Mon—Sun 11.30am—9.30pm
The style:
South Kensington’s Tombo, recently refurbished and reopened, labels itself ‘London’s first authentic Japanese café and delicatessen’ with good reason, with their unique, authentic range of Japanese teas and speciality ingredients cleverly combined into more recognisable European delicatessen forms.
The site emphasises the deli/café elements of Tombo, with a sleek glass-fronted entrance leading to the delicatessen counter and a few light and colourful seats. Moving past this lobby, though, you reach an equally sleek eating area that is open late enough for dinner, with a menu that has a suitably extensive drinks component for an evening meal as well. The atmosphere and lighting in this rear section was well-suited to a more restaurant-y vibe, suitably ambient and not too bright—as I had worried from the café description—and the background music was subtle enough to hear each other talk.
The staff are friendly and helpful, with one of the managers coming out to talk to us at length about the different tea blends available and his recommendations. Their teas are sourced from the foothills of Mt Fuji, which apparently has the best soil and climate for quality tea crops, and matcha (finely milled and thus more intense green tea) features often on the Tombo menu, from mains to cocktails.
The crowd:
When we arrived it was quietly busy, and filled up more as the evening progressed; good for a relatively new addition to the South Kensington scene. Fellow diners ranged from drop-ins tempted by the clean, modern Japanese dining ethos to those who seemed like regulars already, perhaps enjoying a taste of home.
The food:
My visiting friend and I shared a selection of options from both the sushi and the hot food menus, which arrived amazingly quickly and with obviously fresh ingredients. The unagi don was a stand-out amongst the dishes—very tender and well seasoned, and the rice was the perfect consistency. Eel is sometimes hard to find even at Japanese restaurants, but it wasn’t simply absence making our hearts fond of this option.
A salmon teriyaki plate was good as well, with accompaniments that were the ideal complement, although the salmon maybe lacked something flavour-wise compared to the other choices, and was a little dry.
Chicken maki was delicious and unusual on the side, and I will certainly be returning to try more of their sushi options in future—it was the sort of menu that makes it hard to decide what to have. Nowhere was this more evident than the dessert menu, where every option looked mouthwatering, from matcha tiramisu to azuki (red bean) and white chocolate cake. In the end the matcha brownie proved a fantastic—if rich—choice that was almost mossy or peaty in its flavour combination, with a great scent, while the mochi rice cake with azuki filling was sweet and moreish.
The drinks:
I started with Bonsai green tea, one of Tombo’s unique specialty tea blends, which is a mix of Sencha green tea and roasted brown rice and had a nutty, almost meaty flavour. I’m not usually a huge fan of green tea, which I find a bit sickly after a cup or so, but this was a very welcome discovery. My friend had a matcha latte, which is pretty hard to find in the UK and is a favourite of mine, so much so that one of the most exciting parts of my evening was realising I now had a new place to buy matcha powder to make it at home!
There are plenty of alcoholic options too, and we plumped for a classic plum wine that was reliably good and a very good pungent, aromatic sake.
Tombo is Japanese for dragonfly, which is culturally a symbol of renewal and positive forces, and the renewed Tombo is certainly a delightful find, in its simple and cleanly sophisticated focus. It is not a four-course, late-night restaurant, but nor is it simply a café/deli, and is a more than sound option hovering round the corner from South Kensington.
