Londoners walking through Bloomsbury may have noticed huge queues forming outside one restaurant, with diners sometimes waiting up to an hour for a table.
The restaurant attracting these crowds is Swiss Butter, located at 114-118 Southampton Row, between Holborn and Russell Square.
The steakhouse has become a notable spot for Londoners, who are frequently seen forming long lines outside the establishment.
Swiss Butter’s signature steak and sauce continue attracting queues in central London (Image: NQ staff)
The queues, which sometimes stretch down the street, are hard to miss for anyone walking through Bloomsbury towards King’s Cross or St Pancras.
What exactly are people queuing for?
Swiss Butter is a Beirut-born restaurant concept with a straightforward menu.
Customers essentially choose between beef, chicken, or salmon, with each main dish served with fries, salad, a warm baguette, and the restaurant’s signature Swiss Butter sauce.
Beef diners can choose between fillet and ribeye, while chicken breast and salmon fillet provide the alternatives.
However, it appears that the experience is centred around one meal, and more specifically, one ingredient: the Swiss Butter sauce.
This secret butter-based sauce is made with a blend of 33 herbs and spices, with the recipe originating in Beirut.
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The creamy sauce is generously poured over meat or fish, with enough left over for dipping chips and pieces of baguette.
The sauce has become the restaurant’s calling card, with The Infatuation describing the entire meal as revolving around its creamy, peppery and citrus-like sauce.
The sauce is not only a hit with customers but also a key reason behind the restaurant’s popularity.
Another major part of the appeal is the price.
Swiss Butter states that its plates currently start from £18, with most customers expected to spend around £22 per person.
For a central London restaurant serving steak, chips, salad, and bread, this has helped it build a reputation as an affordable option.
Recent online reviews frequently mention the combination of the price and the sauce, with one customer in July saying they queued for around 30 minutes after discovering the restaurant through TikTok and felt the meal was worth the wait.
The restaurant currently boasts a Google rating of 4.3 out of five from more than 4,000 reviews.
The queues outside Swiss Butter can also be attributed to another straightforward reason: the restaurant operates predominantly as a walk-in establishment.
This means that most customers cannot make reservations and must wait in line for a table.
The restaurant does accept bookings for larger groups if they contact the venue directly.
Combine this walk-in policy with the restaurant’s social media popularity and limited menu choices, and the result is the conspicuous queue regularly seen along Southampton Row.
Several recent visitors have reported waiting outside before getting a table.
One July review described the queue as the only downside, while another customer earlier this year said they waited around an hour.
However, not everyone thinks the food justifies the wait.
Swiss Butter has received some mixed reviews along with its many fans.
The Evening Standard’s restaurant critic was unimpressed when reviewing the restaurant after its London arrival, criticising aspects of the meat and fries while acknowledging the sauce’s powerful flavour.
More recent customer reviews similarly range from people calling it worth the hype to others questioning whether they would queue again.
That divide may itself explain some of the fascination.
For Londoners who keep walking past the seemingly permanent line on Southampton Row wondering what everyone is waiting for, the answer is surprisingly simple: a plate of steak, chicken, or salmon, a pile of fries, and a secret sauce that has managed to turn a straightforward meal into one of the area’s most noticeable restaurant queues.
Swiss Butter is open from noon until midnight Monday to Saturday and noon until 11pm on Sundays.