Yikes.
Thought I would take a moment to share my thoughts while the experience is fresh in my mind. Let me start by saying we were absolutely stoked at the idea of visiting a Gordon Ramsay restaurant; we get a kick out of his style and have a lot of respect for his talent and what he does. The experience we had during our visit absolutely did not mirror what we were expecting.
The restaurant itself is situated right along the Thames in a neat little unassuming area filled with a mixture of residences and other businesses. The location is actually pretty awesome.
Right off the bat, we both felt slightly overdressed; as we were walking into the front, families with small children were on their way out, and were all dressed pretty casually. Totally on us for feeling the need to be all fancy lol, but I was honestly a little surprised by how laid back the atmosphere seemed, as well as how many kids we saw while we were there.
We were greeted right as soon as we walked in, and the woman at the front was incredibly nice. As I mentioned earlier, we'd made reservations a while ago, but were met with a mostly empty restaurant. Apparently the night before had been insanely busy, but I digress. We were led to a table on their covered patio right next to a window overlooking the Thames. One thing we noticed immediately was how dark the dining area was... we were able to see each other, of course, but reading the menus became a bit difficult if they weren't angled into the surrounding patches of light just the right way.
After a few minutes, our waitress stopped by to say hello and start us off with some water. We took a few minutes to decide on meals and drinks, but ended up trying their seasonal menu selection - three courses from a small list of items for £23 each. We wanted to get the most out of the experience, so decided to order different things from this special menu and share each dish. I started with the mussels, my main was the gnocchi, and dessert was a chocolate brownie. BF chose the beef brisket starter, pork belly dish for his main, and the same brownie for dessert.
Our starters came out pretty quickly, and we were excited to share. Now I know I mentioned earlier that the lighting was poor, but after receiving our first course, we could REALLY tell just how bad it was. I'll be the first to admit that being able to see the presentation of the meals is one of the things that makes the food appetizing. We struggled to even get a hint of what his starter looked like when it was brought to the table.
Overall, the starters were probably an average of 3/5 stars. The mussels were cooked well, and the sauce they were paired with was smooth and creamy. Super yummy dish. The brisket left much to be desired, though. While the meat itself was halfway palatable for a lump of cold meat, the dish was DOMINATED by the flavor of mustard. The small side paired with it was absolutely unpalatable. We finished the meat very slowly
Next on the list were the main course dishes. We were starving by this point and ready for some real, hearty food to fill us up. It wasn't long before the plates came out, and I have to say that immediate presentation was decent.
Bad choice. BF was served the pork belly with an apple purée and added a small side salad to his meal. I ordered gnocchi, which was mixed in with peppers and broccoli. The entire theme of this course was fat and garlic. His dish was extremely wet and full of fat; I'd say probably a 70/30 split between fat and actual meat... again.. yikes. The apple purée was kind of pretty to look at, but was completely dominated by what I can only think to describe as some weird vinegar flavor. He took probably two bites and wasn't able to stomach any more. Even his salad, easy as they are, just tasted like the greens had come straight from the garden without being washed and prepared. My gnocchi was unfortunately inedible, as well, due to the crazy amount of garlic in the dish. All I could taste was garlic... not gnocchi, not broccoli, not the little peppers, but garlic. I think I had about four of the little potato dough nubs and couldn't handle any more.
Our waitress eventually came back to check in on us, and we had to ask for the check at that point. Neither one of us even thought that continuing the the three courses we ordered was a good idea based on how disappointed we were with everything else we ordered. Neither one of us are usually ones to speak up in restaurants about things like this, but this experience was unfortunately a super huge letdown. The only reason I've chosen to give two stars is solely based upon the fact that we were not charged for all the food we did not eat. We sincerely appreciated this effort to reconcile our experience, but will not be back to try again.
Fingers crossed no one else has a similar experience to ours; perhaps things will improve in the future. read more