After my mother and I booked our trip to London, we made a reservation at the only Michelin 3-star restaurant in the city. Two months and various confirmation e-mails and phone calls later, we arrived at this lovely little restaurant on Royal Hospital Road, ready for a treat.
We were the first to arrive and were promptly seated at a little table set in crisp white with a centerpiece of white roses in a silver vase. The space is small and charming, with good light and an aura that evokes mellow wine in gently clinked glasses.
The service throughout the meal was phenomenal. The staff:patron ratio was around 1:1, and various polite and friendly gentlemen attended to our table to welcome us, check on us, clear our crumbs, perfume our feet...okay, that last bit didn't happen, but maybe only because we went with the cheapest menu option? Our primary waiter was wonderful, charismatic and helpful. He deserved a blue ribbon for unobtrusive small talk.
There were at least five bread options, and we sampled the olive, the baked potato honey, and the rosemary potato. The best was the rosemary potato, but they were all fresh and yummy with knived dabs from the swirly beehive of yellow butter. Incidentally, you get a choice of salted and unsalted butter, which I was surprised to note as unusual.
The amuse bouche was a tomato consomme with a cute baby-shrimp-sized curl of langoustine accompanied by peas, fava beans, olive oil, and a teeny black cluster of osetra caviar. It was mild and refreshing.
We went with the daily lunch menu priced at £45 a head, with three options for appetizers and entrees, and four for dessert including the cheese plate (with a £3 supplement). Our waiter indicated that should either of us have any dietary restrictions, the kitchen would be more than happy to accommodate us.
I started with the salt cod brandade with Noir de Bigorre ham, poached quail eggs, chargrilled red pepper, olives, and rocket salad. My mom got the saffron risotto with clams, mussels, langoustines, and tomato, "paella" style. (It was meant to come with chorizo as well, but my mother doesn't eat pork - I know, crazy.) The brandade was a pleasant blend of pureed cod and potato with a smooth texture enhanced by the meatiness of the fish, great for spreading on the accompanying toasted rosemary crostinis. The brandade was wrapped in a strip of ham and topped with the quail egg with the veggies and olives nestled on the side. The olives were excellent on their own and as an accompaniment. The risotto was beautifully cooked and pretty flavorful, and I imagine it would've been better with chorizo.
For our mains, I opted for the roasted saddle of rabbit with sage, Bayonne ham, trompette de la mort, and stuffed Provencal vegetables, and my mom got the fillet of daurade royale with navet, carrot, radish, baby gem lettuce, and artichokes baurigole. The rabbit was nice, herb-stuffed and wrapped like my starter in yummy fatty pig. It came with teeny little rabbit kidneys looking all cute and un-organ-like on the side, along with a wonderful stuffed shallot and a wonderful stuffed cherry tomato. The sublimely juicy vegetables were the elevating component on this plate. The daurade royale, a simply cooked sea bream in a light creamy sauce, was elegant if unexciting.
For dessert we went halfsies on the banana parfait with passion fruit and salted caramel ice cream and the lemon meringue and almond tart with fromage frais sorbet. The parfait was a block of dry icy reconstituted banana coated with dark chocolate, topped with unmemorable ice cream and sitting atop a meager drizzle of passion fruit. On the whole, it wasn't awful, but I would've preferred a good commercial dessert. In fact, the texture wasn't too far off from a very frozen Klondike bar. The tart was much better, a thing of beauty - circular crust topped with gorgeous layers of lemon curd and nestlike meringue stuck with almond slivers, with narrow strands of caramel sauce leading out from the tart base to a perfect ball of sorbet - and quite delicious to boot, a perfect blend of sweet and sour.
After dessert came two splendid extras. First was a silver tree of spherical silver chocolate truffles. They were fun to pick off and eat. The meal ended with strawberry ice cream balls coated with white chocolate, served in a pot smoking with liquid ice. The ice cream itself was pretty mediocre, but the presentation was so delightful I didn't really care.
Overall, I was happy with my experience at Gordon Ramsay, though I wasn't quite wowed. Other than the banana parfait, everything was great, but nothing was mind-blowing. Since the place does have the three stars I suppose I was expecting more, but I can't say I didn't enjoy myself. The food was solid and the service superb. I probably won't go back as I live abroad but it's worth a try, especially for £45. read more