The best restaurants in Notting Hill

If you want authentic Malaysian food, then run to Normah’s. Located through a neon-lit indoor market in Queensway, the short menu is a list of greatest hits; banging beef rendang, curry laksa, and crispy fried chicken. One woman (Normah) is behind the stove, sharing dishes from her homeland with aplomb. Teh tarik is a sweet, dreamy delight, while hand-pulled parathas demand a return visit. Just make sure you book. For every smug diner there’s a poor soul out of luck at the door.

Head towards Maida Vale to discover one of west London's most beloved Greek restaurants. This friendly taverna has flawless versions of all the classics; taramosalata, tzaziki, halloumi, and Greek salad, followed by souvlaki or whole fresh fish from the in-house chargrill, and majestic moussaka. 

First she bagged three Michelin stars at Restaurant Gordon Ramsay, and now Clare Smyth’s solo debut has gone and done the same. The three star Core is housed in a gorgeous period building in Notting Hill: it’s high-ceilinged and elegant but also vibrant, not pompous and great fun. The food is extremely special, with immense technical brio and a playful streak that makes it all very accessible.  

Akub is chef Fadi Kattan’s Palestinian restaurant on a residential backstreet in Notting Hill. With olive branches, warmly lit dining rooms and a wall draped with arabesque William Morris pomegranates, you'll feel like you've been given the key to a secret garden. Here you'll get shish barak – parcels of delicately spiced pumpkin – and dagga ghazzawieh – a spicy Gazan salad of winter tomatoes, chilli, dill, and plenty of good olive oil. A confident newcomer that’s free and creative in its expression and storytelling.

Heavy is the head that wears the crown in W11. The pedigree behind Dorian is strong, with chef Max Coen (whose resume lists the Michelin-starred Ikoyi and Kitchen Table) wielding the finest British produce within a concise brassiere menu. Ale Villa (previously at Core by Clare Smyth) manages the bar, creating signature cocktails (try his famed fig-leaf negroni), and the French/Italian wine list is supplied by Noble Rot’s Keeling Andrew & Co. With a Michelin-star under its belt, open-fire cooking is celebrated here. Think small bites and generous sharing plates, though prices are in line with the affluent postcode.

Few haute restaurants have the hospitable hum of The Ledbury. Despite its three-Michelin-starred status and deadly serious prices, this world-beating culinary corker is still in the top tier for gustatory good times – thanks to Aussie chef Brett Graham’s way with seasonal British ingredients (and much else besides). For consistently thrilling, audacious, unimaginably delicious food and genuinely friendly fine-dining, nobody does it better.  

Open since 1967, you’ll find Tiroler Hut down a rickety staircase on Westbourne Grove. Can’t see the sign? Then simply follow the sound of dinging cowbells and the smell of hot, liquid cheese. A fever dream of an Austrian restaurant, it’s Disneyland as penned by Hunter S Thompson. Octogenarian host Josef holds court. A one-man band in a felt hat and full lederhosen, he works the small, low-ceilinged room like we’re in Las Vegas, playing keyboards, sax, accordion and clarinet, before his infamous, and largely indescribable cowbell show. Oh yeah, and there’s also food; fondue, all manner of wurst and plenty of booze.

Saffron rice bejewelled with pomegranate seeds, cumin-spiked lamb, pillowy naan bread... Sadaf punches through the mediocre ceiling of high-street kebabs with delicate spicing and robust flavours. This is Persian food at its finest. The interior is simple yet elegant, and service is invitingly warm. This is Notting Hill, so expect blasé trust fund kids next to Iranian ex-pats. Either way, you’ll leave with a modest bill and an utterly satisfied belly.

A supremely chill wood-panelled space that fits just six diners, Juno is the smallest omakase counter in the UK. You'll find it upstairs at Japanese-Mexican fusion spot Los Mochis, where exec chef Leonard Tanyag (formerly of Zuma), and head sushi chef Han (Nobu, Roka) deliver banger after banger of perfectly formed fish dishes, like back-to-back DJs at the culinary equivalent of intimate south London rave spot Venue MOT. The 15-course tasting menu is also gluten and nut free. You'll need to be slightly adventurous though; flying ants mixed with chilli and salt, grasshopper shavings and wagyu with an agave worm are the menu's more leftfield additions. 

Opened on a residential Holland Park street in 1969 by Julie Hodgess, an interior designer who kitted out stores for high-end hippy fashion house Biba, this restaurant set the template for bohemian west London. Over the next few decades Julie’s attracted grizzled rockers and glossy It girls alike. The latest – and possibly the tastiest – incarnation of Julie’s has a kitchen run by Owen Kenworthy whose menu straddles the line between bistro staples and cheffy flair. Martinis are a must. 

The Hero might have many hallmarks of a proper British boozer (beer on tap, a slightly eerie painted sign swinging in the breeze, The Clash creaking out of the speakers) but you couldn’t just come here for just a pint. There are no stools at the bar, for starters. What The Hero is though, is a great restaurant. From the same team behind The Pelican in Notting Hill, the menu comes stacked with sizable snacks of sticky lamb ribs, a toastie bursting with dense ogleshield and a cheese and onion pie that is basically a savoury chocolate lava cake, oozing ogleshield out of pastry that is essentially and incredibly, nothing but crust.

