Helen "A...B...." C.'s Profile

Having lived in Tooting on and off for essentially my entire life, I still am in disbelief that this place is here! Together with Smoke, it gives me hope that I'll be able to persuade my non-south-london friends to venture down here!

The drinks are reasonably priced and good. The bars - there's a smaller one upstairs - are long, spacious and well staffed. There are loads of comfortable places to sit and it's not heinously crowded (because it's in Tooting - if this were in the West End you'd never get in after 5pm). So far, so so what... but the building and its decor is what makes it so great.

The space is vast, being an old tram shed and all, with a mezannine running along two sides, lined with tables, sofas and that extra bar (which never has a wait, as far as I can tell). Every nook and cranny has been thought about - butterfly wallpaper in the loos, antlers way up on the walls, fairy lights liberally scattered throughout. They've turned a big empty space into an eccentric's cosy living room. You can hear yourself think, and each other speak, over the music, which isn't bad.

They just need to start serving food again, I'm not sure why they've stopped temporarily, but it's the perfect place to eat, drink and be merry with friends. And then, if you're a lucky Tooting-dweller, even stumble home.

The crowd is pretty friendly.

More bars should be like this - on the way to dinner, we also passed the Antelope which is owned by the same management and that also looked good. Maybe Tooting will be the new Clapham! On second thoughts, let's keep this one quiet.....

The most terrible thing happened (not here! Those four stars are correct!)... I returned from the States only to find that my hairdresser had left me. Devastated. No return address, not even a dear John letter, just a lovely receptionist telling me he no longer worked at the salon... obviously those 6 years meant nothing to him. Humph.

Anyway, I took the opportunity to try and find a salon closer to home, since long distance relationships suck. Orao popped up, it seemed to be reasonably priced, had a decent website, and they were friendly on the phone. Risky, but I took an emergency Saturday morning appointment with Nick.

The salon itself is around a ten minute walk from Balham station, in an unassuming row of shops. It's white inside, clean and minimalist. Nothing particularly special, but I'm not one for those giant swirly mirrors and whatnot anyway.

They serve refreshments - juice, coffee and even beer! I was most thrilled my coffee came with the same brown biscuit I usually get. I'm easily pleased. Even fancy plates and cups.

To the haircut: Nick was lovely, listened to me ask for a trim in the usual roundabout way that takes me ten minutes. Someone else washed my hair - very thoroughly I might add - and then Nick cut it exactly the way I wanted. I had a banquet of magazines to choose from and was comfortable.

Really a very pleasant experience, with the added bonus of a very good haircut thrown in. I noted they also do manicures at 50% off for the near future. Nick's a senior stylist so it was a tad more expensive than my usual - here's my tiny niggle with the place - they have different prices for short and long hair. That's a bit odd in my mind, because I've had short hair and know it's a lot harder to get a good haircut! I'd rather pay for quality than time, and I refuse to believe it takes that much longer to do my less-than-shoulder-length hair than, say, a pixie bob anyway. So -

Eliminate the strange pricing policy and it'd be five stars. I might try somewhere else just to check, but I do rate Nick and I might be back.

Places like this are what Yelp is for! Please go here! Judging by the turnout on a Friday night - 2 tables including ours, for 2 hours - it might not survive very long, and that would be such a shame. I have a couple of theories as to why it might be neglected, but first, the review...

We booked a table, and as we walked in I was straight away asked if I was Helen. I guess noone else booked (as evidenced by the 2 tables!)! They took our coats, and all in all, the service was superb all night. All the staff were lovely.

Then the food: we had Mongolian crispy, an alternative to the usual duck, which came with lettuce leaves for wrapping. It was a nice change and something new. The squid was crispy, perfectyl cooked and had a hefty kick. As in, lumps of chili on the plate! But we still couldn't stop picking at the crumbs so it must've been good. Then for mains we went safe - chicken with cashew nuts, sweet and sour por, rice and noodles. All were great. No MSG here, people, and all the meat was perfectly cooked - even the sweet and sour pork didn't feel too sinful (though in all fairness, probably was!).

And the bill - with a bottle of wine - was less than 20 each. Bargainous.

The food here is far better than I was expecting - even having been to the place when it was David Wong's - and outstrips many places in Chinatown, for sure. In other words, it's a perfect local restaurant. It should be busier! I think the reason it's not is that it looks far more expensive than it is for dining in. The takeout business seemed pretty busy, but the dining room has upholstered chairs, a fantastic fish tank, and top notch service, plus there's a proper bar. So it doesn't look like the kind of place you can pop in and grab a good meal, but you really can! It wasn't stuffy and the prices were only marginally more expensive than the hideous-looking takeaway a few doors down.

So please, Tooting and Balham residents, if you need a bite to eat before a night out or to catch up with friends, or just because you crave sweet and sour pork, go here.

Oh pubs, how I missed thee. Especially ones just like this - cosy, decent draught selection, lots of shelves on which to place your pint (much overlooked but necessary bar furntiure, especially when there are never enough seats), friendly staff. I'm glad the All Bar One (i know, boo hiss) was too packed to consider and we came here instead.

It was standing room only on a Thursday after work - all night - though the upstairs was largely taken over with one party who'd reserved half the tables. The upstairs is nice, a lot like the upstairs at the Angelic, which is another favourite. Wood tables, mismtahced chairs etc. etc.

The bar is well staffed, though I can imagine a crush on a Friday night. I'll go back summer when the beer garden's open. The food looked good, but I didn't have any this time round, due to a lack of seat (exacerbating the cider effects, see below).

