Otto's French Restaurant

A discreet green-fronted room on Gray's Inn Road, Otto's has kept classical French cooking alive since 2011 under chef-patron Otto Tepassé, an old-school maître d' who carves, flambés and presses at the table. It is best known for canard à la presse, the theatrical pressed-duck ritual once made famous by Paris's Tour d'Argent, prepared here on a solid-silver press and ordered days in advance. The walls are a deep mallard green, hung with Warhol prints and vintage film posters; blue velvet chairs, blue Spode china, candlelight and a wall of wine give the room the feel of a Parisian bistro that time forgot.

For private events the restaurant works on two levels. The intimate Belle Époque Room downstairs sits beside the wine collection and takes a single boardroom table, one long table, or three tables for a seated dinner. Taken as a whole, the ground floor and basement combine for a larger seated dinner or a standing reception, and Otto's opens on its closed days for private hire, so a group can have the place to itself.

The cooking is the draw: bespoke menus built around the kitchen's pressed dishes and a serious, sommelier-led wine list. It suits an intimate celebration or a private dinner where the food and the theatre of the table carry the night.