Table of Contents
Cloth Cornhill Review: The Short Answer
Yes, Cloth Cornhill is worth booking. This Cloth Cornhill review finds a team that brought London’s oldest chophouse back to life with real respect for the room and real skill in the kitchen. The Hereford sirloin with bone marrow and caper butter is one of the best steaks I have eaten in the City this year, and the three course set lunch at £29 is genuinely good value. If you love a proper chophouse, book upstairs and sit in one of the old wooden boxes.
Key Takeaways
- Cloth Cornhill opened on 1 October 2026 in the old Simpsons Tavern building on Ball Court, off Cornhill in the City of London.
- The restaurant sits upstairs in two historic dining rooms, while the pub downstairs, Amy’s Bar, serves drinks and bar snacks.
- The Hereford sirloin with bone marrow and caper butter costs £38 and is the dish to order for steak lovers.
- A set lunch runs Monday to Thursday at £24 for two courses or £29 for three courses.
- Cloth Cornhill opens for lunch and dinner from Monday to Friday, so book the upstairs restaurant ahead.
What Is Cloth Cornhill?
Cloth Cornhill is the second restaurant from the people behind Cloth in Farringdon, now renamed Cloth Fair. Joe Haynes and Ben Butterworth run the business, and chef Tom Hurst runs the kitchen. Hurst has cooked at Brawn, The Marksman and Levan, and his cooking at the original Cloth won a loyal following. This new restaurant takes over the building that was once Simpsons Tavern, which many people call the oldest chophouse in London.
Simpsons Tavern dates from 1757, and it sat closed from 2022 until this team spent a year restoring it. The Grade II listed building kept the details that made it famous: wood panelled walls, tiled fireplaces, and high timber boxes with brass rails where City workers once hung their top hats. The name Simpsons still sits on the door. Any honest Cloth Cornhill review has to start here, because the room is half the reason to go.
A chophouse is not a steakhouse with white tablecloths. It is a plain, generous, meat led room where the cooking does the talking, and this Cloth Cornhill review found that difference on the plate.
Finding It: Ball Court, Off Cornhill
Cloth Cornhill sits at 38 and a half Ball Court, down a narrow lane off Cornhill, postcode EC3V 9DR. You will not find it by accident. You duck down the lane, past the crowds drinking outside, and the building opens up in front of you. That hidden quality is part of the charm, and it is why you should book rather than chance it on a busy Thursday.
Downstairs is the pub, and it works as a pub first. One part is a saloon bar with seating, and the other is the famous standing room only space that Simpsons was known for. The pub is walk in only and mainly for drinking, but the bar snacks are excellent: coronation crab rosti at £8, pig’s head brioche at £8, and nothing on the bar menu over £12. This Cloth Cornhill review rates the downstairs as a destination in itself, not just a waiting room.
Upstairs is where the restaurant lives, in two dining rooms that keep the original chophouse booths. Most tables sit inside the historic wooden boxes, and there is counter seating for eight. It is dark wood, brass and tile, and this Cloth Cornhill review found nothing in the room trying to be cleverer than the food.
What to Order: The Cloth Cornhill Menu
The Cloth Cornhill menu is contemporary British cooking with a clear memory of what this room used to serve. Chef Tom Hurst cooks sharing chops and steaks alongside dishes that riff on Simpsons history, and the best plates in this Cloth Cornhill review do both at once.
Start with the devils on horseback with black pudding and brown sauce at £9, a plate for three that sets the tone: rich, salty, old fashioned in the best sense, with smoked chillies in the mix. Maldon rock oysters with apple and lovage cost £5 each, a clean, sharp opener before the heavier dishes.
The duck liver and foie parfait with pickled quince and onion brioche costs £18, and the brioche alone is worth the order. The smoked haddock, mussel and leek gratin also costs £18, rich enough to share. The sausage with beer mustard comes from a 1940s recipe book found during the renovation, and the venison, bacon and bone marrow pie is the same idea at larger scale, with flour thickened gravy and rough pastry made in house.
The Steak: Hereford Sirloin with Bone Marrow and Caper Butter
This is a steak site, so let me be direct. The Hereford sirloin with bone marrow and caper butter costs £38, and in this Cloth Cornhill review it is the plate that justifies the trip. Steaks were already strong at the original Cloth, and the same discipline shows here: a proper sear, a pink centre, and a sauce that adds richness without hiding the beef. Bone marrow and caper butter is a smart pairing, because the marrow brings depth and the capers cut through it with salt and acid.
