There are few better ways to spend an evening in Soho than being handed plate after plate of Argentinian-inspired food while live music gradually takes over the room.
Sucre, on Great Marlborough Street, is very much built for sharing.
And when I say sharing, I mean the sort where everything arrives in the middle of the table and everyone suddenly becomes extremely interested in what everyone else has ordered.
It is a much more sociable way of eating, and one that suits the restaurant perfectly.
We started with a Chimichurri Margarita, which was every bit as lively as its name suggests, before the food began making its way onto the table.
Chimichurri margarita (Image: Ezekiel Bertrand)
The chipá Argentine cheese bread disappeared quickly, as did the layered potatoes with garlic cream and guindilla chillies.
The smoked beetroot, cashew cream and pickled walnuts was a particular favourite, while the sea bream tiradito with blood orange and shiso brought something lighter and fresher to the spread.
Smoked beetroot with cashew cream and pickled walnuts (Image: Ezekiel Bertrand)
This is where Sucre’s sharing concept really works.
You are not sitting there waiting for your one plate to arrive.
You are picking, trying, passing things across the table and inevitably deciding that you need another bite of something you thought you had finished with.
For the main course, the sea bass with tamarind jam was the surprise for me.
Sea bass with tamarind jam (Image: Ezekiel Bertrand)
I am always a little apprehensive when it comes to seafood, but this was soft, delicate and genuinely lush.
The tamarind jam gave it a sweetly sharp edge without overpowering the fish.
The Argentine sirloin, meanwhile, brought the meal firmly back to the restaurant’s open-fire roots, while the Trombetta courgette with Pecorino Fiore Sardo kept it from becoming entirely about meat and cheese.
Argentinian sirloin (Image: Ezekiel Bertrand)
And then came dessert, or rather, came the dessert that I intended to eat.
The dulce de leche fondant with mascarpone ice cream and hazelnuts looked exactly like the sort of thing that needed a photograph before anyone was allowed near it.
Dulce de leche fondant, mascarpone ice cream and hazelnuts (Image: Ezekiel Bertrand)
Unfortunately, I spent far too long fussing over getting the perfect picture that my dinner partner could not wait.
By the time I was ready to put the camera down, she had eaten the entire thing.
So, in the interests of journalistic accuracy, I can confirm that it looked fantastic.
My ability to review the fondant itself has been somewhat compromised.
But food is only half of what makes Sucre work.
At around 8pm, the live music began, and the atmosphere shifted.
Live music kicked off at 8pm (Image: Ezekiel Bertrand)
The room, already busy with conversation and plates moving between tables, suddenly felt like somewhere you could quite happily stay for another few hours.
That feels particularly fitting given Sucre’s surroundings.
The building was once a concert hall housing the London College of Music, and the restaurant’s Origins programme has embraced that history by bringing music back into the space.
The music, food and setting all feed into the same idea of an evening out rather than simply a meal.
And that is ultimately what I liked most about Sucre.
It is not somewhere you go to eat as quickly as possible before heading somewhere else.
You arrive hungry, order plenty, share everything, listen to the music and let the evening stretch out.
For a restaurant in the middle of Soho, that feels like exactly the right way to do dinner.
Just remember to eat your dessert before your dinner partner does.