Bentley's Oyster Bar & Grill

The business end is fishy...

First I have to declare myself a long-time fan of Richard Corrigan's, and a previous visitor to Bentleys, so it was doubly-disappointing to have a decidedly mediocre experience for a recent birthday lunch. Perhaps I should have been forewarned when a restaurant representative phoned ostensibly to confirm my booking, but actually to give me the ‘hard sell’ about their special ‘Beef and Oyster’ event taking place in the main restaurant that Sunday lunchtime. When I declined , as two of my party of five did not eat beef, I was told 'ok, you'll have a table in the downstairs bar'. And what a service disaster that was, from start to finish…

Ten full minutes passed before we managed to flag down a waiter to take out drink orders – despite the fact that we were squeezed into the end table and they were flitting back and forth behind us the entire time, studiously ignoring us. Bread arrived, but no side plates ,which did eventually make an appearance about half an hour later when some hapless waiter came to organise our cutlery (by which time the bread was pretty much finished and the crumbly evidence littered the table). The Bloody Marys that were presented were possibly the most insipid I have ever had the misfortune to imbibe in an expensive London restaurant – and for Sunday lunch! How tough is it to actually flavour the tomato juice? For £13 a pop I expected way better.

To be fair the shellfish was exemplary, but then I would expect nothing less from a fish restaurant of this caliber (and price range)and there is not much you can do to ruin some good oysters and chilled langoustine. But the erratic, distracted service continued apace – it all felt like we were doing the heavy lifting in the front of house area. All in all it seems that standards have slipped perilously since my previous visit and that Chef Corrigan has taken his eye off this particlar corner of his burgeoning empire. What a shame, but I shall be going to Scott's next time around.

Bentley’s inhabits the same part of the restaurant universe as Scott’s or Sheeky’s: fundamentally classic in its approach to food and décor, a service culture in which you are addressed as ‘sir’ or ‘madam’ rather than ‘guys’ and a set of prices that will make your mouth go dry.

The restaurant backs on to Mayfair and evidently relies on its plentiful supply of tradesmen who hawk Ferraris, Canalettos or gilt-edged derivatives. In fact, Bentley’s makes me misty-eyed at the memory of lunch in the 90s: arriving by rattling black cab, downing a bloody Mary at the bar with a copy of the Standard while waiting for the rest of the table to arrive, chugging through more than one bottle of Chablis over the meal and, crucially, sticking the whole thing on expenses without a moment’s thought. These days you arrive by tube, debate whether two glasses or a carafe of wine will be sufficient, and if the cost gets near £50 per head then you know an email from the ‘expenses helpdesk’ in Bangalore will be forthcoming. Happily on this occasion I had no such concern as my companion was paying and she signs off her own expenses!

Not that this is to say that Bentley’s food is stuck in the past; far from it. My main course of scallops with clementine, squid, broccoli, noodles and chilli was superb in execution, in the combination of tastes and in presentation. It was modern and classic simultaneously. Equally accomplished was the starter of squid stuffed with chorizo and feta, served with mussels the size of my biceps and a sauce vierge. My companion’s starter of lobster macaroni was great in terms of presentation and taste, and outstanding in the quality of the fresh macaroni.

Service wasn’t quite as polished as in the other sorts of places in this category of restaurant. The staff in the bar downstairs bantered a lot amongst themselves and bickered a little too. The sommelier was rather too keen to refill our glasses between every sip, though she did come up with a spot-on response to our request for a follow-up bottle of white. The staff member who talked us through the specials didn’t quite have good enough English to be clearly understood, and bless him he looked a bit daft in a white jacket that was two sizes too big. The maitre d’ however was a more serious gent, confident and brimming over with enthusiasm; the kind of person who persuades to you to have three more dishes and a great deal more wine that you intended.

On those thumping great prices: it’s £13 for a cocktail, there’s only one starter under a tenner and a main with a side will easily head north of £30. A dessert of ‘petits fours’ for a fiver turned out to be three bonbons each of the type you’d expect to see arrive for free with coffee in other places at this level. So if you live or work in Mayfair, or if your corporate expense account is still stuck in the 90s, or if you are able to treat yourself while being temporarily blind to the bill, Bentley’s can be recommended heartily.

