthetic seems built to encourage.