Langan’s Brasserie
AA Gill, The Sunday Times (Rating: 0/5 stars)
“I was prepared to be disappointed, but not for it to be so staggeringly frightful”. In its 70’s heyday, Langan’s may have been “a cultural milestone, a starting block, a sign of things to come, a glimpse of what London could be”, but nowadays, says the critic, most of the cooking seems “made to push the envelope of what the kitchen could get away with”. The whole experience is “horribly depressing”.
Boundary
Zoe Williams, The Telegraph (Rating: 6/10)
Our scribe has “mixed feelings” about the French cuisine on offer in the “speakeasy”-style fine dining room of Conran’s Boundary Project, and is less than impressed by the long waits between courses. She speculates that perhaps the “tardy service [is] part of Terence Conran’s grand design. He has a rare gift for making you believe that you’ve arrived – not just arrived, you’ve even been allowed in! And, look, they’ve given you your very own table. It seems almost churlish to carp on about what happened next.”
Great Queen Street
Jasper Gerard, The Sunday Telegraph (Rating: 4/5)
The critic visits a “no-nonsense, manly restaurant in London's Covent Garden that specialises in great chunks of nose to tail meat” (and, most particularly, pork). “[I] you just want to pig-out, get your snout down here”, he advises. “it’s a trough not to be sniffed at.”
Marco Pierre White Steakhouse & Grill
Oh dear, seems it’s getting personal. The critic leaves the new City chophouse with an urge to throw darts at the photo of MPW which appears on the menu. Why? Simple: “almost everything we ate was awful”. (Not quite sure about Jay’s analysis, though: if the place really “sells food aimed at red-blooded hedge fund managers”, it’s surely located in entirely the wrong place. Hedgies are much more likely to be seen in Mayfair, St James’s or Belgravia than in the City.)
Age & Sons, Ramsgate
Terry Durack, The Independent on Sunday (Rating: 17/20)
“Situated in the old Page & Sons wine warehouse (the P fell off) in a secluded courtyard just off the high street, Age & Sons is a breath of fresh air for Ramsgate”, says the critic. “It is not a pub, a tea-room or a chippy. Nor does it feel like a transplant from the capital, telling locals how things should be done.” “This is a genuine find, a place of integrity, charm and good humour, and [chef] Toby Leigh goes on my list of Britain's exciting new order of rising young talent.”
Richard Phillips at Chapel Down, Small Hythe
Tracey MacLeod, The Independent (Rating: Food 3/5 stars, Ambience 3/5 stars, Service 2/5 stars)
“Chapel Down [award-winning Kentish winemakers] recently set up a destination restaurant in partnership with a named chef, in this case Richard Phillips, who already co-owns two restaurants in Kent, Thackerays and Hengist”, the critic tells us. She notes a certain arrogance attached to having a name chef affiliated with a restaurant, without him being in evidence - “the restaurant should more properly be called ‘Richard Phillips Not at Chapel Down’’’. She was “left un-greeted in the bar for ages”, until eventually being seated “with an air of benign tolerance”. The food was up-and-down and service never rose to the occasion – “unbelievably in a wine restaurant[, we] were offered no wine list.”
Glasshouse Brasserie, Worcester
Matthew Norman, The Guardian (Rating: 5/10)
Mr Norman proclaims the the food at “this self-styled brasserie” (“it’s no such thing”) as “very good indeed” (“which is no surprise given the involvement of Shaun Hill”). But a restaurant experience is not all about the food. Here, a “catastrophic” misuse of space, “sterile colour scheme” and “funereal” atmosphere combine to counteract the “cracking” nosh, and he leaves with feeling of “relief”.
The Duke of Cumberland, Henley
Giles Coren, The Times (Rating: 9/10)
Giles visits “a tiny inn on a hill surrounded by steep garden all around, dozens of little stone pools full of trout and crayfish, the sound of running water, little bowers, tables in nooks and crannies, views over the South Downs, and cool, pale, lovely light pints of Hip Hop from the Langham brewery at Lodhurst, just round the corner.” The charm and its “terrific food” make it “just about the nicest pub in West Sussex”.
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