Dining Out: Five London Restaurant Predictions for 2025

From dive bars and crisps to the gulf between restauranteurs and diners...

The end of one year of eating marks the beginning of another – we are stepping out beyond the frontier of London’s fixations on smashburgers and mini martinis, and out onto new plains, as yet untraversed. What might 2025 hold? Will sandwiches get even bigger? Will Eating with Tod go redder than anyone has ever gone on camera before? There is this whole wine and ice cream thing that’s going on, I suppose, though I predict that might just end up in a lot of vomit.

If you want my two cents, anyway, I’ve had a look into my crystal prawn ball, to tell you exactly what is going to happen on the London food landscape over the next year. From dive bars to crisps, here’s what I think we can reasonably expect:

The Rise and Rise of the Dive Bar

First Rasputin’s, then Café Mondo – the results are in and Londoners love a nouveau dive bar (even though Rasputin’s get annoyed if you call them that). It makes sense – why wouldn’t you want your drinks to come cheap and creative (like Café Mondo’s Camberwell Handshake – a pint chased with a shot) with a side of a sense of humour and a cheap hot dog or patty melt?

I think the idea of eating genuinely good food at a venue where you can also have a laugh and a dance is only going to become more popular – look at Bar D4100’s success this year, too – because why would you not want to do all of those things all at once? I am not one to hold much about American culture up on a pedestal, but I do hope we see more of this type of New York-y, casual-but-deliberate food – your big sandwiches, your pizzas (imagine a new slice bar in this vein?) – alongside late licenses and actual fun in 2025.