The Best Restaurants Near Borough Market

Borough Market is the best place to buy food in London and one of the worst places to eat a meal, and the two facts are related. Three million people a year come to a market that was built for traders, and the stalls are set up to feed a queue rather than to seat one.

The best Borough Market restaurants are in the streets around it, not in it. Winchester Walk, Stoney Street and Bedale Street hold more serious kitchens per hundred yards than anywhere south of the river, and almost all of them are a two minute walk from the stalls people are queueing at.

Here is what is worth sitting down for, and the thing about the market’s own hours that decides your whole day.

The market’s hours are not the district’s hours

The full market does not run every day, and a great many people arrive on a Monday to find a fraction of it trading. Our Borough Market guide has the day by day breakdown and which day to pick.

The restaurants around it keep ordinary restaurant hours and are open when the market is not. If you are here on a quiet market day, the eating is still the reason to come.

The serious Borough Market restaurants

Hawksmoor Borough, Winchester Walk

The original Hawksmoor south of the river, in a low brick room a street behind the market, and the set menus are the same unusually good value as the rest of the group.

Hawksmoor Borough

Address

16 Winchester Walk, SE1 9AQ

Nearest

London Bridge

Hours

Monday to Saturday midday to 11.30pm, Sunday 11.30am to 11pm. The kitchen closes earlier: 9.30pm early in the week, 10pm Friday, 10pm Saturday and 8.30pm Sunday

Price

Set lunch 21 pounds for one course, 26 for two, 30 for three. Early evening 26 for two courses and 30 for three

Standing

The original Hawksmoor south of the river

How to get in

Thirty pounds for three courses at lunch or early evening is the cheapest serious steak this side of the river. Their own published note is worth repeating: the restaurant is currently not wheelchair accessible. The kitchen shuts up to two hours before the room does.

Roast, in the Floral Hall

The one restaurant actually inside the market, in the Floral Hall above the stalls, and the only one on this page where the market is the view rather than the walk.

Roast

Address

The Floral Hall, Stoney Street, Borough Market, SE1 1TL. A second site opened at the Virgin Hotel, 45 Curtain Road, Shoreditch

Nearest

London Bridge, less than a two minute walk

Booking

Online, or 0203 3713 120, or info@roast-restaurant.com

Standing

Inside the market, in the Floral Hall above the stalls

How to get in

Upstairs in the Floral Hall, which is the iron and glass structure over the market itself, so you eat looking down on the thing everyone else is queueing in. They still publish no opening hours on their own site, so ring rather than assuming, particularly on a quiet market day. Note the second address when you book, because Shoreditch is a different restaurant in a hotel.

Padella, Southwark Street

The short hand rolled pasta menu that spawned the queue, and the queue is the whole subject.

Padella

Address

Borough Market, and also Shoreditch and Soho

Nearest

London Bridge for the Borough Market site

Price

Pasta from 9.50 to 16.50 pounds

Standing

Three London sites built around a short hand rolled menu

How to get in

Pasta from nine pounds fifty is why the queue exists and why it is worth it. Go at opening or late: the middle of a Saturday is an hour on the pavement. There are three branches and the Borough Market one is the original, the busiest and the only one that takes no booking at all: Shoreditch and Soho now take reservations up to four weeks ahead, which makes them the answer when the time is fixed.

OMA

Address

2 to 4 Bedale Street, SE1 9AL

Nearest

London Bridge

Price

Three pound signs in the Michelin Guide

Standing

One Michelin star, and in their own words the spirit and simplicity of the Greek isles. Sits directly above its downstairs counterpart, AGORA

How to get in

The only Michelin starred Greek restaurant in London, by the Guide's own cuisine listing, and it is above a counter at Borough Market rather than in Mayfair. Most guides to this district miss it entirely.

This is the serious cooking at Borough and it is easy to walk past. OMA holds one star, the Guide files it as Greek and Mediterranean, and AGORA downstairs is the same operation at a lower price. Our Greek guide puts it against the Notting Hill rooms, which are run on much stricter booking rules.

Brother Marcus Borough Yards

Address

Borough Yards, SE1 9PA

Nearest

London Bridge

Hours

Monday to Friday 8.30 to 23.00. Saturday 09.00 to 23.00. Sunday 09.30 to 21.00

Booking

Online for up to 22 guests. The terrace here is walk in only, because they take terrace bookings at Spitalfields and Canary Wharf only

How to get in

Fourteen and a half hours a day Monday to Friday, which is the answer to this district's whole problem: the market keeps short hours and the restaurants around it do not have to.

Half past eight in the morning to eleven at night is the longest day in Borough. In a district where the market itself shuts early and visitors arrive to find the stalls packing up, a kitchen running straight through is worth more than a ranking. Dogs are welcome with a note on the booking.

The counters

Brindisa, at the market

Brindisa Borough Market

Address

Borough Market Tapas Counter, SE1 9AG

Nearest

London Bridge

Booking

Walk ins are always welcome, and some terraces are walk in only

Standing

A tapas counter at the market, from the Spanish importer next door

How to get in

Their own line is that walk ins are always welcome and that some terraces are walk in only, which makes this the answer when Padella has an hour on the door. It is the restaurant arm of the Spanish importer, so the ham and the tinned fish are the things to order rather than the cooked dishes.

