News
Bubbling up: My wife's in Paris right now, walking down the Boulevard St-Germain in cool midday sunshine--one of those days when it's easy to fall in love with the city all over again. She went over on Eurostar, easily the best way to go (and now that the British link is complete, quicker by 20 minutes, now just over 3 hours). She left from the new, completely re-done St. Pancras Station, which just opened, and boasts "The Longest Champagne Bar in the World," so I went along to have a look and a glass. The station is wonderful, quite majestic--someone standing near me said, "It's like being in an old movie!" and it is. The bar's pretty nifty too, open all day (10 a.m. to midnight), starting with a Champagne breakfast, all-day posh snacks, and afternoon Champagne Tea (not exactly a misnomer--you can have both). A full-service restaurant will open on the Platform Level in Spring 2008.
Where's the best Fish & Chips in Town? Most "chippies" are really local joints, usually in residential neighborhoods, but some can be easily found. I'm starting with a fairly posh one, Geale's, in Notting Hill (2 Farmer Street; tel: 020 7727 7528). When I lived around here, this was the longtime local favorite, a casual hangout with varied kinds of fish, friendly and raucous; after the founding family sold out, it went through a few changes, none good. Now it's been taken over by a Michelin-starred chef and turned into a good, informal fish restaurant. The good news is that the fish (four or five, including cod) comes in feather-light, crisp batter, and chips are thick-cut and very tasty, and that they'll only set you back £10-£11; add on very crisp, light onion rings (£2) and a glass of something like Guinness stout (£4), and you're well set up. This is tops so far--more to come.
A reader reminded me about Bentley's Oyster Bar & Grill, near Piccadily Circus, so I popped in (you can eat at the marble-topped bar without reservations). First-rate: good fish, light, crisp batter, chunky chips, mushy peas (mashed, with bacon), fresh tartare sauce. With a glass of Albarino (perfect!), it came to £29.59, not bad value for what it was, and the neighborhood. . . Near Grosvenor Square, Scott's also offers first-rate posh fish & chips, and mushy peas, at the bar or a table in the informal part of the brasserie, with a decent glass of wine, for a few dollars more.
A clean, well-lighted place for books--and resting: Waterstone's, the huge bookstore just off Picadilly Circus, has just opened 5th View, a top-floor restaurant with large windows overlooking Jermyn Street, with a space next door that looks like a very hip reading room--which is more or less what it is, except that it has table service for lunch, weekend brunch, evening tapas, and tea, drinks, and pastries almost anytime (the store's open from 10 a.m. to 10 p.m. six days a week, noon-to-6 p.m. Sundays, food and drink service begins at noon and ends at 9 p.m. weekdays, 4 p.m. Sundays) The wine list is surprisingly good for such an informal place, from decent Pinot Grigio to Dom Perignon. It's a great place to relax, a blessing; Virginia Woolf would have loved it.
Jugged wines--a welcome trend in the making: After Arbutus opened this autumn in Soho to enthusiastic reviews for the splendid food and a policy of serving almost all of the 90+ wines on the list in 250-milliliter carafes for one-third of the bottle price, making many fine wines quite affordable, Odette's, a new restaurant in chic Primrose Hill, did the same. Lately, Wild Honey, a new brasserie in Mayfair run by the Arbutus team, has also adopted the idea. Two other London restaurants have now announced that they'll test the idea. Update: Scott's, the historic fish restaurant in Mayfair, thoroughly renovated, has also introduced fine wines in carafes. More to come, for sure. . .
Hotel news: The Connaught has closed down for renovation and expansion (taking over a building next door). Gordon Ramsay won't re-open Angela Hartnett's restaurant there; they're shopping for a new venue in London for her, now that she's finished opening a new Gordon Ramsay restaurant in Florida. . . Theo Randall, former head chef at the popular River Cafe, opened his own Italian restaurant within the Inter-Continental Hotel on Park Lane. Now that the Hilton has raised the stakes by hiring hot-chef-of-the-moment Jeff Galvin to finally get their rooftop restaurant right, and the Dorchester has taken on Aidan Byrne (formerly Tom Aikens' right-hand man), Mayfair's getting interesting. Scott's, the historic seafood restaurant (Oscar Wilde was a regular--this is supposedly where he first said, "I can resist anything but temptation") also opened to largely enthusiastic reviews. It had fallen on hard times the last few years, but new owners and a capable new chef seem to have brought it back. Update: The Dorchester is really raising the stakes, again; Alain Ducasse, the chef with the world's most Michelin stars, has opened a restaurant on the terrace. Posh? Try £150 for a meal, with a modest wine.