Pollen Street Social

Food is superb

We had a 9pm booking and went for the Tasting Menu which takes about 3 hours, so make sure you have the baby sitter booked until late, what a 3 hours though the food was incredible both in terms of the variety of flavours and textures. Highlights included the amazing flavour in the gambas tatar and scollap sashimi dish entitle trip to Japan. The food is clever without being gimiky and all about the flavour and quality of the ingrediants. The wine list was also great and we went off piste with a greek riesling and a malbec from southern France which were both fantastic and great value.

Don't miss the dessert bar

Though my visit was a while back now, I remember the experience well and those delicious, fresh and innovative desserts. As soon as you walk in to Pollen St Social, you are met with friendly staff who eagerly show you to your seat where you witness the magic of the restaurant. Interiors are understated but the finishing touches are contemporary and refreshing.

The menu too seems simplistic in its approach but the executed dishes are a thing of beauty. The master piece for me however were the desserts, which you take in at the dessert bar instead of remaining at your table ( a clever way of table turning but one that works for the diner too), where you witness your desserts in the making.

I love this kind of culinary theatre and best of all staff make it a fun interactive experience. There are also a few pre-desserts to gobble down whilst your waiting for your main dessert, and although you may think three desserts might be over kill or extreme indulgence, you'd be wrong. A light and refreshing combination of flavours and textures (lime granita, passion fruit coulis, coconut sorbet) all blend to leave your taste buds zinging and your palette suitably cleansed.

Definitely one to return back to.

As previous visits, an excellent meal

I've eaten here several times, though this is my first review of it on Square Meal. So far , I've enjoyed each meal I've had here, and always look forward to returning. Today I lunched with old friends that I hadn't seen for a while, so the food quite possibly got less attention than it deserved. We each ate the set lunch, well priced at £26/3 courses , which is good value for food of this quality. Unlike many restaurants, the food on the set menu seems comparable with what you see on the main menu, not an obviously cheaper and less interesting alternative.

My potato and leek veloute over a range of tiny ingredients including rabbit was smooth and tasty, though perhaps the best course was a “bourguignonne ” – aka a piece of slow cooked and well-flavoured beef with leeks , tiny onion rings and an intense jus. The dessert, which centred around Rhubarb sorbet , was less successful; I much like rhubarb and it was a pity to see it overpowered by its accompanying mint and biscuit. We enjoyed a bottle of Puglian red from the lower end of the list, and the coffee, petits fours and bread were all good.

Pollen street Social is well established on our list of restaurants to return to, and I look forward to next time.

Have to say that I don't share the publical hype about this place despite having been there a few times. It was him that made Maze what it used to be (and you can feel the impact of his departure there ever since) but I expected more of this place given how much I admired him at his peak back there. Shame he is not doing the tappas style small sharing plates that was part of his take on things back aty Maze. It's not a let-down – don't get me wrong – but in my opinion it just doesn't live up to the created hyped-up image (and my own expectations). Decent service

So many reviews, so many comments, what more can I add? Perhaps just a rave about the dessert bar – genius way to turn tables and for a non-dessert fan, I was converted if only for the night. I don't usually enjoy chef's tables. but the team made it an absolute pleasure to watch them at work and you couldn't help but feel carried along by their enthusiasm and encouragement to just try another morceau…

Loved the food, the service and the relaxed buzz of the place – definitely on the “must return” list.

Fantastic welcome, confident staff and that razzy warmth of atmosphere that has all the finery of the Mayfair restaurant scene mixed with the bustling conversations of well dressed foodies, fiancés and good friends.
The sommelier took us through the most appropriate wines with ease. His knowledge of flavour and body for every possible menu choice was truly outstanding.
The dishes were well proportioned and intricately executed with more of a classic feel to the menu rather than the ultra-stand-out-of-the-crowd culminations I often have trouble identifying as real food.
Highly recommend. Square away a light lunch and book for dinner at 8.

Pleasant, lively, buzzy place with good service and very good food.

I had been looking forward to eating at Pollen Street Social for months and hence my expectations were high. Did it live up to expectations? yes and no is the answer, the food was fabulous and i am unable to fault it, but the overall experience was let down by the service. As a table of 6 we were seated in a tucked away corner of the restaurant as far away from the central service area as possible, our pre dinner cocktails came in dribs and drabs one of them being forgotten completely (when they did arrive they were amazing, but it would have been nice to have them all at the same time and not have to remind the waiting staff). With the meal itself there were long waits between courses and i think we had all finished are desert wines before the deserts even arrived. I'm not sure if the service was so patchy because of the location of the table, but it was a shame that it let down the other wise excellent food. Would i go back? Yes, would i request a different table? definitely.

At the beginning of this year The Better Half (TBH) and I decided that we would go to one very good restaurant a month. If you go at lunch time and stick to the set menu, you can actually pick up a really good deal in what would otherwise be a wallet-busting day out! So I set about creating a bucket list of restaurants I want to try.

