Chinese New Year and Appo’s 70th so we thought we’d try and go posh!

Certainly the plush surrounds of the restaurant gave a good initial impression, which sadly didn’t last for long. We were led to the table and after a few minutes of standing with coat in my hand waiting for it to be taken to a cloakroom I gave up, which was maybe a good thing as to start with the restaurant was very cold inside.

On our table for 10, it seemed a little hit and miss whether you got a plate and cutlery, amusing the Chinese on the table that the Gweilo was the only one without a folk!

The food arrived promptly and whilst not bad, it didn’t match the quality that the prices would suggest. We decided against the sharks fin soup starting at £28 a bowl and had a lobster and spinach soup to start which was good and tasty. For 2nd starter (well it was new year!) we had crispy duck, which arrived and then was quickly whisked away by an annoyed looking waiter as he had to go and shred it, nice but nothing special. For 3rd starter, did I say it was a celebration?! We had soft shell crap, which was by far the highlight of the meal, deep fried with a hint of chilli, tasty and succulent.

Then for mains we had Roasted Crispy Belly Pork, sweet an sour pork ribs, sautéed Dover Sole, stir fried king prawn, lobster in honey bean & xo sauce, sharks fin with crab roe, choy sam and rice. Again all rather ordinary and nothing to really distinguish it from what the local take away brings me on a Saturday night!

To be fair the service was quite mixed, simple things like taking coats, cleaning the table between courses and missing plates and cutlery from the table were missed, wine and water were topped up regularly and food did arrive fairly promptly with no long pauses between courses.

All in all the place was a little bit of a disappointment, we were expecting Chinese food taken to a fine dining level, as the name, décor and prices would suggest. What we got was mixed service, and very ordinary food. In hindsight we regretted not going local as we think we would have had better food at half the price.

Our bill was about £500 for the food part (£50 a head), which puts it on a par with Min Jiang which in my opinion is a far better choice.

Just in case we’d not eaten enough over Christmas and Boxing day, we visited on the 27th, mainly due to the 28, 29 and 30th all been fully booked at time of booking. As indeed was our night, partly as it is a relatively small restaurant but also, I suspect, partly because of the restaurants excellent reputation.

It was a tasting menu only on our evening, but that is fine with us as we always go for the tasting menu. The majority of courses in the tasting menu also had choices which gave welcome extra variety.

Kicking of with a trio of amuse bushes set the standard high, which was maintained thought the evening. Course included pressed Fois with pheasant, the pheasant taste a little too subtle against the fois. Langoustine Ravioli, very tasty and delicious, scallop mouse, which tasted great but texture was a little mushy. Braised shin of beef, very strong, rich and yum. The finally being a towering soufflé but despite being cooked to perfection not really my thing as was pear flavoured. They were also happy to serve just one plate of cheese for the whole table, which gave us all a taste and didn’t leave us too stuffed.

Service was good and attentive, but sadly it did wane a little towards the end and we were left to wander up and down the restaurant when it came time to find the (unsigned) toilets.

At £60 for food, £40 for matching wine, £15 for the cheese, coffee and water adding another £50 (four of us), reasonable value in a restaurant of this class.

I’d be very happy to return when the menu changes in spring.

Unfortunately it was dark when we arrived, so didn’t get to enjoy the park vista, but is probably worth getting there before hand for cocktails and sunsets.

Possible my only quibble for the evening was that we sat in the bar waiting for the last of our party to arrive, it took just too long for the waiter to give us the drinks menu and subsequently take our order and deliver the drinks.

Once sat at our table for dinner however, there were no complaints for service. We ordered a dim sum platter, which was very good tasty filling and not too gloopy skins. We went for the squid and soft shell crab in salt, pepper and chilli where were very good.

Next came the Peking duck, pre-ordered at time of booking or it is a 45 min wait, which was deftly carved at the table. Very authentic and very similar to that I’ve had in Beijing. The carcass and remaining meat is then taken away and cooked as a main.

For mains we had the remains of our duck stir fried in ginger and spring onion, crispy sea bass in soya, tofu with prawns and scallops and a forgettable chicken dish. All well cooked and tasty.

The food part of the bill came probably close to £200 for the four of us, which given the quality of ingredients and expert cooking was fair value. However, I’m not sure it is different enough from my local Chinesse Restaurant (which is very good) to really want to race back unless out with clients.

Just looking at their web site, it looks like we ate in the café section, although I didn’t know that there were different sections. Something you’d think they’d ask when you book.

The menu is in French, so for those of us lacking our French O-level it makes ordering a little tricky. Fortunately with my fake Allo Allo style French accent I bluffed my way through.

