Tom Aikens, London

43 Elyston Street, London, SW3 3NT, England **

Mon-Fri, Lunch 12-2:30pm, Dinner 6.45-11pm, Lunch Menu: £29 for three courses, coffee £5 supplement.

8.5/10

As J and I walked around the streets of South Ken, admiring the Georgian crescents and remarking open London’s unfailing and attractive ability to place council housing directly opposite what must be the London pads of the rich and famous, we both stated our desire to end up living in such an area. While this is in no doubt a possibility for J, it most certainly isn’t for me – but perhaps I can visit. One of the attractions of the area would be having such a wonderful restaurant as Tom Aikens as your local eatery. The dining room is a reasonably small affair, though the tables are well-spaced out. During our lunch 6 tables booked, including our own. No doubt the credit crunch is hitting the restaurant, though I might ignorantly wonder aloud whether Tom Aiken’s is more an upmarket local restaurant for South Kensington – it certainly did not have the suits one associates with the restaurants of Mayfair. However, one very noticeable victim of the credit crunch – if that is what is the cause of such an empty dining room – is atmosphere. The restaurant felt cold – temperature I mean – and empty, regularly the conversation of the separate tables stopped at the same time and the room was filled with a hush while numerous staff (though all of them attentive, more than competent and friendly without being intrusive) stood in the corner slightly aimlessly, almost embarrassed, waiting for something to do

This did not effect our enjoyment of the cooking at Tom Aikens. This was the finest lunch I’ve enjoyed at such a restaurant in a long time. The meal started very well with bread including a choice of semolina and buttermilk rolls and bacon brioches, alongside more standard fare of brown and ciabatta. All of these were served as individually baked breads, made on site. While the semolina roll was good, the bacon brioche was truly fantastic: flaky on the outside, sweet and moist on the inside and, well, exciting (8/10).

A successful amuse bouche kicked off proceedings. This consisted of a confit of rabbit hidden beneath a layer of chicken consommé jelly with chunks of celeriac, with a rich celeriac mousse on top. An enjoyably rich beginning. The jelly successfully avoided tasting of a Baxter’s soup (this happens more often than you might imagine in such restaurants), the celeriac mousse was particularly flavoursome with what seemed to be an addition of garlic and yet successfully did not dominate the more delicate flavour of the rabbit (8/10).
My starter consisted of a roast scallops, with cured duck breast, roast pine nut and mango puree. The scallops themselves were undone, leaving them slightly chewy. My personal preference for scallops is for them to be well done, so this was a slight left down. The dish did come together well though, with the mango puree providing appropriate bite to the depth of the duck and the pine nuts adding a little crunch to proceedings (6/10).

Mains consisted of roast loin and filet of venison on a bed choucroute red wine celeriac, fondant sage beignet and parsley crumb. This was wonderful. The venison arrived on top of the choucroute dressed in red wine alongside some celeriac. The edges of this had been cooked a little further providing an enjoyable crunchy texture. The venison had been cooked to perfection; extremely tender and succulent. Beignets seem to be very fashionable at the moment and this one was successful, with a light sage flavour coming through. On a normal occasion this would have been the highlight of the meal… (8/10).

Feeling a little disappointed by my rhubarb dessert at the Ledbury the previous fortnight I ordered off the lunch menu and went for the truffle pannacotta, accompanied by black pepper truffle ice-cream, white-chocolate mousse, thin squares of white chocolate and truffle shavings. I think it is a sign of a great dish that I am still thinking about the intensity and richness of its flavours even now. It will go down in Fat Robin folklore. Each of the pannacotta, ice-cream and mousse were along a gradient ranging from silky and light (the mousse) to velvety and rich (the pannacotta). While all pretty much in the same general texture area (that is, smooth) each was sufficiently distinct to make for an interesting mouthful. While I appreciate such things are not to everyone’s taste, I am a fan of truffle and, as stated previously, black pepper as ingredients for desserts. What was very noticeable about this dish was the strength of the truffle flavour; a lesser chef perhaps might have backed away from having gone so full-out with arguably a daring flavour paring of white chocolate and black truffle (let alone also black pepper). For me this was a great success (10/10).

Petit fours here are generous to a fault. And such a statement is not something that comes easily to me. The number of sweet nibbles – various flavoured madeleines, chocolates, mousses of varying innovative flavours – were enough to warrant description as a second dessert. I am ashamed to say that neither I nor J could finish even half of these, though not for want of trying I assure you (8/10). A doggy-bag might have been a good idea.

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Le Gavroche, London

43 Upper Brook Street, WK1 7QR **

Open for Lunch Mon-Fri 12-2pm. Three Course: £48.

