IT IS ABOUT time Martin Saxon had his own place.
But that sounds churlish. The truth of the matter, certainly, is that Saxon's emergence as proprietor, rather than his usual front-of-house manager, is as welcome as it was inevitable. His function, up till now, has been to alert us as to which new-fangled eatery was most fashionable. His sharp-suited presence welcoming you at this just-launched place or other was all one needed to know about its claim to modishness. If he were there, it was incon- testable.
I first encountered him, some seven or so years back, in my more intensely Notting Hill period, at 192. Martin Saxon on dis- Play, Alastair Little in the kitchen: the com- bination was to be savoured. From there, Saxon went to 51-51, which was fashionable for about five minutes, then to Columbus, which didn't quite make it that long. Cer- tainly after Saxon turned a shuddering back on the place, its demise was not long com- ing. He returned to 51-51, which had been reborn as Zuma, and with the hugely tal- ented Angela Dwyer (late of — among other places — 192, Alastair Little's and the Wilds, now at the Groucho) there began another high-fashion, high-achieving Partnership. From there, Saxon went to Sud Ouest, a restaurant tucked away behind Harrods, which never quite got the attention it deserved; its chef, Nigel Davis, is tellingly enough now at the Ivy. A brief period setting up the Square, an only slight- IY smugly trendy outfit looking like a set for a Swedish airport lounge in an Antonioni film, takes us up till now and the Lexington, where he has set up shop on the site of the recession-hit Sutherlands, with Ian Loynes, second chef at the Square, in the kitchen. It promises to be another one of Saxon's smart partnerships. The place is very much the sort of thing One would expect from Saxon, whose ele- gantly spivvy ways and 1950s Brighton air are gently defused by his beaming affability. There is more than a touch of the 192, apparent in the style of the place rather than its actual design, though there are reminders there too. Black leather ban- quettes line the cream walls of this galley of a room; tables, bar and floor are pale wood; menus convey voluptuous fare in Cupped tones. Just around the corner from National Magazine House, the Lexington is an obvious lunching-pad for Harpies and
Queens and the place's trendiness is con- firmed by a daily quota trekking from Vogue House.
In the evening, it is more the indepen- dent film-maker brigade, women in hippy gear, men in Gaultier jackets — that sort of thing. But not exclusively, and not inhibit- ingly, so relax. Food is better than many such enterprises usually boast: undeniably fashionable but not to the point of off-the- wall whimsy. The dinner menu is a tripar- tite affair — starters, stuff that'll double as starter or main courses and main courses proper — with a supplementary sheet for puddings. We toyed around with all three sections: from the first a sauté of mush- rooms and mussels, a rapturous success, briny and bosky and creamily pungent; from the middle one came a creation of genius, the Lexington Paysanne, which tastes like something one could make at home with the leftovers for supper on Sun- day night (no higher praise), and is a salad comprising a few leaves and various odds and ends, a few lentils, a bit of couscous, some shredded confit of duck, some home- made crisps made of root veg and new potatoes. This is wonderful, a sort of fried salad, quite mad really but it works to per- fection. For a main course, I had lambs' sweetbreads and tongue, thinly sliced in a creamy amber sauce, veal stock and Dijon mustard poking through, and given a strange perfumed intensity by a generous sprinkling of tarragon and a smaller dose, but still evident and aromatic, of basil and parsley. At the centre lay a mound of soupy mashed potatoes (new potatoes apparently, most modish) which served to thicken the sauce rather than as a vegetable. All these three were exceptional. Less successful were the wild mushroom risotto (the rice was chalky, the broth probably added too impatiently while cooking) and the fettucine with smoked tomato and scal- lops. Here the pasta was heavy, the sauce thin and the effort to bring them together too strained. The only serious failure was the bread, which came in indigestible doughy orbs and lay heavy on the stomach. With food this good, one doesn't want to be filled to bloating point before one's even ordered.
From the pudding list, I chose 'The Full Monte', which is quite the David Nivenish, at-the-races kind of expression to be expected on Saxon's menu and is a guz- zler's plate of the lot, more or less — pista- chio and praline mousse, crunchy with shards of praline, a slab of chocolate ter- rine, cherry brandy ice-cream, a little trian- gle of lemon tart and a slice of caramelised pear tart.
This is not an expensive place. I ate more than is perhaps decent, but drank consider- ably less (a glass of grassy-fresh chardonnay at £3), which probably, pricewise at least, balanced things out, and dinner for the two of us came to just over £40.
The Lexington: 45 Lexington Street, London WI; tel 071 434 3401
Nigella Lawson
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