Polpo Notting Hill

Went with my wife for brunch and had a simple request to make a scrambled egg instead of a poached egg since she was PREGNANT… But the chef refused. The Chef can’t take 60 seconds to scramble an egg for a pregnant woman?!? Why? Great question! I decided to bail rather than stick around and ask the chef if he was just lazy or a pretentious prick. Either way, there are so many other places in London that would accommodate such a reasonable request that I’ll happily spend my money there instead.

Polar opposite experience to what I had at their soho branch…
Staff were lovely, service was relatively quick without rushing and the food was delicious.
Best way to do this place is by sharing, and if you’re in a group of 3 then you’re in luck because most things ome out in lots of 3’s. Polpo actually means octopus but I don’t think there is much octopus if any at all on the menu (I didn’t see any).
You can choose from a number of things on bread such as chicken liver parfait, salmon on crostini and there are a couple of things from the fryer such as arancini and stuffed olives. They are ok but nothing too out of this world. The pizzettes are pretty delicious and very cheese heavy in a comforting way.
The meatballs are particularly delicious the only thing I would like to see is a little bit more sauce. They match very well with the herbed polenta. The courgette salad also goes combination with this perfectly.
Be careful when you order because everything comes out at the same time so maybe if you are looking to eat things in stages ask the waiter or order a little bit at a time.
They have a Campari spritz special 4−6pm each day take advantage of this but give your drink a sniff and make sure the prosecco in the drink tastes ok as we had a problem with corked wine.

Good food and although it is a tapas restaurant it is very well served. Big portions, three can be divided by two people.

This place is cute, fancy, and has friendly service. The food was a bit uneven. Some of it was great (mussels, meatballs) but my octopus dish was overwhelmed by beans. Nice wine selection, and they were happy to let us sit for 4 hours and eat and drink.

We ordered a few tapas in Polpo yesterday, two of them being the octopus which we’d thought must be good as it’s a signature dish. Turned out to be a dish made of 90% beans a a few pieces of polpo. None of us like beans and if we were told or the menu had mentioned beans in English, we surely would not have ordered this dish. We called the waitress and explained why we don’t like the dish, she asked if we would like her to take the plates away, we said yes. Later the bill included these dishes! For mains we went across the road to Eat Tokyo where we paid less for a massive incredible japanese feast than we did In polpo for only the starters.
Another dish that was almost as disgusting was a courgette salad, raw tasteless courgette. Not recommended.

A lovely, spacious and trendy restaurant with a nice bar to sit at for quick bites and drinks.
We popped in for a drink before going to dinner. The drinks menu includes lots of nice cocktails and aperitifs as well as wine, beers and spirits.
We both went for the elderflower martini. It certainly packed a punch, but had a slight floral taste to it too.
The restaurant layout is much better than the Polpo in Soho. I’ve eaten there before and everyone is crammed in. Here there’s plenty of space for lots of diners.
The décor and lightening sets the mood nicely for a chilled out evening.
The staff were polite and helpful regardless of the fact that we weren’t eating.
The food menu looked great, though I’ll review it properly for the Soho restaurant!

Loved this place. My husband and I stopped in for a cocktail and snack at the bar and the menu was perfect for us. We ordered the meatballs, crab arancini and foccaccia bread– all were quite tasty and good (though small) portions for us to share mid-​afternoon. Looking forward to returning for a full meal with friends.

Loved my meal here!
We had the spicy pork and fennel meatballs, which weren’t too spicy but had great flavour. They perhaps could have used a bit more salt though. The prosciutto, smoked mozzarella, and rocket pizzette was awesome. And they managed to make a zucchini dish (a bland vegetable, in my opinion) taste absolutely delicious.
Great meal, great atmosphere, great service.

Great simple lunch for two. We ordered the one of everything plate to be able to try all the starters.
For my main course I had the Prosciutto, Smoked Mozzarella & rocket pizzette. This was a great light meal that had good flavor and is a perfect sized portion for a single person.
Dessert was just as tasty as the meal with my all time favorite Tiramisu. This had an outstanding flavor with the perfect mix of sweet cream and chocolate. My only issue… the size! I’d rather it be served in a pint glass vs a bathroom tumbler. :).
Overall a good experience, with the food and the service.

Perhaps the one star is not fair because we only tried 2 tapas, but I had no desire to order any more. Risotto that was not risotto, but more like a ham casserole with peas, and fritto misto dominated by sardines left me wanting, wanting to leave. Cool vibe, but food and service did not deliver.

I loved my Polpo experience in the spitalfields branch, I think I gave I something like 5 stars. So, when the chance to get fifty percent off for soft launch came up for their new branch, well, it would be a sin to not go. Also I’m really sad to give it such an average mark but seriously WHO HAS A FOUR HOUR LUNCH?! apparently our table– they couldn’t really handle the amount of people they had coming in despite a lot of staff on hand. But you know, that’s why it’s soft launch– and I respect that. But in that time I think hazel and dan had about 4 proseccos each in the time in between! (Also not a in a posh proseccos glass– sad face)
Also it might be that we ordered pretty much the WHOLE menu, that might have been an issue for the kitchen to keep up. There were a few dishes I wished I didn’t order like the rabbit salad with capers which was TOO salty and I’m sorry the endive salad just cannot compare with the courgette one. The courgette one is like 10x better! Highly recommended but I think the one I had at spitalfields was better seasoned– MORE CHEESE PLEASE! :) and the panzonella didn’t really match the rest of the menu, it had a sweet Ottoman influence with raisins and it just didn’t work for us! Out of the dishes we had, the top few contenders are definitely the courgette salad, the spinach pizzette which was GORGEOUS with the runny egg, and the name sake meatballs!
The location is pretty easy to find, restaurant ambience was low key, and great for catching up with friends and although we had a really great time, there are some major kinks with the service and the speed of service and I think in time, hopefully this will get ironed out! Until then, find me in the spitalfields branch yeah?!