Restaurants to try in NW1

The business has relocated to smaller premises on the opposite side of the street but these days only pet accessories are sold.

The listed façade of the once-famous original shop — considered almost an outpost of London Zoo — with its appeal to naturalists and collectors of talking parrots remains a memorial to less politically correct times, but Regent Bookshop, Godfrey's bakery, a greengrocer's and toy store have also gone. Estate agents and restaurants now colonise Parkway. The latest arrival in the latter category is Coast Dining at No 108.

White and bright inside and out with communal tables at the back stretching towards an open kitchen, Coast Dining looks like what it is, the new kid on the block. As if to acknowledge that this is a tactless time to open a fish restaurant — pictures of fish and crustacea decorate the menus and impressionistic seascapes, apparently from St Ives, the walls — there are more meat-led dishes than you might anticipate.

"I'll have the Classic British beefburger and chips with light pickled vegetable relish and Montgomery cheddar'," announced my lunch companion. With instruction, he soon knuckled under and asked for fish pie (cod, mussels, smoked kipper and duchess [sic] potatoes). It had an oddly pink sauce. To start, he ordered tempura rock oysters with wasabi mayonnaise and rice vinegar and, in a fit of nostalgie de la bourgeoisie, I chose kipper pâté. This arrived warm, half-liquid, looking horrible. "Has it been microwaved?" I asked. "It was heated in the oven to develop the flavour," said the waiter who took it away. Instead I had a glass of tiger prawns served with aïoli.

The tempura was limp, the prawns a gelid reminder that we probably shouldn't eat prawns any more. Catch of the day, whole fried gilthead bream sold at £1 more than the menu price, was OK but the shower of sautéed potato cubes on the plate reinforced a creeping idea that this restaurant was an amateurish exercise, as did the dinner party classic dessert of cocoa-stiffened chocolate mousse. We were the only customers in the place for a late lunch last Tuesday. Evenings are possibly jollier and the menu then is slightly more wholeheartedly piscine.

Market at No 43, run by chef Dan Spence and front-of-house Denise Tang, opened to great acclaim early in 2008. When I rang to book a table (anonymously) last week I said that ideally we would like to come at 8.30pm. "That is the ideal time for us," said Denise, whose Swiss-Chinese voice I recognised. How good it is to be so on top of your game that you can afford to be warm, welcoming and even mildly witty. It happens rarely.

The fairly priced British menu in a plainly decorated room with zinc-topped tables is embellished with dishes of the day on a blackboard, which included peas in their pods as an amusement to begin with. Thereafter, first courses of scallops with cauliflower mash and toasted almonds and devilled kidneys were both judiciously timed — and timing was of the essence — and a risotto with artichokes, broad beans and basil followed on the heels of the kidneys suitably innocently and meekly. Reg had chicken and ham pie again and loved it again. It is worth noting the first-floor private room — seats up to 12 — for a convivial evening underpinned with food that doesn't bust a gut but is just naturally pleasing.

"Sushi makes me hum and I only hum after sex, Japanese food or oysters," said Camden resident Julian Clary in praise of Sushi Waka at No 75. My plan to eat there was thwarted by tight Japanese timekeeping, in this case lunch finishing promptly at 1.55pm. Sushi chef Makoto Hirose started making sushi when he was 17. He is now in his fifties. He takes pride in the generosity of ingredients in his assemblies. A modern, slicker operation is Bento Café at 9 Parkway. There is no tatami room there.

Leaving aside pubs and chains, there are other opportunities for modestly priced eating in Parkway. I saw seasoned customers piling their plates high with hummus, tabbouleh, falafel, moudadara and more from the lunchtime buffet at Mezza Express at No 47 where, foolishly, I ate more or less the same à la carte. Good lunchtime deals also obtain at the Spanish Jamon-Jamon at No 38 where I was at this point in my exploration reduced to ordering just cheese and wine. Appropriately feisty young Spanish women run the place.

A large bowl of beef pho with noodles is a healthy meal-in-one for £5.50 at the charming family-run Vietnamese Viet Anh at No 41. At the elaborately decorated but keenly priced Teachi at No 29-31, dim sum and all the faves from the Chinese repertoire are served all day.

To reassure that not everything changes, sometimes the centre holds, you could have a sewing machine repaired or scissors sharpened at Chapman Sewing Machine Co Ltd (est 1937) at No 80 or enjoy an Italian meal as we used to know it at Trattoria Lucca at No 63.

STAR RATINGS:
COAST DINING **
108 Parkway (020 7267 9555) £45

MARKET ****
43 Parkway (020 7267 9700) £40

SUSHI WAKA ***
75 Parkway (020 7482 2036) £35

BENTO CAFÉ (not tested by me)
9 Parkway (020 7482 3990) £24

MEZZA EXPRESS **
47 Parkway (020 7267 7111) £22

JAMON-JAMON **
38 Parkway (020 7284 0606) £24

VIET ANH **
41 Parkway (020 7284 4082) £22

TEACHI **
29-31 Parkway (020 7485 9933) £28

TRATTORIA LUCCA **
63 Parkway (020 7485 6864) £32

Prices estimate a meal with wine and service for one.