I HAVE been on holiday and so, fortunate- ly, missed
the deluge of hype that has accompanied the opening of Quaglino's in St James's. The extent of my briefing, before I arrived at the restaurant, was that Sir Terence's aim was not to recreate the old Quaglino's, but to evoke its spirit. I expected something large, bustling and undauntingly glamorous, and this is exactly what the Conran Quaglino's is: in feeling, though not in appearance, it is the spiffy London answer to La Coupole (though, thank God, without its overbearingly surly waiters). So, what could be better? It hums. It buzzes. It is beautiful.
In fact, several things could be better. And I have no doubt that they will be. But before I get on to the many right things about Quaglino's, I want to get what's wrong with it out of the way. There are things that have to be said.
Item: when you bowl up at a restaurant outside of which stand several men, osten- tatiously kitted out in gold braid, impor- tantly draped on cap, epaulet and frogging, you do not expect to have them stand by and watch as you stumble up to the door, feel like a klutz as you push when you should pull, or pull when you should push, whichever it is, and then just shout 'Pull!' or 'Push!' at you. Thanks, guys.
Item: all restaurateurs know how impor- tant a good maitre d' is. That this should be forgotten in a restaurant which, after all, is named after the most famous maitre d' of all is extraordinary. Actually, I was told when I inquired, there was a maitre d', one Eric Gamier, but he'd taken the evening off. Why on earth is someone so crucial to the smooth running of the restaurant tak- ing off the first night the restaurant is offi- cially open?
Item: if you are opening any sort of homage to the spirit of the Twenties, there are just some things you have to get right. When we asked for a dry Martini by way of an aperitif we expected something other than a straight glass with a single shot of the right one, the bright one. 'Oh, you mean a gin Martini,' said the waiter when we pointed out the error.
Item: nix the cigarette girl. She walks around in a tiny black tulle tutu lackadaisi- cally touting Marlboros to a crowd that was born 20 years after the last cigarette girl walked abroad in London. This should be a restaurant, not a theme park. Item: It is simply naff to give the price of `a Quaglino's ashtray' (a clever bit of alloy cast as the letter Q) at the bottom of the menu. It's cringingly self-conscious and, again, far too theme-parky. I can see why they've written it: it represents the same sort of thinking as that used by hoteliers who pin labels to their bathrobes saying, `You may buy a hotel robe at the front desk when you check out', meaning, 'We know you want to pinch the bathrobe, but don't even think of it.' But that's no excuse. Rather the opposite.
But in the restaurant's defence, although the faults I have listed are all significant, they are all easily righted. And I don't doubt but that they will be. I also don't doubt that Quaglino's will be a huge suc- cess. It already feels like a successful restaurant , which is a large part of it.
The menu reads well and eats better. Chef Martin Webb comes from one of Sir Terence's other restaurants, the Pont de la Tour, via a 10-year stint in Australia and a five-week stretch at the Ivy. It is, in fact, of the Ivy that the menu here is immediately reminiscent. By this, I mean that it is an old-fashioned supper menu with fashion- able furbelows. You can order fish or steak and chips, boudin blanc, magret of duck or pickled Japanese crab with mirin and soy and mackerel with lime and coriander.
This is the sort of menu it is pleasurably difficult to choose from. Pasta e fagioli was lighter than I had expected, but not dismay- ingly so. The soup was not of the casalinga dense and grainy variety, but a clear golden broth, filled with chunks of pancetta, pinky tan borlotti, shining like beads, cabbage, celery and soft pappardelle-like ribbons of pasta. I'm always suspicious of fashionable reworkings of prawn cocktail. The coy attempt at kitsch hipness can jar. I have, though, only good words for its reformula- tion here: the langoustine tails, so sweet, so plump, so tender are just draped in a lightly tomatoed, almost nutty mayonnaise to such graceful effect that I almost forgave the price, which at £9.50 is more than quite a few of the main courses.
`I'm a German money spider.' Speaking of which, the deep-fried plaice with chips was near on perfection, the fish bouncily fresh, the batter sweet and crisp, only the chips fell short. Let me have none of this pommes allumettes business: I want proper, old-fashioned, fat chips. Spiced lamb with roast onions was velvety pink and smeared and seared with cumin, coriander and garam masala.
Chef Webb comes from Lancashire, his pastry chef comes from Yorkshire and they have come up with what might be thought of as a grown-up version of sticky toffee pudding: parkin pudding, dark as tar and smokily redolent of nutmeg and cinnamon. The Sauternes custard, which comes with prunes steeped in armagnac, tastes some- where between a syllabub and the crème under the briilee, though better, far, than both.
Our dinner, with drinks before, a glass of house red (OK) and white (not OK) and a bottle of Bonny Doon's Big House Red (rhapsodic) with, and coffee after, came to £74, including a tip of 15 per cent. You could easily, and enjoyably, pay a lot less, but I would reckon £70 for two to be an honest average for three courses.
Quaglino's; 16 Bury Street, SW1, tel: 071 930 6767.
Nigella Lawson
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