The River Cafe
Italian Restaurant in Hammersmith
Opening Summary
Lunch
Monday - Friday: 12:30 - 14:15, Saturday: 12:30 - 14:30, Sunday: 12:00 - 15:00
Dinner
Monday - Thursday: 19:00 - 21:00, Friday - Saturday: 19:00 - 21:15
River Café is one of London’s most famous restaurants, partly due to the stable of chefs it has trained over the years, who have included Theo Randall, Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall, and Stevie Parle. Set up by Ruth Rogers and the late Rose Gray, this Italian restaurant helped to popularise fresh, seasonal, locally sourced ingredients, now the accepted standard for any eatery.
There are great views of the Thames thanks to its fantastic riverside location; otherwise you can spy on the chefs while they work in the exposed kitchen.
Sit outside on a nice day if you have kids. There's a great big grassed area on which your children can play, as well as a vegetable garden for them to explore!
We visited on a Sunday lunch service; we sat outside and the sun was overhead as we looked over the river - this was always going to be a good meal!
The River Cafe effortlessly creates the kind of atmosphere to which nearly every other restaurant aspires: a buzzy, friendly informal affair but all underpinned by professionalism and faultless cooking.
We ate crab, courgette tagliatelle (drowned in butter!), turbot, sea bass, summer pudding and plum and almond tart. All perfectly balanced and masterfully seasoned and cooked. Fantastic, simple, fresh, seasonal food.