Pollen Street Social was one of the restaurants on that list.

We decided before we even sat down that we were going to stick to the set menu. I have a tendency to SAY I'm going to have the set menu and then get distracted by the a la carte. I didn't even look because the set menu just read so well. And at £24 for 2 courses or £27.50 for 3 courses, that is just amazing value!

While we were choosing, the waitress left us with a few little “snacks” (out with the poncy ‘amuse bouche’ and in with the less formal snack.) Pork crackling that was more prawn cracker in texture than rock hard pub pork scratching, with a gorgeous mustard dip that looked like melted butter. A salt cod spread that was so tasty I wanted to lick the bowl it came in! Salt cod is really strong flavoured and knowing TBH, I was very surprised that even he liked it. There were also some really good olives.

For my starter I chose mackerel with BBQ cucumber and horseradish cream, because I have only ever had mackerel once. Shocking, considering how much I love fish. When it came it looked as pretty as a picture! The flavours were Asian inspired and with the added mooli on the plate (something else I have never tried!) it made the dish really interesting. The dish was served cold which I wasn’t expecting and it looked like the mackerel had only been blow-torched. I can't say I loved it, but it was different from anything I have ever tasted. The tastiest part of the dish for me was the horseradish cream, which is a shame because the mackerel should've been the star of the show.

TBH chose the truffled hen's egg with London smoked salmon and watercress soup. I am assured it was as gorgeous as it looked! I definitely had some plate envy going on, especially when he cut through the egg and the yolk just burst out like a jack-in-the-box!

I stuck to fish again for my main dish. Halibut is one of my favourite types of fish and when I saw it on the menu, it was a no-brainer. Served with a shellfish salad, bouillabaisse and liquid potato. Sounds interesting, doesn't it? And it was! The bouillabaisse was full of fishy flavour and I just loved the way the two liquids were poured into the plate that made it look a bit like ying and yang. I'm not sure if that was intentional, but it looked and tasted great all the same. My only gripe was that the seafood salad only consisted of clams. Salads to me are made of lots of different things and it would've been nice to have some other shellfish in there.

TBH had the 18 hour braised Angus feather blade with baked celeriac and marrow crumbs. It looked amazing! I had a little taste and the meat was so tender it just melted in your mouth.

After our meal came a pre-dessert. The waitress told us to stick the spoon in all the way to the bottom and make sure that we got every layer. We did this and what we got was a sharp raspberry sorbet, soft meringue and then little balls of what tasted like white chocolate at the end, but couldn't have been because they just melted away like little raspberry icicles.

Neither of us fancied a dessert after this, the pre-dessert was all I needed. But the waitress managed to talk us into sharing the English rice pudding with goat’s milk, mango and ginger. It made me think of a dear friend of mine who totally (and very vocally) dislikes anything that comes from a goat! “It just tastes like a farm yard!” Rest assured it did not taste anything like that at all. It was creamy and packed full of vanilla. The mango and ginger sorbet brought sharpness to the dish that just cut through the rice pudding and actually made the whole dish feel quite light. Very clever!

While we waited for the bill, we were given apple and almond parmentiers. Goo’ey in the centre with the lightest crisp on the outside. You just have to love all these little extras!

The waitresses were sweet and attentive, and the sommelier made some excellent recommendations. But the service didn't feel as slick as it does in some other Michelin star establishments. Maybe that's the aim, with it being a more relaxed type of dining? Incidentally, TBH disagrees and thought that the whole experience was the best he has had in a long time.

Our bill came to £112 which included service, 2 glasses of Prosecco and 3 glasses of wine. For that level of cooking and the fantastic atmosphere, it’s an absolute steal!

@SamTheFoodFan

On being seated at Pollen Street on this occasion (my third visit) I was somewhat disappointed to be placed right by the kitchen with a direct view into the action itself. However, not only were my dining comrades comfortable facing out into the main, buzzy, dining area, but I ended up getting a superb insight into just why Pollen Street is so successful. Despite the restaurant being almost full on a Tuesday lunchtime, the whole operation worked superbly smoothly. The team in the kitchen appeared to be working in perfect harmony, always busy, but never rushed and the attention to detail seemed meticulous. This was also evidenced in our food. We all ate from the set lunch menu and between us tried all three of the starters, two of the three mains. All were presented beautifully. The food was wonderfully fresh and ingredients paired innovatively. The braised beef was tender and the best I had had for some time. The sommelier was also helpful in his suggestions and the list both varied and reasonably priced (wines from £25). Our Cote du Rhone Villages (at £39) was ideal for the food and the occasion. Minor quibbles would be (i) noise level – every time I have been here, I have had to raise my voice in order for my comrades on the opposite side of the table to be able to hear and (ii) a rather disorganised end to the meal – a long wait for cheese, coffee and the bill; and then all three arrived together. Just minor issues though and set lunch of this quality and in this atmosphere at the price (£24 for two courses, £27.50 for three) is hard to beat in London at present.