Real Japanese class

With only a handful of design teams responsible for the majority of London's new bar and restaurant operations, the results are generally a predictable, if not a little mundane, display of blandness.

It's as though proprietors take the advice of miscreant estate agents, who encourage us to decorate our homes in neutral colours on the basis that this will be more appealing to prospective buyers.

Noriyoshi Muramatsu, of the Super Potato design group, Tokyo, is, thankfully, unaffected by the current penchant for all things dull, and although he can do sleek as well as the next man - he was responsible for the perennially fashionable Zuma in Knightsbridge - Schochu, Zuma's sister bar, is a magical miscellany of interior design and ranks up there among the most visually stimulating bars in town, alongside Hakkasan in Hanway Place and Loungelover in Shoreditch.

One wall is covered with old wood and copper, reclaimed from a disused Japanese distillery, another wall is lined with shelves of bulbous jars of marinated shochu - a drink similar to vodka, but more of this later - two lounge areas are separated by a large island bar and both have nice, squashy, quiltcovered seats and comfy cushions.

Sake - a fermented rice drink, brewed like a beer but served like a wine - makes a welcome appearance on the drinks list but doesn't make it as an ingredient on the cocktail list as it does at Zuma. No matter, shochu drinks are what this bar is all about. Shochu, like vodka, is distilled, but to a lower alcohol content - 25% by volume, as opposed to vodka's usual 40% - and from raw materials that can include sweet potato, rice, buckwheat, barley or brown sugar.

The shochu tonics (fruit and herbs marinated in shochu) have certain health-giving properties, if you believe Japanese folklore. Plum and cinnamon aids digestion, grape is high in antioxidants, strawberry is good for the complexion and grapefruit clears the head. From the list of shochu cocktails, a Noshino Martini (shochu with cucumber) and a Lemongrass Shochu proved to be flavoursome finds.

Asahi and Sapporo beers are both imported from Japan, and an Old and New World wine list complements the range of eclectic drinks. But the really good news about this bar is the food: the full restaurant menu from Roka, the restaurant upstairs, is served in the bar, so do like we did and order lots of simple, but perfect sushi plates.

The owners of the bar aren't blowing their own trumpet loud enough. The press release heralding the arrival of the restaurant, which has since received rave reviews from all the food critics, all but buried mention of the bar, but this makes it all the more pleasant a find.

The idea behind Schochu - and Roka, for that matter - is that it's meant to be a more casual and accessible destination than Zuma. However, I predict its popularity will be such that getting in might be quite tricky in the future. Even in its early days a burly man, pleasant of nature, was guarding the door, but after a gentle inquisition - 'Do you have a reservation for the restaurant?' Answer: 'No' - he stepped aside and allowed us down the stairs.

Schochu
37 Charlotte Street, Fitzrovia,, W1T 1RR