7.5/10

Today K and I ventured into the depths of Mayfair – an inhospitable land for those of us up to our eyeballs in our overdrafts and entirely reliant on our culinary companion for food purchasing power – to visit what is regularly touted to be the finest restaurant in London: Le Gavroche. The restaurant is a few seconds walk away from Grosvenor Sq and a few minutes walk from Bond Street tube station. The lunch menu comes in at £48 per person. This includes a three course lunch, with an accompanying half bottle of wine (from a selection of 4), a half bottle of mineral water and coffee and petit fours. Given this, the initial feeling of intimidation faced by this price begins to weaken.

The main dining room itself is down a flight of stairs. You are led into what appears to be an old gentleman’s club with hunting lodge green walls and chairs to match. Vast arrays of flowers sit amongst mirrors on the walls. K and I were sat at a table directly next to one of these floral arrangements and I wonder, given that so much of food tasting is via one’s sense of smell, if the pungent aromas of lilies affected our lunch.

An amuse bouche arrived: sand eel fried in a thin, crispy batter on tartare sauce and a fried potato crisp. The eel itself had an intense eel-y flavour, with plenty of moisture. The tartare sauce was quite mild, with the predominant flavours being mayonnaise and mustard – the bite of capers was lacking. The potato crisp predominantly oily and reminded both of us of a Real McCoy crisp. K thought the dish tasted of a cold summer’s day on an overcast beach in Cornwall. Less articulately, I thought the eel itself was rather good but as a composition this was little disappointing (6/10).



My starter was a filet of pan-fried mackerel on top of a bed of mushed aubergine and caviar, surrounded by cooking juices. Similar to the amuse this was a dish of a striking contrast. The mackerel itself was great: a wonderfully fresh piece of fish which retained a pleasing degree of moisture, with each biting oozing with mackerel flavour. Its accompaniment, however, was bland and moreover had a rather unappetising dark green and greyish colour. This added very little to the dish aside from a different texture to partner the crispy coating of the fried mackerel (6/10). K had asparagus, thin slices of meaty chorizo and a poached egg in batter. She was visibly disappointed by this dish and, given that we had spent a while looking forward to this meal, attempted to find a way of stating this without dampening the mood. It is still, just about, asparagus season in England but these were less flavoursome than those at the height of the season. The chorizo was without dominating fatty bits but also lacked spice and sharpness. Together the ingredients were just ‘nice’ without being impressive. Simple arrangements of intensely and complementary flavoured ingredients is all well and good but sometimes, as was the case here, this fails to wow (4/10).

Mains was a supremely well cooked filet of roast pork – pink, moist and piggilicious – accompanied by puréed potatoes, prune preserve, glazed shiitake mushrooms and carrots and topped with deep fried pork crackling. This is haute cuisine at, perhaps, it’s most traditional and unadventurous but it is also it at its best. The pork was wonderful, and the other ingredients on the plate served their purposes well. The mash was creamy, the carrots and mushrooms succulent and sweet, the prune preserve gave an added kick. I enjoyed this: it was familiar, friendly and homely. It lacked perhaps enough flavour punch to be scored any higher, but this was still a fine dish (8.5/10). K and I swapped half-way through. Her mains was poached salmon, on the ‘rare’ side of poached, in a light tomato consommé with diced tomato with an arrangement of penne and a few sprigs of fennel. This was distinctly underwhelming. The salmon was, like with all the dishes in this meal, a good piece of meat. The consommé was light and subtle to the point of being bland, likewise the pasta added texture but not so much flavour. I tried to give extra time to this dish to see if, contrasted with the pork with its booming flavour, I was just missing the subtly. But closer inspection only seemed to confirm that this was just a little bit bland (4/10)

For dessert we shared a selection of six ice-creams and sorbets (Strawberry, black forest berries, pineapple, white chocolate, coffee and vanilla) and an assiette of puddings. The former were wonderful. The white chocolate ice cream was the most instantaneously wonderful, and successfully conveyed creamy white chocolate flavour without being sickly or overly sweet – quite an achievement. The other standout flavour here was the pineapple; a difficult ice cream to make in the first place, this captured pineapple flavour supremely well (8.5/10). The assiette consisted of: tiramisu, passion-fruit cheesecake, vanilla ice cream in a dark chocolate case, raspberries and shortbread, a rum baba, a chocolate truffle cake and a praline tart. Given the number I think the best way of summarising this dish would to be say that I would have happily eaten each one of these as a main dessert aside from the raspberries and shortbread. Each of these was a delight (9/10).

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Hix's Oyster and Chop House, London

36-37 Greenhill Rents, Cowcross Street, London, EC1M 6BN, England.

Sunday Lunch: 12-3pm, £34.50

2/10

It is a little hypocritical for a fan of nouveaux cuisine to chide as a fad restaurants producing simple British cooking based on organic, fresh ingredients. What follows in this review is as much about my scepticism towards such places as it is about the quality of the cooking. The fan of relaxed cooking should then take with a pinch of salt the gripes which follow. We went to Hix’s for Sunday lunch. £32.50 for a set menu of three starters, a main course of roast beef followed by a choice of puddings.

