The Connaught
IT WAS Monday. It was raining. I had too much work to do. And the only thing, I decided at about half past twelve, that might just possibly cheer me up — if not exactly help me get my work done — would be lunch at the Connaught. Luckily, one of the benefits of the recession is that such a thing was immediately possible: a table was easily, and no doubt gratefully, given for three quarters of an hour's time. I had last eaten at the Connaught on the evening of my eighth birthday, or it may have been my ninth. I can remember being awed with the glowing ceremoniousness of it all: the copper pans fluttered by wasp- waistcoated waiters over tableside burners; the golden light reflected in the swollen bellies of the domed silver carver-trolley covers; the padded scrunch of the soft car- pet underfoot; the laboratory precision of the cutlery before me and the rosy glow of the wood all around.
Foolish, maybe, to go back, but how sweet to find how little has changed: it is still enchantingly old-fashioned, with not an inch of twee. A crisp white menu, bordered with gold and ochre, lists the plentiful good things you may have for lunch. Chef Michel Bourdin is one of the greats of the old school and his food sets out to seduce rather than to surprise. I started with the Petit Pilaw de Crabe, Homard et Lan- goustines Thermidore and felt like a spoilt and languorous Edwardian heroine eating it. The small bowl of delicately spiky rices, pearly white and bark-coloured, were piled with hunks of seafood, pinkly, rosily fra- grant and swathed in the coral coloured sauce with its subtle hints of tarragon and chervil and distinctly unmodern voluptuous creaminess. The onion soup, our other starter, was like essence of onion soup, the soup you have to try just to know how good perfect soupe a l'oignon gratin& can be. I didn't know whether to go next for the Pintadeau en Salmis aux Morilles et Champignons des Bois or the less robustly named Rendez-Vous du Pecheur Sauce Legere aux Pistils de Safran. The guinea- fowl sounded reassuringly old-fashioned and since you come to the Connaught for the elegantly solid, I chose that. As in the old days, the trolley is whisked to the table, a copper pan piled high and played over the fire, which exudes its keroseney breath from a silver burner. The pale flesh of the guinea-fowl is covered in cream, deepened in colour, in sweet bosky taste, with smoky wild mushrooms and amber cooking juices, and studded with black morels spotted with the sauce: real Murillo colours on my plate. This is food that transports you and com- forts you at the same time, not an easily achieved combination.
I hate to say this, but I think I'm getting rather puritanical in my old age: I was slightly shocked that the steak and kidney pie, golden topped and enough, seriously, for four hearty eaters, was made for one, the obvious, inevitable wastage expected and built-in. But I melted as the pastry was parted with the graceful work of a couple of long-tined silver forks and a rich, mahogany gravy coating fat cubes of steak and curves of kidney spilled densely out.
The vegetables in both cases, and the bread that's touted beforehand, were the only disappointments. Puddings were eaten with not enough relish, maybe, but then the portions are so massive it's difficult to keep levels of enthusiasm up. Anton Mosimann has rather made bread-and-butter pudding an impossibility for everyone else. M. Bour- din's version was of the homespun egg-cus- tardy kind rather than the vanilla-souffleish Mosimann miracle. I rather wish now that I'd had the trifle. Still, next time.
The wine list is of the enslaving sort, but mindful of the work I was intending to do after lunch, I kept a steady head both before and after ordering. Yes, it is expen- sive: three courses each, a glass of whisky, a glass of champagne and a half-bottle of heavenly Leoville-Barton between us came to £120. But a mediocre lunch in London can cost £60 for two, and more likely £70 these days, and I would rather have lunch at the Connaught once than twice, or even three or four times, anywhere else. You feel so looked after here, and it worked: I did feel cheered up by it.
The Connaught, Carlos Place, London W1 Tel 071 491 0668
Nigella Lawson
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