Minus one star because I was rather surprised to be charged, yet again, for soda water. This apalling practice should be illegal. I also forgot how strong English cider is, but that can't really be blamed on the pub...

From a geeky engineer's point of view, the national's building alone garners it some stars - it's an interesting structure. Not to everyone's taste, but you can't deny it makes wandering around inside more interesting, and despite being nook and cranny-y, it's actually very spacious and well designed. Plus check out the concrete formwork finish, should you want to geek out like me. Nice.

On a more theatrically-relevant note - you can't beat the 10 pound tickets at the National. Unlike the West End, the cheap seats won't give you a nose bleed and vertigo, and they're genuinely cheap. None of the theatres are so big that you get a bad view.

Yes, I've seen some not-so-great productions here, but I've also seen some mind-blowing ones. Every Good Boy Deserves favour, on at the moment, was interesting and a good length (short) - not the best theatre review ever, I'll admit - not my cup of tea, but for a tenner, worth a shot. Whenever they put on the classical Greek stuff, I'm there like a shot and it's never disappointed. Those will never make it to $100-a-ticket Broadway (pah) but plenty on here in past years did.

The bars are well designed so you don't die getting a drink at the interval; the shop also sells a good range of stuff. Now the South Bank's been revamped, there are plenty of places nearby to get a bite to eat so make an evening of it and head here.

My first yelp review back in London - and for a good while! - so forgive me if I'm a bit rusty. Thought I'd start with Cafe East as 1) I went there most recently, 2) noone wants to read yet another review of Pizza Express or how wonderful the national Theatre is, 3) I have many things to compare it to so I might even be objective! Result.

So, it's not often I venture over to Canada Water, but now my friend lives there it's difficult to avoid. After a somewhat odd experience in the Hollywood Bowl (odd because I was painfully aware I wasn't 15), we ventured to Cafe east for some grub. It is often that I venture to Kingsland Road, so I was interested to see how it would compare.

Very favourably, is the answer. The food was absolutely delicious. It all tasted extremely fresh, with lots of fresh herbs (coriander-tastes-like-soap-disciples, tread carefully), and a spciy kick to knock your socks off. I asked for medium, and was downing green tea towards the end of the meal to soothe by tongue, so watch out! The menu has a few usual starters, spring rolls and the like, and then a dozen or so main courses. I had the pho with everything - don't ask me what it was actually called! - my friend had bun cha which was wonderful. The phos come with the soup on the side so you can choose how to eat it. Portions sizes are huge - the boy was defeated by his - and we left only a tenner poorer.

The space is nice, nothing special but comfortable enough. You probably wouldn't be spending long here anyway - our food arrived within ten minutes. If I'm in this area, I'll eat here for sure. But I think my heart still belongs to Kingsland Road. I'm spiritually a North londoner.

It seems rather unfair that I should discover this place literally the night before I leave Chicago for good!

We didn't go for the all-you-can-eat special, though we probably should have done since most of the things we ordered were on that menu too. It seems generous, and it's only $20 before 8pm Monday to Friday. We had gyoza, 3 rolls including the rainbow, and edamame. The rainbow roll had much fresher fish than our usual sushi place, and was generous on the sashimi and skimpy on the mayo - my favoured sushi balance. The asparagus tempura was incredible, and the edamame were also the best I've had in Chicago. Yes, they're only soy beans, but even beans can be great! Treat them with respect. Gyoza were tasty.

Anyway, all the food was delicious - the tempura ice cream is a novelty, I'd have settled for just excavating the delicious green tea ice cream from the batter but what they hey, it was my last night here so I ate all the deep fried goodness too.

The staff were lovely, it's BYO for wine (though there's a $2 corkage), the décor's great and we whiled away 3 hours here and never felt hurried. So very sad to not get the chance to go back here as I'm sure it would become my favourite sushi place.

Oh - and they sell Calpico soda - Calpis in Japan - which I have never seen outside Japan and was terribly exciting. Try it if you go. it's, erm, unique. In a good way!

Please, USPS, fire everyone who works here and hire some people who actually give a shit.

This place makes me so angry. As everyone has already noted, the staff are slow, rude and unhelpful. Just a please and a thank you would go so far. I'm not so happy about spending $102 on international postage either, missy, but I still said thank you as I handed over my card and as far as I'm aware, you're earning money being here.

I've visited numerous times but today I actually got a snippy comment for not knowing that if you put something in a reused box, you have to pick off every single bloody bit of sticker left on it. (Just in case UPS spot it in the USPS truck and try and deliver it for them?!) I know the crazy postage rules aren't the staff's fault, but them making posting anything a complete and utter misery is.

I miss royal mail, even though they do go on strike every 5 minutes!

3 reasons to go:

Happy hour till 7pm, $1 beers, $3 'cocktails' (as long as they're made of rum and rum only, bizarrely). Half price appetizers.

The food is excellent. Maybe we got lucky but the burger was excellent, as were the buffalo wings and the spinach dip. I didn't find it that overpriced for the quality (and quantity).

Hot waiters.

OK, so it was our first night in Vegas and we had no clue what we were doing. Someone asked us if we wanted free champagne so we said yes. Then we tried to get it.... uh.... not so easy. They keep the crowds outside to make it look desperately popular, then when you get inside there's one girl wearing a belt as a skirt and swinging her ass rather disinterestedly on a table. Then you get 10 minutes of the hour's free drinking for no explicable reason, when the trolls are still giving out freebies outside.

Lies, damn lies, and a bunch of wannabe strippers (and a couple of real pole dancers who were, to be fair, pretty good). Not my scene. Maybe better for dinner.