Loafing List
Submerged beneath new London eating hotspot Hix, Marks is one of the best bars that we have ever been to. Cool, relaxed, sophisticated; this is a place worth spending your hard earned loafing hours
We will, no doubt, recommend Hix - the new effort from celeb chef Mark Hix (his other London restaurant being Hix Oyster & Chop House). First, however, we want to rave about Marks; the rather brilliant bar serving up cocktails and drinks to quench the driest of thirsts.
Most bars tacked onto a first class restaurant tend to almost be an afterthought, but not here. The high standards devoured upstairs are maintained in the basement bar. A former sushi bar (which explains the low level of the service counter), where the drinks are mixed with as much love and care as you'll find upstairs or anywhere in the city.
The tenders of the bar are knowledgeable, dutiful and keen to impress with their skills. They need to be helpful too with the vast array of booze to choose from. We ended up discarding the verbose drinks menu and instead named our favourite spirit and asked for a recommendation; you're unlikely to be disappointed if you do the same.
The cocktails are served in fantastically random glasses (ranging from grannie's best crystal to metal goblets) and all from a reasonably priced menu. If cocktails aren't your thing then Marks' good range of great wine, British beers and ales will keep you occupied.
Loafing on the sofas is almost positively encouraged with some cocktails served up in halves; one half for drinking whilst the other half remains chilled in its own personal glass ice bucket. Slow appreciation of your drink, your surroundings and your company is clearly the order of the day.
So, with perfect Perfect Manhattans and delightfully Dirty Martinis in hand, we lounged watching the bar billiards table put to good use. To top it off, if you can't stand the wait for the tables upstairs, you can get yourself something off the bar menu (ranging from quails' eggs to chips).
