Restaurants in hotels are rarely cool. Not in London, anyway. They often feel disjointed or half-baked, as if there’s an expectation customers will come because they’ll be in the vicinity anyway. Why go all out when there are guests ready to go? Many of them are wealthy beyond all comprehension and intent only on revelling in luxury. To that end, cold langoustines and a crispy duck salad will do.
This isn’t to say hotel restaurants are bad, necessarily. One or two have long been among the best places to eat in town. The Ritz Restaurant is one, adored by any and all who can afford it. Hélène Darroze at The Connaught and Alain Ducasse at The Dorchester each maintain three Michelin stars. An omelette Arnold Bennett and a beef Wellington at The Savoy Grill remain two majestic dishes. But cool? Well.
As London steps a little closer to New York, hotel restaurants are shifting from an afterthought or an annex, into places to hang out at, even if a room isn’t in scope. Even before Florence Knight’s new opening, Lunette, anybody who’s anybody has been clamouring to visit Café Clement at Nick Jones’ Strand hotel. Nigella Lawson’s been more than once and it only opened — softly, I should add — in June. Stanley Tucci visited with Angela Hartnett almost as soon as the doors opened. Oh yes, savvy marketing has been employed, but these people don’t have time for nonsense even if it’s free.
Café Clement might be an easy sell: an elegant all day café with a terrace overlooking the Thames and the leafy gardens next to it. But it would have been found out already were the food not good. And it’s not the only new(ish) venue that has upped the ante.
Mezzogiorno at the Corinthia is another. Francesco Mazzei’s love letter to southern Italian cooking is a monumental place with exceptional dishes. And it’s a cool place to eat, contradicting so many other places around Embankment. If nothing else, go and have the fileja e spuntature: pasta with spare ribs ragu and smoked ricotta. £42 for two, by the way.
Or visit Tobi Masa at the Chancery Rosewood a grand hotel in Mayfair newly home to the sushi master Masayoshi Takayama’s omakase experience.
Elsewhere, Mexican chef Paola Arenas is breathing new life into Decimo at The Standard, the new Six Senses hotel in Bayswater does one hell of a club sandwich — so often average in the capital — and Canal is still putting out playful food beside the Grand Union Canal in Westbourne Park, at the foot of Mason & Fifth.
London’s hotel restaurants are looking up.
