The Park Road Hotel, Teddington

One of the interesting things about going to London when Bernhard is there is that I get to stay in hotels I'm much too much of a Puritan to stay in on my own. This is one of those, and it has a hotel restaurant in which we both ate on Thursday and where I ate alone of Friday, as Bernhard was out with his colleagues.

Both days were filled with an earnest desire for food and a lack of discrimination; Thursday started with leaving my hostel in Malmö, Sweden, at 4 in the morning, and Friday was spent transcribing German texts in the British Library. In both cases, I rapidly reached the point where I'd eat anchovies and call it good. I hate anchovies.

To our great pleasure, this turned out to be quite a nice hotel restaurant. While it can't hold a candle to Brassierie Gérard, it serves well-cooked English food and does so with friendly service.

Thursday, Bernhard had chicken livers, fish and chips, and a passion fruit creme brulee for dessert. I had a shank of lamb and sticky toffee pudding - unlike most food aficinados, I have a serious liking for British food - so sue me. This place has the sense to cook food without interfering to much: the fish tasted like fish, the lamb like lamb, and flavours were well-mixed and pleasant. On Friday, I had seafood tagliatelle, a glass of pinot grigio, and the creme brulee, painfully aware of how standard a woman-dining-alone-meal this was, and it was all tasty and cheerfully served. While there is also other excellent food to be had in the area, this hotel restaurant is certainly worth eating at.

Bernhard adds: Adding the hotel part into it, with good service at the reception, your bags being carried and a very nice room this certainly qualifies as the best overall Hotel experience I have had.