ILLUSTRATION BY ALEX GREEN FOR THE SUNDAY TIMES MAGAZINE

Oh, the misery of it all. Winter has been going on for 400 years and I can’t pick up my phone without another friend messaging to say London is dead now because nobody can get a pint after 10pm.

Well, I am not going to take this lying down, despite all evidence to the contrary (my spending most of the winter in bed with flu). There’s a solution to all this, and that solution is Exmouth Market: a little pocket of Clerkenwell that always feels like a square in continental Europe, even amid the bleakest weather, thanks to the judicious application of outdoor heaters and a constant supply of students drunk on youth and alfresco Aperol spritz.

Luckily, then, everyone keeps mentioning a new restaurant