Punk Royale, London W1: ‘Someone shoved mystery slop in my mouth’ – restaurant review | Grace Dent on restaurants

<p>A new immersive dining experience promises to unleash anarchy in Mayfair. But is it just revolting?</p><p><a href="https://punkroyale.com/en/london/">Punk Royale</a>, from Stockholm, has landed in London promising, or rather threatening, that their rowdy, immersive, 20-course fine-dining experience will destroy all puny British perceptions of posh food. It’s a huge claim from these Swedish punks. Indeed, nearly 50 years after the UK invented punk, with the <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LtHPhVhJ7Rs">Sex Pistols effing and jeffing on live TV</a> and provoking a national meltdown, here we have some folk with mullets and Roxette CDs slopping “bumps” of caviar on to my hand shortly after beckoning me into a shoddily decorated, fusty-smelling dining room in Mayfair. It’s all a bit student house and needs a good visit from Mr Sheen. That bump, one supposes, is a playful twist on taking cocaine at a grotty afterparty. However, none of the jokes at Punk Royale is really playful: rather, they’re mostly big, clumsy sledgehammer thwacks. Such as when, for example, they turn off the lights, serve some substandard remoulade, and&nbsp;instruct you to lick it off the plate, while blasting <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KXx9W110CRg">Khia’s My Neck, My Back</a> again and again as your soul dies. I’ve heard more whimsical humour at a <a href="https://www.roychubbybrown.biz/">Roy Chubby Brown</a> gig.</p><p>That caviar bump, by the way, came with a shot of tomato water that complemented it nicely. All the drinks afterwards on the non-alcoholic wine flight, however, were thick, soupy, funky and vegetal.</p> <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/food/2025/oct/12/punk-royale-london-w1-grace-dent-restaurant-review">Continue reading...</a>