RESTAURANTS AS THEATRE Alice Thomson
AT THE HEIGHT of the Tory 'sleaze' scandals, when wodges of cash were flying around Westminster in brown envelopes, I had lunch with one of John Major's minis- ters. Within minutes he was admitting that he had just rented a hotel room by the hour. "You don't need to tell me this,' I said. But he insisted. He had taken a woman to an extremely smart London hotel just before Christmas, ordered cham- pagne and spent the afternoon sprawled on the bed with her before returning to his red boxes and children. He admitted that the hotel staff had been agog — until they realised that it was his wife who had shared the room.
Spending a few licit hours in a swanky London hotel with your wife, he explained, was far more entertaining than getting involved in some messy affair. There was all the fun of watching the staff trying to scrape their eyebrows off the ceilings, rootling around in the mini-bar, ordering room service and getting ketchup over the sheets, with none of the horror of being dis- covered. So when my husband celebrated his birthday last week, I told him to take his toothbrush to work and booked us into the Hempel Hotel in Bayswater.
The Hempel may seem a bizarre choice: not just because we live only five minutes away in Notting Hill Gate, and my parents — and his parents-in-law — live in the same square and might spy one of us leav- ing in the morning, but because we had already been to its I-Thai restaurant and loathed the excruciatingly expensive (starters £20) experience.
When it opened two years ago, this five- star establishment seemed perversely mini- malist. The vast concrete and marble white entrance hall looked like a samurai villain's torture playground, empty except for two pits filled with wooden contraptions and kneeling mats, with fires at either end burn- ing only pungent grey gravel. Even the ranks of white orchids looked like the fly- eating variety. You expected the stony- faced reception staff to hand you swords so you could do the decent thing and commit seppulcu.
The restaurant in the basement was even more alarming, all black walls and black tables and completely empty. Only the waiters' gym shoes gleamed an ominous white. Opaque glass screens hung from the ceiling, looking as if they might fall and decapitate you at any moment. The Thai food came in little, black, compartmen- talised boxes, like laboratory specimens, with prodding equipment (two alarmingly sharp chopsticks) and left us so hungry that when we finally escaped we headed straight home for scrambled eggs. What this white hotel lacked in chintz and tweeness, it com- pensated for in channlessness.
But with our house overflowing with old newspapers, unwashed shirts and chipped mugs, I thought my husband would appre- ciate some precision and order. And I'd always had a grudging respect for Anoush- ka's decorating skills, grandly taking her inspiratidn from 'the Pyramids, igloos, the inside of a ship's tunnel, sitting in a pud- dle'. I couldn't bear to think that the Aus- tralian sheep-shearer's daughter from the back of Bourke, the shop assistant, Bond girl and fashion guru could have hit the buffers in Bayswater.
Two years later, the Hempel has sharp- ened up its act. Before we even stopped the car, the doorman rushed out and offered to park it for us (and filled it up with petrol). He didn't flinch when he realised we had no bags. The Teutonic concierge was equal- ly relaxed when we registered under differ- ent names. The American bellboy, when he finally located the lift in the blank white wall, asked, 'Work or pleasure?' We decid- ed not to bore him by explaining we were married.
The corridors were dark and smelt of Swedish pine, but they opened onto rooms of blond brilliance, so sparkling that we knew we didn't want to ruin the linen by tipping up our consommé of smoked duck- ling and cinnamon. The best place to have eaten the cellophane noodles and black ink parcels would probably have been in the stone bath, but it wasn't big enough for two. So we descended to the basement restaurant.
The glass panes thankfully had been removed, the gym shoes were a little grub- bier and the menu now included truffle and mascarpone risotto, oven-roasted rack of lamb and even the occasional knife and fork. At one end two stunning Malaysian girls looked as though they were entertain- ing granny. At the other was a famous black supermodel with a photographer. In the middle was a group of beautifully groomed Asian Eurotrash, if such a thing exists. But the waiters and waitresses, now they are permitted to smile, were also extremely good looking.
Two minutes after we sat down, cham- pagne and a dish of mini-appetisers appeared. They were not very appetising. My husband, who has just been to Japan, now considers himself a connoisseur of shark's fin soup. He pronounced his first course of sashimi 'adequate' but not fresh enough. Stale? 'Not, exactly, more flabby, it hasn't swum enough lengths recently.' My honey-spiced duck with coriander raita had obviously been made with more ener- getic birds and was delicious, apart from the soggy filo pastry crust.
The waiter begged me not to eat Italian — 'It's not our speciality' — so for the main course I had the scallops with tamarind Oriental vegetables — a hearty broth of the stuff with mounds of clean, white rice wrapped in the same flaccid fib. My hus- band's pesto risottini, a sort of dried-out risotto, was exquisite, his papillote of plakapong was flabby and tasteless fish, but the waitress was so sweetly apologetic he'd have happily eaten fish-fingers for her.
By the time we had eaten the Thai ices (served in the now ubiquitous soggy filo pastry) and the ginger tiramisu, we couldn't even contemplate the 12 symmetrically per- fect chocolate mushrooms. Dinner, thanks to the staff, the setting and the cost, had been memorable, but the food doesn't live up to the menu. I would rather eat Italian at Pizza Express and Oriental at Yo! Sushi than opt for this uncertain blend.
When we returned to our bedroom, it looked even more inviting, with white dressing-gowns on the bed. The mattress was surprisingly soft, not at all futonish. Next morning, the sun streamed through the blinds. Breakfast was mounds of fresh fruit and pastries with two full sets of news- papers. We'd become so fond of the black boxes that we took a lunch-time selection to work the next day. I silently thanked the minister who suggested this bedroom-hop- ping, all week.
The Hempel: 31-35 Craven Hill Gardens, London 1412; tel: 0171 298 9000. Dinner for two without wine about £60 a head, with bel- uga caviar about £150.
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