15 JUNE 1985, Page 40

Auberon Waugh

The restaurant I choose most often when I am paying is L'Escargot in Greek Street (telephone 437 2679), much favoured by publishers with mysterious young women in tow. Nearly everything is good, but my favourite meal is a salade dire chaude with pigeon breasts and bacon, followed by a feuillete of salmon and angler fish in a creamy sauce. The wine list is unusual, excellent and very reasonably priced. Wines are grouped according to taste — light reds, heavy reds etc — rather than by area of production. They are chosen by Jancis Robinson, wife of the proprietor, Nick Landa. It is a wonderful place for discovering new wines, as they are all good and mostly very cheap. Resign yourself to £20 a head and you might be agreeably surprised. While L'Escargot survives there is no possible need for Groucho's.