A witless relaunch by MPW of the classic seafood ‘concept’, on the St James’s site which was formerly Luciano; if there are any attractions to eating here, our visit failed to discern them.
Its successor doesn’t deserve to do any better. The rather beautiful rear dining room – formerly the only obvious real attraction – has been turned into something like a high-class S&M parlour: all blood red walls, and kinky B&W photos. Rather oppressive. If you visit, we’d suggest sitting in the front, which is lighter, brighter and much more elegant.
It’s why you’d want to come here at all, however, which is the real mystery. The service set an off note even before we arrived: our polite ’phone enquiry as to whether the place was yet open was met with a smug confirmation, implying we were idiots not to know already. A great way of setting the scene. On the spot, the service often verged on perfunctory.
It was, however, better than the food. There’s nothing wrong with the classic (read bog-standard) dishes for which the ancient (and recently revived) house of Wheeler’s was once famous, but such classics should be done well or not at all.
A seafood specialist which does not understand the theatre of oysters does not deserve to survive. Our molluscs (decent-sized) arrived without the benefit of a stand, or an oyster fork, or a spoon for the shallot vinegar, or any rye bread.
Main course classics such as a fish pie (vast and horribly lunar-looking, and tasting no better, said a companion) seemed like some sort of throwback to the ’70s. Our fish and chips was, overall, pretty horrible: grey fish in a cludgy batter than any fool could see was ‘wrong’ – “oh, looks just like a spring roll”, said companion. Another companion left half her lemon sole. What a waste. Chunk chips themselves and fresh peas were OK, mushy peas grey and vile.
No one could bear the thought of pudding.
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