Food Type : Pan-Asian
Location : 1st Floor Kingly Court, Carnaby Street, London W1B (nearest tube : Oxford Circus)
Courses : 3+
Price : Approx £50/head but with a lot of dishes & cocktails/wine
Book Ahead? Only in peak times
Website : www.okarestaurant.co.uk
So after my rather terrible & frankly awful review of the highly sought-after (& massively overated) SushiSamba, I wanted to flip it with one of the best Japenese/Pan-Asian meals I have had in a long time. Me & my husband had a rare day off together, in the week, and we needed to go central anyway, so I started looking for a nice cheap-ish japanese we could hit up for a late lunch. OKA came up continuously on my google searches so we decided to give it a try. We didn’t book as it was after the lunch rush , and got a table easily.
It’s on the first floor in Kingly Court, which is an amazing place to go and get food if you are central/visiting London and at a loss of what to eat as this is a large courtyard of restaurants, pop-ups and lively bars. It gets really busy in the lunchtime rush and in the evenings 7-9pm , but if you avoid these peak times you can probably just rock up and have a seat at one of the 30 or so restaurants packed up in this area, running over 3 floors.
OKA is a modern take on pan-asian and you will be right at home is you like freshly-made sushi, seafood & japanese hot dishes ; possibly my favourite food in the world! The restaurant is pretty small and maybe has around 9 tables, but you can also have food to takeaway and office delivery.
What we ate & drank.
We started with a fresh cocktail each which was really, nice (Think I may have had some kind of Mojito..) and then a bottle of white wine to go with our dishes. From the menu we ordered Prawn Tempura, Soft Shell Crab Uramaki, Seared Salmon with miso & Daikon Salad, White Fish Sashimi, Mongolian Rack of Lamb & then the hot cookie dough to share as dessert. A LOAD OF FOOD. All was absolutely delicious, we did want to try the Black Cod but that was not on when we were there so we opted for Mongolian Lamb instead (which is another speciality). There was not one dish that wasn’t fresh, tasty and finished up but the highlight must have been the Seared Salmon dish which was one recommended by the very helpful and informative waitress.
All the seafood was fresh-tasting and beautiful and although we ate loads, we didn’t have that sickly feeling when we left ; That’s what I love about this type of food. We chose a few of the signature/more expensive dishes but you could easily eat here for like £20-£30 per head without the booze.
Like I said, we went after the lunchtime rush (I think it was like 2.30pm) when we arrived, but there was still a good, lively atmosphere and a few of the other tables filled. Although it’s inside, if you sit by the window, you can open up a big window that allows some of the Kingly Court atmos to pour in.
Final Thoughts: Can’t wait to go back to this little gem! Absolutely would reccomend to anyone who loves this style of food. The only negative is that thay didn’t have the Black Cod on the day we went, but I can let that slide because EVERYTHING we had was delicious.
PS If you are a blogger visiting London and want to stay central and get a bit lost when you want to eat (it happens, it still happens to me) …..just take yourself to Kingly Court & I promise you won’t be dissapointed. No they have not asked me to write about it etc, I just love food, interesting food and ALL THE OPTIONS & PEOPLE WATCHING.