The pubs, which are older than the market’s current building

The George Inn, Borough High Street

The George Inn

Address

Borough High Street, Southwark, SE1

Nearest

London Bridge or Borough

Standing

The only Grade I listed pub in London, owned by the National Trust since 1937

How to get in

Set back from Borough High Street through an archway, which is why people walk past it. What survives is only the south range of what was once a full quadrangle, so the galleried front is about a third of the original inn. The courtyard fills first on a warm evening and the bars inside stay quieter.

The Royal Oak, Tabard Street

The Royal Oak

Address

44 Tabard Street, Borough, SE1 4JU

Nearest

Borough

Standing

Harvey’s of Lewes, and no longer their only London pub

How to get in

A Sussex pub transplanted to SE1, a few minutes from Borough station and far enough off the main road to stay quiet. It is the one place in this postcode where you can reliably get a table at seven on a Friday, because almost nobody walks that far from the market.

Practical notes

Walk two streets. The queues are at the market entrances on Stoney Street and Borough High Street. Winchester Walk and Tabard Street are two and six minutes away respectively and are a different evening.

The kitchens close earlier than the rooms. Hawksmoor stops cooking at half past nine early in the week and half past eight on a Sunday, while the bar runs to half eleven. This is the most common way to lose a booking here.

Go at opening or after nine. Borough between noon and three on a Saturday is the densest pedestrian crush in London outside a station, and every restaurant in it inherits that.

Check accessibility before you book. These are old, low, converted buildings on narrow streets. Hawksmoor states plainly that its Borough room is currently not wheelchair accessible, and it is not the only one in the postcode that would say so if asked.

Everything here was taken from each venue’s own published information and rechecked on 28 September 2026. Several of these publish very little, which is noted where it applies. Confirm before you travel.

Where to go next

The Borough guide covers the whole neighbourhood, including which day to come and why the market shutting at five is the detail that matters more than its closed Monday.

Bermondsey Street is the other end of the walk, and the day you go decides what is open.

Rambutan is on Stoney Street and takes walk-ins, which almost nothing else here does.

Padella is the most famous queue in London and it is not the only model. Who takes walk ins in London sorts 154 venues by how you actually get in, from the fourteen that take no bookings at all to the thirteen that hold tables back on purpose every day.

The tower on the other side of the station is a different budget entirely. London Bridge and The Shard covers the six rooms stacked above the platforms, the three that publish a price and the ones that give you a dress code instead.

The Borough Market guide covers the market itself: which days it trades in full, what to buy and what to skip. The best pubs in London has the George in its proper context as the only Grade I listed pub in the city.

Comparing neighbourhoods: King’s Cross, Shoreditch, Covent Garden and Canary Wharf.

The market is also where Wright Brothers started, which is why it appears in the seafood guide alongside the rule that decides whether you eat oysters or cooked fish: the raw bar and the kitchen keep different hours.

Brindisa began on the corner of the market twenty years ago and still runs a counter there. The tapas guide covers it, along with the three restaurants one chef keeps on Bermondsey Street ten minutes away.

Questions we get asked

What are the best restaurants near Borough Market?

Hawksmoor on Winchester Walk for steak, and its set lunch at 30 pounds for three courses is the best value serious cooking in the postcode. Padella for hand rolled pasta from 9.50, if you will accept the queue. Roast, in the Floral Hall, is the only proper restaurant inside the market itself. Brindisa’s counter takes walk ins when everywhere else has a wait.

Where should you eat at Borough Market?

Buy at the market and sit down somewhere else, which is the honest answer. The stalls are built to feed a queue rather than to seat one, and the serious kitchens are one or two streets away on Winchester Walk, Stoney Street and Tabard Street. The exception is Roast, which is upstairs in the Floral Hall and looks down on the stalls.

Do you need to book restaurants near Borough Market?

For Hawksmoor yes, particularly for the set menus. Padella Borough Market takes no booking at all, only a virtual queue on the Dojo app, and at a Saturday lunchtime that runs to an hour, so go at opening or late. Brindisa states that walk ins are always welcome and that some of its terraces are walk in only, which makes it the reliable unbooked option.

Is Borough Market open every day?

Not in full. The market runs a different pattern through the week and a good many visitors arrive on a quiet day expecting the full thing. The restaurants around it keep ordinary restaurant hours and are open regardless, so a quiet market day is still a good day to eat here.

What time is Borough Market busiest?

Between noon and three on a Saturday, which is the densest pedestrian crush in London outside a railway station, and every restaurant around it inherits that. Arrive at opening or after nine in the evening and it is a different neighbourhood entirely.

Is there a Michelin starred restaurant at Borough Market?

Not in the market itself. The cooking here is chophouse, tapas counter and pasta rather than tasting menu, and that is the character of the district rather than a gap in it. For starred cooking the nearest concentration is across the river in the City and Mayfair.