Telephone: 020 7584 2003
Address: 43 Elystan Street, London SW3
Dinner for two, including wine and service, £150

In this restaurant-reviewing game, it sometimes pays to be last. If I had piled in to Restaurant Tom Aikens within minutes of its opening, as many of my so-called rivals did, I would probably have said that the £39.50 charged for three courses represented good value for cooking of this calibre. And I'm sure it did, but it doesn't any more, for just two months into its life the price has gone up to £49. This doesn't represent good or bad value, but it does tell us what we need to know about this new Chelsea restaurant. Both the chef, Tom Aikens, and his eponymous restaurant are determined to take on the big London boys. So pay attention. He means business.

Then again, he could hardly slip back into London quietly. Aikens has long been regarded as a major if unsteady talent. A few years ago he departed London's Pied à Terre after an incident involving a hot kitchen implement and a junior member of staff.

Since then the gossip about him has been constant. What's he doing? When's his restaurant coming? He passed the time while he laid his plans as a private chef for, among others, Andrew Lloyd Webber. He's no snob, Aikens.

So it had to be a big opening, and it is. The new site, craftily converted from a pub, is big and black-and-white and has hardwood floors and wood shutters on the windows and downlighters. It is a little 80s-Athena-poster for my liking - the tennis girl scratching her bum would not look out of place in the loos - but in Chelsea I'm sure it fits the bill.

The food, which should be what we're interested in, is never less than very good and in places fabulous. Aikens does complex, but he does a careful kind of understated complex. He doesn't over-punch the flavours or over-adorn the dishes. There's a lot going on, but it is all of a piece.

One of his tricks is to present an ingredient twice on a plate, both as itself and its purée, so that it is reflected across textures.

It was there in my starter of langoustine with pork belly (the ingredient of choice in London right now). Alongside the huge and perfectly cooked langoustine were some pieces of marinated artichoke and then, in a long painted strip, an acidulated artichoke purée. He played the same trick in my companion's starter of frogs' legs. In the middle was a veritable market garden of asparagus and fresh peas and leaf parsley, and beneath the peas, their mousse. Rich, satisfying and clever.

The trick turned up for a third time in my main course of roast veal fillet and shin: a plate of different textured pieces of meat, with both whole baby carrots and a carrot-and-honey sauce. The only place we didn't get it was in a terrific main course called simply Pig's Head, a plated eulogy to the great porker, though its title was misleading, for it also included both trotter and belly (natch).

There were crispy, breaded shards of pig's ear and bits of cheek and tongue and, acting as ballast, a celeriac purée.

Puddings - one a developed riff on chocolate, the other ditto on palm sugar, including a gloriously aromatic crème - are equally accomplished. There are, for the record, various appetisers, tasters, pre-desserts and petits-fours, which also exemplify the chef's light touch in mousse and purée.

And so to criticisms. A £10 supplement for a mediocre cheese board including an unfinished Epoisses is more than pushing it. And, as too often, the wine list will make your ears bleed. If you wanted a half of white and red, the minimum it would cost is £59. There are, though, some reasonable bottles in the £30 mark.

I am left with only one question: are there enough people in London who want this kind of product?

The city is already stuffed full of heavyweight places. To survive, Aikens will simply have to find his very own fan base - one with deep pockets.