Gordon's Wine Bar

Gordon's opened in November 1890, when Angus Stafford Gordon — one of the last Free Vintners left in London — set up in the vaulted cellars a few steps down from Villiers Street. The rooms haven't changed much since: bare brick, candle stubs melted onto every surface, and a wine list built mostly around sherry, port and old-world bottles rather than anything trendy.

There's no table service and no reservations in the cellar — you queue, then claim whatever corner opens up, cheese board in hand. The courtyard terrace above, wedged between buildings a couple of minutes from Embankment station, is the fallback when the cellar's full, and it's a good fallback.

Go on the earlier side of the evening if the underground rooms are the point; by 7pm on a weeknight the queue is already out the door.