We arrived at Bentley's around 7pm on a midweek evening without a reservation and were seated in the bar at a snug red leather banquette. We started with a glass of champagne each whilst studying the brief, well organised menu. My better half began with a Seafood Cocktail which she described as the finest version of this retro dish she had ever tasted; perhaps unsurprising given the quality of the langoustine, prawn, crab meat and brown shrimp ingredients. I took a “special” starter of morcilla, scallops, mint and blood orange, the latter citrus notes making for a beaufifully balanced dish set against the sweet seafood and fat blood pudding. On to the mains, first a rather humdrum fish pie consisting of just cod and salmon, but a better dish was a generous lobster spaghetti. For dessert, my wife had a lemon sponge pudding which was a substantial end to the meal served with a lemony custard sauce. I chose a savoury variation on a welsh rarebit, which was delicious and served with a cleansing pear and watercress salad. Unfortunately, I waited 10 mins for the savoury as they had mislaid my initial order. We drank a 500ml carafe of Albarino throughout which was elegantly served in a bucket of water and ice. Service was warm and friendly save the wobble on my savoury, but Corrigan knows his stuff and for a good selection of seafood at reasonable prices – at least for W1 – try Bentley's Oyster Bar.

Having enjoyed eating at Bentleys many times, our recent visit was a big disappointment.
Service lacked organisation and customer concern and interest.
Time gap between starter and main was unreasonably long. We were told that the Royal Fish Pie had to be created and baked from start to finish!
The Royal Fish Pie(costs almost 30 pounds)was very short of content(fish)and not particularly tasty.
We were a small party(3) and they got a very simple order wrong-delivered spinach instead of potatoes.
Desserts were amateurish.
Quite disappointed.
Will not return soon.

The food is mediocre to poor and over priced, the wine ditto, and the ambience somewhat claustrophobic with too much brass and white linen and not enough real character.

My spaghetti with clams was quite foul – greasy, and the clams were fishy and had seen much better days. The fish pie was nothing to write home about, and overpriced for what it was. Calamari with Seville orange sauce were OK, but overly sweet, and reminiscent of orange chicken in a Chinese.

Probably the nicest thing was the creme brulee, which was vast, creamy and very good. The wine list is singularly expensive and not especially interesting.

The outside terrace is lovely for a drink, but if you actually want a decent meal, my advice is to go elsewhere.

Just had lunch at Bentleys with a couple of clients, it was my first time there and I can honestly say I will go back. The service was impeccable, and the food was delicious. Not being a fish lover, I was a little worried about menu items beforehand, but the wild duck salad (a special) and the rib-eye steak were fantastic (Gaucho's, eat your heart out !)
The chocolate brownie with cappuccino mousse as a dessert was the best I had in a while, I had it with the accompanying glass of Maury Mas Amiel , which worked perfectly with it, very nice recommendation.
Our waiter was helpful and classy, and the whole atmosphere is lovely, without being stuffy. I will definitely be back, and not just for client lunches!

I found some dishes over salted and others without seasoning. The ingredients were clearly excellent, just not prepared to equivalent quality. Not up to the standards of other similarly priced restaurants, maybe the chef had a cold?

I visited Bentley's for a birthday meal last month and had an exceptionally fun time! The whole party was treated like royalty and the surroundings are so beautiful. The food was to die for – and although it is predominantly a fish restaurant – they serve incredible steaks with a scrumptious and flavoursome peppercorn sauce. We sat at the bar afterwards and enjoyed a couple of cocktails which were delicious and Bentley's has some of the most welcoming bar staff in town.

Great food, lovely place – staff are shocking. Rude, un-attentive and un-professional. We were left sitting for over an HOUR between main course and our plates being collected in time for dessert. Even after excusing ourselves on several occiasions to our waitress (and other peoples waitresses) and requesting the dessert menu we were just ignored. Actually got up, left and complained to Maitre'D who was confused when we came down to front door and asked for our bill. We were given a discount and an incentive to visit again but we do not plan to. Service ruined a fantastic meal – not idea what dessert's are like but can highly recommend everything we were served!

This was a disappointment, after looking forward to the meal. The service was snooty, the food was seriously mediocre and very over-priced. We had booked a table at the oyster bar and we moved to the restaurant with no notice; the night we went there was a special menu that we had not been told about when we booked. It was so disappointing we left before coffee or desert and went somewhere else.

We had 6 oysters to share which were the best thing, but took about 30 minutes to arrive.

I had the monkfish en croute – the fish was fairly tough and the sides – broccoli, creamed poatoes – were unimaginative and entirely bog-standard.

My wife had the lobster fish pie – although the lobster was tasty the whole thing in general was bog-standard.

I would like to go to the oyster bar ( which is where we'd wanted to go in the first place) but based on my experience in the restaurant would not go there again.