A London food diary entry on saying goodbye to a fourteen-year Soho institution, why unpretentious restaurants matter more than the flashy ones, and what actually gets lost when a neighbourhood favourite closes
10 Greek Street closed its doors permanently this week after fourteen years, final service on the eighth, and I booked a table the moment I heard, dragged my sister along, and then spent an embarrassing portion of the meal genuinely tearing up over a plate of skate wing in a restaurant I’d probably only eaten at a dozen times total.
Why A Restaurant I Barely Visited Regularly Still Hit Me This Hard
That’s rather the point, isn’t it. Founded in 2012 by Cameron Emirali and Luke, it was never the place I went every week, but it was always there, the reliably unpretentious neighbourhood spot you’d suggest when you couldn’t decide on anywhere else, and somehow that background steadiness made its closure land harder than I expected.
What The Final Service Actually Felt Like From Inside The Room
Genuinely lovely, in the specific bittersweet way these things go. Regulars greeting staff by name, a low hum of shared nostalgia across every table, and a kitchen clearly determined to send the whole fourteen-year run out on exactly the same unfussy, generous form that had defined it the entire time.
Why I Think Soho Keeps Losing These Particular Kinds Of Places
It’s never the flashy openings that struggle, is it, always the steady, modestly-priced, genuinely reliable ones, squeezed by rent and rates in a way the big-ticket Spanish spots and Michelin-adjacent newcomers never seem to be. Soho gains a new headline-grabbing restaurant practically every month and loses this kind of place almost as regularly, and the trade feels increasingly lopsided.
What I Actually Ordered For My Own Small, Private Send-Off
The skate wing, obviously, because it felt like the correct, appropriately unshowy choice for the occasion, alongside a bottle of something my sister picked entirely because she liked the label, which felt exactly in keeping with the restaurant’s own unpretentious spirit.
What I’m Actually Going To Do Differently Now That It’s Gone
Book the quietly reliable places more often, rather than saving my restaurant budget purely for the new, buzzy openings everyone’s talking about. Fourteen years is a genuinely long run for any independent restaurant in this city, and I’d rather actually show up for the next steady neighbourhood favourite while it’s still here than mourn it properly only once it’s too late.