Vori

Vori (“spring”) opened in late 2023, situated on Holland Park Avenue quite near the tube station. It was set up by Markos Tsimikalis, a former derivatives trader who previously ran a restaurant called The Hungry Donkey in Shoreditch. The head chef is Mustafa Cetinkaya. The restaurant uses the excellent butcher Lidgates, which is just a few doors away, for its meat. The ground floor dining room seats around 55 guests, and there are a couple of outside tables, suitable for good weather.

The all-Greek wine list had 35 labels ranging in price from £30 to £150, with a median price of £65 and an average markup of 3.1 times retail, which is pretty decent for London these days. Sample bottles included Kokotos Estate Savatiano PGI Attika 2022 at £41 for a bottle that you can find in the high street for £9, Domaine Zafeirakis Microcosmos'Malagousia PGI from Tyrnavos in Thessalia 2024 at £68 for a wine that retails at £27, and Hatzidakis Mavrotragano 2022 was £100 for a wine that is currently valued at £62. At the high end of the list, the excellent Pure Assyrtiko 2020 from Episcopi Gonia in Santorini was £120 compared to a retail price of £79. The lovely Foundi Naoussaia Xinomavro 1999 from Macedonia was £150 for a wine whose market value is currently £103. The list appeared to be following a gradated markup policy, adding a fixed amount to the wholesale costs for the posher wines, rather than multiplying the wholesale cost by a factor. This is a progressive way to price a wine list, encouraging customers to order better wines since they are not being penalised for ordering better bottles. I wish this practice was more common.

We started the meal with a series of dips, served with good pitta bread. Taramas had white cod roe with cucumber and dill oil (£7.50), while the next was Santorini fava split peas and onion (£7.50). Tzatziki was the classic Greek yoghurt with garlic and cucumber (£7). Melitzanosalata was roasted smoked aubergine, flavoured with marjoram (£7). My favourite of the dips was tirokafteri, made from roasted red pepper and feta with Metaxa confit figs and chilli (£7.50). The gentle bite of chilli really lifted the flavour of this dip. These were all pleasant dips, with the tirokafteri being genuinely interesting (13/20)

Gloucester Old Spot skewer (£18) had high-quality pork grilled over charcoal, but it was cooked a little longer than ideal. It was served with confit garlic and tirokafteri, a spicy feta cheese dip (11/20). Mastelo cheese (cheese from the island of Chios in the Aegean) was pan-fried with walnuts, chilli and honey. This worked well, the walnuts providing a contrasting texture to the cheese, the gentle chilli enlivening the dish (13/20). Grilled prawns with tomato, chilli and feta (£20) had reasonably good quality prawns that had been grilled over charcoal, the prawns being tender. The feta and a touch of chilli gave the dish a Mediterranean slant (13/20). Whole sea bream (£28) was cooked carefully and had good flavour. This was a simple but enjoyable dish (13/20). The best dish for me was manitaria (£16), which comprised a stew of Portobello mushrooms with Kariki blue cheese and honey butter. The cheese is a cow milk cheese, aged in gourds, from the island of Tinos. The combination of blue cheese and mushrooms sounds a little odd but worked very well in practice, the earthiness of the mushrooms pairing well with the richness of the cheese and honey (14/20).

Dessert was bugatsa, traditional a breakfast pastry. This had filo pastry stuffed with custard and flavoured with cinnamon and vanilla. This was a good dish, the pastry light and the filling well balanced (13/20). Service was fine. I was being taken here so didn’t see a bill, but if you shared a modest bottle of wine then a typical cost per person for three courses might be around £80. Vori is a pleasant neighbourhood restaurant that seems to be attracting a regular local audience. For me it was better than Oma, which (bizarrely) has a Michelin star.