Sushisamba

SUSHISAMBA occupies the 38th and 39th floors of the Heron Tower on Bishopsgate, and the main reason to go is the view before the food ever arrives: outdoor terraces here are among the highest in Europe, wrapping the City’s skyline in a way very few restaurants anywhere in London can match on a clear evening.

The kitchen fuses Japanese, Brazilian and Peruvian cooking, an unusual combination that traces back to the Japanese immigrant communities of Sao Paulo and Lima rather than being an invented fusion concept dreamed up for the London market, so the menu jumps between sushi rolls, ceviche and Brazilian churrasco-style grilled meats within the same meal without feeling entirely disjointed. Cocktails draw on cachaça and pisco alongside the more familiar sake-based options found at most Japanese restaurants in the city. Set tasting menus range from around £80 for a vegetarian option up to £135 for the most elaborate version on offer, with plenty of room to order individual dishes instead.

The room matches the concept in energy: loud, brightly lit, closer to nightclub-adjacent energy than a hushed fine dining space, which suits a celebratory group booking far better than a quiet dinner for two trying to hold a conversation. A resident DJ plays through service most evenings, and the crowd tends to be a mix of City workers marking an occasion and visitors booked in specifically for the view.

Given the height, the views and the City postcode, this was always going to be an expensive night out, and reviews are broadly consistent on that point. The more debated question is whether the food itself fully matches the prices charged, with several reviewers describing results as inconsistent from visit to visit despite genuinely impressive presentation on the plate.

The honest caveat: this is a restaurant where the setting does a great deal of the selling, and diners going purely for the cooking rather than the spectacle and the view may leave feeling the bill outran what actually landed on the table, however memorable the skyline looked from the terrace.