At the table This sushi spot is flippin' off the scale

Is Chris D'Sylva London's angriest restaurateur? He might want diners to think so. He's learnt from the Ramsay playbook: rage is a bait people take. In March he made headlines by letting slip about a customer blacklist at his Notting Hill bistro Dorian, where he reviews and ranks his diners.

- DAVID ELLIS RESTAURANT CRITIC

“Everything gets marked,” he warned darkly. Rude to staff? Out on your ear. Cancel a booking? Yer barred. Influencer wanting a freebie? Go to hell. Dare even to ask about moving tables and D'Sylva will be stood over you out in the street.

Thing is, none of this has done a jot of harm to D'Sylva's business; whatever he puts down, others pick up. His celebrity fans are by now wellpublicised — Victoria Beckham is so devoted to Dorian that last winter she brought out a handbag named for it — but he's got so many local regulars that he can’t seem to help opening places.

Besides the Michelin-starred mothership is the Notting Hill Fish Shop and Supermarket of Dreams; a £250-a-head, invite-only night called Tuna Fight Club; and a sellout, supper-only Japanese bistro called Urchin. All of these in W11. An empire is forming. Genghis Khan got started with less.

Now there is Eel Sushi Bar, which sits on the opposite side of the road to Dorian. It is a boxy thing, covered in pale wood. “That's clever,” I thought, “he's opened in a B&Q shed.”