London | One Club Row: A Chic Shoreditch Restaurant You Can’t Miss
Paris will always have my heart. The slow cafe mornings, buttery croissants still warm from the boulangerie, and that unmistakable golden glow that makes every street feel cinematic. Not to mention incredible food and wine on every corner. It’s a city built for lingering, letting beauty accumulate in small, deliberate moments until an ordinary Tuesday feels worth remembering.
Still, as much as I love the elegance of Paris, another European city pulls me in with a completely different kind of energy- sharper, moodier, and endlessly magnetic. So much so, I am constantly daydreaming about planning my return more often than I should.
London doesn’t seduce you the way Paris does. It challenges you, confronting you with contradictions: Georgian townhouses shadowing brutalist towers, century-old pubs pouring pints beside bars where mixologists treat ice like sculpture. The city operates in layers, each neighborhood with its own personality.
This is a city that rewards restlessness. You might spend your morning lost in the hushed galleries of the V&A, your afternoon threading through Borough Market, breathing in the scent of sourdough and aged cheese, then your evening dissolving into a candelit room so intimate it feels like trespassing on someone’s private dinner party.
In Shoreditch, where street art bleeds across brick facades and vintage shops sit next to tech startups, I found one of my new favorite restaurants. It’s the type of restaurant Londoners mention only to peoplethey trust not to ruin it. Discreet entrance, impeccable execution, and sublime hospitality. Not to mention incredible food.
Friends, I introduce you to One Club Row.
London | One Club Row: A Chic Shoreditch Restaurant You Can’t Miss
The Origin Of One Club Row
Above the Knave of Clubs, a Victorian pub that spent years shuttered before restaurateurs James Dye and Benjy Leibowitz coaxed it back to life, sits One Club Row, accessible only through a discreet entrance you might walk past twice before noticing. Dye and Leibowtz restored the pub below with reverence, then did something unprecedented: they converted the upper floor, which had been untouched for over a hundred years, into a standalone restaurant. Not a private dining room. Something wholly its own.
For the kitchen, they enlisted Patrick Powell, a chef whose tenure at some of London’s most exacting establishments taught him when to intervene and when to let exceptional ingredients speak for themselves. His menu is transatlantic conversation, European technique filtered through a New York sensibility, executed with the best from British farms and waters that week.
What emerges is a space that defies categorization. One could say it’s too sophisticated (and hard to get into) to be merely a neighborhood haunt, but conversely too unpretentious to feel exclusive. Although I felt incredibly special when I snagged a brunch reservation. It’s the kind of restaurant where regulars and first-timers receive the same warm hospitality. I can see people easily lingering after midnight, not because it’s a scene, but because people genuinely don’t want to leave.
London | One Club Row: A Chic Shoreditch Restaurant You Can’t Miss | Quaint & Cozy Interior
Things to know before you go
Securing A Table | With just 45 seats and a small bar, tables disappear quickly. Weekend evenings book out days in advance, though the occasional bar seat opens up for walk-ins, signaled by a light outside the door that functions as the restaurant’s only real-time vacancy indicator. For anything resembling certainty- reserve ahead HERE.
Bar Seating | Ask for a seat here if one’s available. You’ll watch martinis being stirred with surgical precision, feel the kitchen rhythm, and absorb the room’s energy. It’s where regulars sit when they want to be a part of the theater rather than just watching it.
Atmosphere | Convivial without sacrificing refinement. The service operates at the ideal frequency, attentive but never intrusive. During my visit, one of the owners emerged and made rounds,offering the kind of genuine hospitality that turns an excellent meal into something more memorable. Our conversation meandered from London’s dining scene to Nashville’s (where he’d just returned from), and he went as far as to offer a list of places I shouldn’t miss during my stay. I didn’t make all of them, but the list lives in my notes for next time.
For those looking for something a bit more unique, weekend evenings bring a house pianist filling the room with live music.
What To Order | Patrick Powell’s menu is deceptively simple, the kind where every dish sounds familiar until it arrives and you realize this is the version you’ll compare everything else to. A few standouts worth building your meal around:
Martini | I enjoyed the Club Row, but honestly, they all seem incredible.
Pickled jalapeno gougères | Incredible flavor combination and that cheese! SWOON!
Roasted scallop, confit garlic butter | One of the BEST scallops I’ve ever eaten. I would have ordered several more if I had not set my sights on the burger.
One Club Row cheeseburger “au poivre” | The main character of the meal.
The Menu | Shifts with the seasons, which means return visits reveal an entirely different restaurant.
London | One Club Row: A Chic Shoreditch Restaurant You Can’t Miss | Menu
How it unfolded
By the time I checked availability, dinner slots had vanished, leaving only a brunch opening, which I took without hesitation. The entrance gives nothing away. You climb a narrow staircase and emerge into a dining room that feels like someone’s exceptional private residence. Imagine low lighting and tables close enough to feel the room’s energy without sacrificing intimacy. I settled at the bar, ordered a Club Row Martini, and did what any sensible person does when faced with a menu this good: asked the staff what they’d choose if they were sitting in my seat. Their recommendations subtly reshaped my plans without sacrificing my entire strategy.
London | One Club Row | Lobster + Country Ham Croquettes (Bottom) And Pickled Jalapeno Gougères (Top)
To Start
The Lobster + Country Ham Croquettes arrived first, golden, crisp-shelled, the kind of thing you order, thinking it will be refined and discover it’s actually just deeply, satisfyingly rich. But the Pickled Jalapeno Gougères stopped conversation entirely.
Airy choix pastry, aged cheese, the bright heat of the jalapeno curring through all that butter, it’s a bite that recalibrates your brain. I would have happily eaten a dozen.
Then came the Roasted Scallop + Confit Garlic Butter, which, despite being listed under starters, commanded the table like a main. A single, hand-sized scallop seared to caramelized perfection, sitting in a pool of garlic butter so rich it bordered on indecent. Each bite gave way with almost no resistance, sweet and buttery, soaking up that incredible butter sauce.
This is non-negotiable. Order it!
London | One Club Row | Roasted Scallop + Confit Garlic Butter
The Burger
The One Club Row Cheeseburger “ Au Poivre: arrives without ceremony, just a perfect specimen on a plate, no architectural stacking, no unnecessary garnish, Medium-rare as requested, the patty thick enough to stay blushing pink at the center, topped simply with melted cheese, onion, and pickles.
But the revelation sits beside it: a saucière of black pepper sauce, glossy and intensely savory, spiked with just the perfect amount of black pepper. This is where the burger transcends. Each bite dragged through that sauce transforms something already excellent into something you’ll think about for weeks.
The burger doesn’t come with fries, which seems like an oversight until you realize it’s an opportunity. Order the hand-cut fries with aioli separately. The peppery, beefy richness paired with the crisp potato and garlicky aioli completes the equation.
London| One Club Row | One Club Row Cheeseburger “Au Poivre” | French Fries + Aioli
The Verdict
London doesn’t lack for excellent restaurants. New openings arrive each season with their Instagrammable interiors and celebrity-chef pedigree, generate buzz, then quietly fade when the next one opens. One Club Row operates on a completely different frequency.
Reserve ahead, well ahead, and arrive hungry. Order the things that sound impossible to improve upon, then watch Chef Powell prove you wrong. Stay for one more drink than planned. Some restaurants you visit once for the experience. This is the kind you build return trips around.
Until Next Time!
