The National Portrait Gallery’s top floor restaurant has a long, narrow dining room and is thus louder than the apocalypse. The food is mostly impressive, however, and impressive views across Trafalgar Square are guaranteed from each seat. Open for lunch and dinner, the restaurant serves a Mediterranean-inspired fine dining menu of classic dishes executed with modern flair. Fish and seafood cookery is the kitchen’s clear strength.

An urban oasis in central London, The Garden Café is affixed to The Garden Museum at the foot of Lambeth Bridge. Natural light floods the spacious dining room and the constantly changing menu features simple, seasonal dishes — elegantly presented and served on classic white plates, rarely featuring more than three main ingredients. These may include cold breakfast radishes with cod’s roe; cockles, bacon and laverbread; or gently spiced breast of lamb with chickpeas and bitter chicory: substance over style at its best.

The second coming of artist Damien Hirst’s Pharmacy restaurant, Pharmacy 2 is an immersive addition to Newport Street Gallery in Vauxhall. His long time friend and chef Mark Hix has created a menu up there with the best in London galleries (‘Heaven and Earth’ — a marble of soft black pudding with mashed apple and potato is a must-try), but the eccentric dining room is the main draw. Stained glass windows have double helix patterns, bar stools resemble pastel-coloured lozenges and surrounding medicine cabinets are packed full of every type of pill, capsule and medical paraphernalia.

If Osteria’s dining room is unattractive, be thankful for the views of the brutalist Barbican Centre. (Try to get a table on the edge of the dining room, looking out.) Elsewhere, there’s plenty to love here. Modern Italian bistro cooking is showcased in simple dishes. A fillet of plaice is modestly presented with new potatoes and samphire, for instance, and dressed with a butter and caper sauce. Grilled octopus is a clear speciality though (with more potatoes and capers), as is the ham-wrapped saddle of rabbit saltimbocca. One of London’s more underrated restaurants.

On the ninth floor of the new Blavatnik Building, the Tate Modern Restaurant boasts impressive views across the river. Service is casual and the atmosphere relaxed, while the menu has a strong focus on seasonal British cooking. Simple, yet accomplished. Moreover, to accompany the Picasso 1932 — Love, Fame, Tragedy exhibition, a Picasso-inspired lunch menu is currently available. Dishes include roast rabbit leg with chickpeas and tomato, or bacon crapiaux with pungent Andouilette sausage and English mustard: a perfect pairing.

Replacing the also-lauded Whitechapel Refectory in 2020, Nick Gilkinson — formerly of fellow listee Garden Museum Cafe — and Joe Fox — formerly of fellow listee Petersham Nurseries — Townsend has gone from strength to strength in its short, pandemic-clipped life. Dishes like fried Wensleydale with heather honey and smoked chilli; wild mushrooms with egg yolk, Berkswell cheese, and truffle; and poached root vegetables with potato cake and green sauce betray the fact that this is a modern British restaurant aware that much of modern British is really old European with an accent.