As a cookbook specialist, this bookshop-cum-café is one for the purists. Each week, its tiny in-house kitchen road-tests recipes from the latest titles and serves them as two or three-course lunches at OMG prices. There are also loads of cakes, all of which would have Mary Berry coming back for seconds. It may be off the tourist trail, but this is a hugely popular spot – so expect to queue.

There’s usually a queue at this ‘Med-inspired’ Turkish grill, but no-nonsense service means you’ll bag a table pretty quickly. While you wait, get the juices flowing by watching Fez’s meat maestros as they rotate the hefty barbecue skewers and shave slices off the own-made doners. They also score with cut-above accompaniments including crunchy red cabbage, spice-rubbed flatbreads and tangy Turkish yoghurt. It’s BYO and they don’t charge corkage – hooray!

Who would expect a Hollywood hot-spot to be hidden within the leafy streets of Holland Park? Enter Caza Cruz. Imposing copper doors keeps the riff-raff out and the beautiful people in. With celebrity diners like Taylor Swift, George Clooney, and Cara Delevingne, and a burly doorman (bouncer?) out front. But make it through and you’re gifted with South American-inspired cuisine in an intimate, luscious space; all mirrors, velour, and ripe opulence. The menu is equally decadent, and the wine list borders on ostentatious. 

Quietly confident and refreshingly laidback – and that’s just the service at this much-loved Notting Hill favourite, housed in a one-time butcher’s shop. Ex-St John chef Tom Pemberton’s ‘nose to tail’ training shows in a seasonal menu of butch-but-stylish British dishes cooked with real flair and panache (a Blythburgh pork chop with swede and kale, for example). Prices are all-round neighbourly.

With the melting pot of cultures that Portobello Road represents, a fusion-inspired menu feels like the only way to do the iconic postcode justice. Notting Hill’s Portobello 177 is headed up by chef Shay Ola, who pays homage to Caribbean flavours with a modern British twist, mirroring the area’s carnival heritage, and adding the occasional nod to Japanese ingredients. As the newest venture by the team behind Trailer Happiness – the long-running tiki bar downstairs – Portobello 177 invokes a similar kind of celebratory spirit. 

A Turkish grill restaurant near Portobello Road that offers posh dips, healthy salads and incredibly tasty grilled meat. Everything here is inspired by the cuisine of south-east Anatolia; the best are the lamb chops, glorious, delicate and smoky and served with a couscous salad of apricot, mint and pomegranate.

This wholesome clean-living take on the chicken trend smacks of middle-class family holidays in France. Herb-marinated, whole-roasted happy hens are brought to the table on a wooden board, along with your choice of sauces and zingy salads teeming with heroic superfoods – think kale, quinoa, pomegranate, nuts and seeds. Hot sides include classic ratatouille – or the rebel of this goodie-goodie family, truffled mac ‘n’ cheese.

Easily outclassing its previous incarnations, this sidekick of Notting Hill’s Electric Cinema is done out like a grungy New York diner – all bare brick, concrete and red leather banquettes. A blaring soundtrack adds to the vibe, while the supersized menu is stuffed with stateside classics – philly chilli cheese dogs, hot reuben sandwiches, wedge salads and unmissable ‘fries au cheval’ (inspired by Chicago’s Au Cheval diner).

The main characters behind this shiny Notting Hill sophisticate are a starry couple: she is Michel Roux Jnr’s daughter, he is a former head chef at Le Gavroche. Together they have created a classy contemporary venue with a menu that’s oddly divided into six character traits: ‘curious’, for example, equals roast diver scallops with radicchio, hazelnut, blood orange and beurre blanc.

Med Salleh Kopitiam is inspired by Malaysian ‘coffee shops’, casual spaces serving drinks alongside food stalls. Although a restaurant, the menu is representative of kopitiams with dishes now seen as quintessentially Malaysian, such as roti canai (created by the Indian community), rendang (originally an Indonesian Malay dish), and char kway teow (‘char’ meaning stir-fry in Hokkien and Teochew). The food leans towards a sweet palate and doesn’t have the heat of some Malaysian regions, but if you're new to Malaysian food it’s a great introduction, and if you’re looking for a taste of home, you will find flavours here to curb any homesickness. 

Caia is a tale of two venues. The upstairs room of this new Notting Hill restaurant and wine bar gives off an air of sophistication, with chic bar stools to perch on and floor-to-ceiling bottles. But there’s a clear vibe shift when you walk downstairs to the basement. Suddenly you’re at a ’70s house party, with kitschy-cool velvet seating, chandeliers and even a disco ball. Conceptually, Caia joins the rising London trend of cool music-first joints that also offer banging grub and cocktails. 

This upmarket Japanese joint specialises in temaki: chunky rolls of sushi designed to be eaten with your fingers rather than chopsticks. It also boasts tempura dishes, a sake list, and a dessert menu featuring elaborate treats including a many-layered matcha mille crèpe. 

Coming from the same team as Gunpowder, who’ve been neatly delivering classic Indian sharing plates across their trio of restaurants in Soho, Tower Bridge and Spitalfields for the past few years, this is their first west London venture. Empire Empire focuses on the full throttle cuisine of the northwestern Punjab region, with biryanis, kebabs and tikka given top billing. Order the tandoori hariyali king prawns; big, beefy boys, stained Kermit-green with coriander and mint and juicy goat seekh and duck and guinea fowl jheela kebabs.