The interior is quite bare but light and with mirrors at the back which cause the illusion of a much bigger eating area around the corner of the bar. There is almost a canteen feel due to the high ceilings, wooden tables and lack of decoration or adornment. No doubt this is intended: paired down settings for no nonsense, unpretentious cooking. The starters and puddings are prepared in front of you in a coking station manned by one chef; the mains were brought up to the restaurant. For Sunday lunch you are served in one sitting at 2pm. I really don’t like the single-sitting approach to serving food for a number of reasons. Most importantly there is always the danger your table will be the one which will be the last served – as indeed was the case for myself and J during our visit – which means your dish has begun its quick descent into tepidity. Secondly, being served in a procession rather contributed in the case of Hix’s to the almost canteen-feel of the meal. To see so many other people devouring the same dish as you somewhat undermines the illusion – something particularly important to the restaurant experience in such cases when you want to feel special – that the restaurant is not mass-producing the same dishes over and over.

Myself and J had intended to go to St John’s and – this being an occurrence that seemingly has happened to quite a few people who end up in Hix’s – finding the former closed wandered over the street to its competitor. Hix’s does not serve food like St John’s, but rather what I might call, not knowing better, extremely good pub food without a ‘cappuccinos’ or a black truffle in sight.

Or perhaps I missed the point. A bowl of fresh peas in their pods arrive as a kind of repost to an amuse bouche. These were quite sweet, if not entirely perfect. Here my dislike of restaurants telling me how wonderful untouched English produce is was stoked. The peas felt like a gimmick to me; a statement of good individual English ingredients can be on their own, without modification. But I don’t need to go to a restaurant, pay £30+ to enjoy ingredients that I could grow in my garden. Indeed, my father toils on an allotment and has grown peas – partly because he’s just picked them and hence they’re much sweeter – which were more enjoyable than these. I want someone to impress me with their culinary technique, not illustrate to me that they realise that organic, fresh ingredients are good (1/10).

The starters came one by one.
First De Beauvoir smoked salmon on toast. The salmon had been made into a thickly-cut pate, flavoured with lemon and fennel and spread on a slice of toasted crusty white bread. This was a very successful morsel, particularly because of the texture of the salmon which what (3/10). A second starter arrived: a salad of crisp smoked bacon, broad beans, pea shoots and green beans. This was less successful for a number of reasons. Firstly, the repetition of pea shoots was regrettable. While I had not exactly enjoyed my pea pods earlier the fact they were in front of me meant that I did consume a far amount of peas, partly due to the cathartic process of shelling them. Covered with a very light dressing this salad’s predominant flavour was the saltiness of the bacon. The vegetables tasted fresh. But but but. Again, this is ‘just’ an arrangement of good quality ingredients (2/10). The third starter was a boiled Gladys May duck egg with a devilled mayonnaise placed inside a lettuce leaf. Again, a good quality egg no doubt but ‘just’ an egg (2/10). Is it enough for a £30+ lunch to rely predominantly on good quality ingredients? If you answer yes to that question then you are a different kind of restaurant-visitor than I. You can buy Glady May’s eggs in Sainsbury’s – there is no mystery here.

The main course consisting of roast rib of Herefordshire beef, accompanied by a wonderfully voluminous Yorkshire pudding, roast potatoes, greens, buttered peas (again!) and carrots with gravy. This was good, wholesome fare but did not raise its level beyond good quality gastropub. The beef was on the rare side of medium, not at all chewy though perhaps lacking in flavour a little – as was the gravy. The greens, peas and carrots were of a similar quality to the kind you might get buying organic equivalents in Waitrose – which is no bad thing at all. The Yorkshire puddings were perhaps the highlight; aesthetically impressive huge mountains of bubbly soft batter. The lowlight and for a roast dinner, according to J, entirely unforgiveable were the roast potatoes. Every culinary-minded person has their way of making roast potatoes, which their loudly declare is the best way of doing them. At Hix’s whoever was responsible for the potatoes seemed to have learnt their recipe from my primary school canteen. These were not at all crispy on the outside and very stodgy on the inside. All in all, this was a pretty good roast, potatoes aside. Just I don’t think that’s saying much (2/10).

The desserts menu consisted of three options: a whiskey and walnut tart, a chocolate mousse or a slice of Lancashire cheese with chutney. Both of our party went for the tart, which was accompanied by a huge dollop of Cornish clotted cream. (If there is a word appropriate word for describing a serving of clotted cream it is dollop). We’re quite big fans of walnut tarts in our household and this was a particularly well-made example.

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