Sharing chops and steaks lead the Cloth Cornhill menu, and the kitchen treats them as the main event. Order a chop or a steak to share, add a pie or a gratin for the table, and let the room do what it was built to do. For home cooks, the lesson is the same one I keep coming back to on this site: rest the steak, season it properly, and let the fat do the work. My guide to how to cook rump steak covers the pan technique that gets you closest to a grill room result at home.
Cloth Cornhill Prices and the Set Lunch
Cloth Cornhill prices are fair for what the room offers. Starters run from £5 for an oyster to £18 for the parfait or the gratin, the Hereford sirloin is £38, and bar snacks downstairs stay under £12. The wine list is serious, as you would expect from a business founded by two people from the wine trade, with bottles at four figures for collectors at the top end. You do not need to touch that end of the list to eat well here.
The best value is the set lunch, Monday to Thursday at £24 for two courses or £29 for three courses. My advice in this Cloth Cornhill review is simple: book the set lunch, order the sirloin as your main, and judge the place on that plate. Hardens puts a three course dinner with half a bottle of wine at around £50 a head before service, which matches my sense of the room.
What the Critics Say
The early reviews have been warm. Giles Coren praised the smoked haddock gratin and the venison pie, Jay Rayner called the room a place cooking food that barely exists anywhere else in London, and Tom Parker Bowles wrote about the subtle modern touches, including a Provencal panisse and vegetarian dishes, that stop the menu feeling like a museum piece. That last point matters: Cloth Cornhill honours the building without freezing it in 1757.
Hardens gives five out of five for ambience, three for service and two for food, which reads harshly next to the critic reviews, but the room is the star and the rough edges are the kind that smooth out in the first months.
Who Should Book Cloth Cornhill?
This Cloth Cornhill review recommends booking if you work in the City and want a lunch that feels like an occasion, if you love historic dining rooms, or if you want a steak in a room built for eating steak. It suits a business lunch, a birthday, or a Friday dinner with friends who appreciate a proper pie and a good glass of wine.
Skip it if you want a quick bite, a cheap dinner, or a weekend table, because it opens Monday to Friday only and the room rewards a slow meal. If you want a rooftop view instead of a wood panelled booth, my 14 Hills restaurant review covers the City’s best high rise dining, and the top 5 tomahawk steakhouses in central London is the place to start for a steakhouse shortlist. For another of this autumn’s most talked about openings, my KID Soho review makes a useful comparison: KID is bright, modern and Turkish led, while Cloth Cornhill is dark, historic and British to its bones.
Cloth Cornhill Review: My Verdict
Cloth Cornhill is a proper restoration, not a theme park version of one. The team saved a room that London nearly lost, kept the boxes, the tiles and the name on the door, and put a kitchen in it that can cook a sirloin worth crossing the City for. The set lunch at £29 is the smartest way in, the Hereford sirloin is the dish to order, and the pub downstairs is the best place in the City to drink standing up with a pig’s head brioche in your hand.
I will go back. Next time I want the venison pie, a seat in one of the boxes, and a longer look at the wine list. For a first visit, book upstairs, order the sirloin, and take the lane slowly on your way out. Rooms like this one do not come back often.
Practical Details
For readers planning a visit, this Cloth Cornhill review puts the practical details in one place. Address: 38 and a half Ball Court, Cornhill, London EC3V 9DR. Hours: lunch and dinner, Monday to Friday. The pub downstairs is walk in only; the restaurant upstairs is best booked ahead, and the set lunch runs Monday to Thursday. Book through the restaurant’s own site, Cloth Restaurants. For a fuller picture from another visit, the Hot Dinners test drive of Cloth Cornhill covers the pub snacks, the dining room and the dishes in detail.
Frequently Asked Questions
Is Cloth Cornhill worth it?
Yes. This Cloth Cornhill review finds the Hereford sirloin at £38 excellent, the room one of the most atmospheric in London, and the three course set lunch at £29 good value.
What was Simpsons Tavern?
Simpsons Tavern was a City chophouse founded in 1757, often called the oldest chophouse in London. It closed in 2022, and the Cloth team restored the Grade II listed building before reopening it as Cloth Cornhill on 1 October 2026.
How much does lunch cost at Cloth Cornhill?
The set lunch runs Monday to Thursday at £24 for two courses or £29 for three courses. Starters run from £5 to £18, and the Hereford sirloin costs £38.
Do I need to book Cloth Cornhill?
Yes for the restaurant upstairs, especially on Thursday and Friday nights. The pub downstairs is walk in only.
Is Cloth Cornhill open at the weekend?
No. Cloth Cornhill opens for lunch and dinner from Monday to Friday only, which fits its City of London location.
Where is Cloth Cornhill?
Cloth Cornhill sits at 38 and a half Ball Court, off Cornhill in the City of London, postcode EC3V 9DR, a short walk from Bank station.