The Frog: Inventive to a fault

Don't be fooled by the bare tables, industrial design features and low prices, says Bloomberg. The cooking at The Frog in London's E1 "is more serious that in many fancy restaurants, with a focus on flavour and an appreciation of aesthetics".

Adam Handling, a finalist in Masterchef: The Professionals in 2013 and last year's Scottish Chef of the Year, "is clearly totally dedicated and highly skilled", says David Sexton in the London Evening Standard. "But tasteful?"

Not entirely, says Marina O'Loughlin in The Guardian. "I can't shake the feeling that the Frog is a rather silly restaurant, torn between a desire to be both fine dining and rock'n'roll".

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Roast hake "cooked for maybe a crucial minute too long" and tortured into a boat shape "verges on the comical", she says, but crackly, beetroot-stained sugar tubes stuffed with beetroot pannacotta and jellied yuzu, then dusted with a blanket of lurid beetroot powder has "technique, panache and creativity".

There are some obvious problems, agrees Radio Times, most notably the decor and the service, but Handling's cooking is ample compensation. This is a restaurant "brimming with verve and excitement".

The Frog is at Old Truman Brewery, London E1