For starters I had Jambon cru, figues et gorgonzola, which sounded much more exciting in French than it looked on the plate, but as ham and cheese go, it was quite good. For main I had one of the specials, cod in a prawn and seafood sauce/ broth. A passion fruit sabayon finish me off. All in all very good food, and pretty reasonable at £33.85 for the 3 courses.

One of the best things about this place is that it is almost a tapas style of service, as in the bring the dishes as they are cooked and placed in the middle of the table to share. Which means it doesn’t look too greedy to have four starters between the two of us! Although the starters were quite good, none of the four really amazed out of the ceviche, crab and lobster salad, deep fried courgette flowers, and the one I forget (never a good sign).

Things did take a radical turn for the better when the mains arrived, grilled lamb chops with smoked aubergine, were quite possibly the best lamb chops I have ever had, cooked and tasted amazing. The chicken in lemon was also cooked well, nice and succulent and a good lemon tang.

A delightful chocolate mouse and a crème Brulee big enough for two finished us off.

On the whole a very good experience, service was a little slow to start with but did pick up fairly quickly. The table are indeed far too close together, so going to the lavatory involves putting your bum in other’s dinners. But all in, I’d recommend it.

Daughter restaurant to that in the Longville hotel. Very nice to sit on the balcony and enjoy the view of the castle. Heaters and blankets are provided to word off the sometimes chilly coast breeze.

For starters we had Slow Cooked Pork Belly, Confit Pigs Cheeks, Crisp Black Pudding & a Carpaccio of Fennel and Carpaccio of Hand Dived Scallops with Mint Risotto, Lobster & Pink Grapefruit. Nice crisp pork belly although the black pudding was a little dry. The risotto was done very well with a nice big chunk of tasty lobster on top.

For main I had Monkfish Cheeks, Roasted on Creamed Potato with Pork Belly, Langoustine, Madeira Sauce and Shellfish Foam, which proved to be another winner, with moist well cooked and tasty fish.

Pudding tipped me over the edge with their miniature puddings. Which was five small pudding on one plate, chocolate fondant with perfectly gooey and oozy insides being the best.

Promt and fairly efficient service throughout, a tiny bit cramped as they squeezed the tables a little too close, but if you’re not up to the large tasting menus at Longville then this certainly makes a great venue.

We stayed at the hotel and took one of there 2 night stay packages, room, car hire and dinner both nights. One night was the ‘taste of jersey’ and the second the ‘prestige menu’.

Surprisingly it was the smaller ‘taste’ menu that wiped us out more, as the portions were a bit chunkier than the ‘prestige’ menu. The wife gets me every time as she gives up come the main course and I end up eating hers too!

Both menus are classically French, erring towards the plentiful seafood landed on the island; turbot, langoustines and scallops featuring highly on both menus, along with fois and truffles. Although enjoying both meals, it is maybe a little telling and disappointing that a few days later I am forgetting the courses specifically, so hard to describe here.

Service top notch, prompt attention, not too intrusive but never had to pour my own wine or water, was asked if we need a break before main courses and puddings. Nice not to be hurried, and they were full.

If in Jersey, I’d say a must to at least eat in the restaurant, but would recommend the hotel too.

Clients I had invited couldn’t make it so I took the Mrs instead, very much her gain and their loss.

Hibiscus is very worthy of it’s 2 stars, service was attentive and unobtrusive. The sommelier was very helpful and suggested a reasonably priced bottle to suit our meal and our tastes. The ambience was quite convivial and the strip of smoked mirror circling the restaurant makes for excellent surreptitious people watching. Claude Bosi even came out to do a little smoozing with the dinners.

The food was quite sublime, being a school night we just went a la carte. Oak smoked sweetbreads with goats cheese mousse for me to start, the Mrs having the fois. Mains were an enormous veal chop for me while she had chicken, which came in two courses, first a cray fish stuffed breast which was the tastiest moistest chicken I have ever tasted. The second part featured crispy chicken and a parfait, each plateful would of really served adequately as a course on its own. We finished with a raspberry gratin and a Milefeuille, both of which were superb. Teas and petit four finished us off.

For the two of us it came just a little under £300, which given the quality of the food and service was good value especially when I would consider it a far better experience to Marcus Wareing where dinner for two comes in closer to £400.

The only fly in the ointment and it nearly stopped me booking is that when booking they ask for credit card details so they can charge £50 per head if you can’t make it. As I often take clients who often cancel and reschedule, as I say at the wife’s usual gain, it does deter one from booking and perhaps why it was only half full on a Thursday night.

As the name suggests this is indeed a ‘wee’ restaurant, so it is a little cramped in the 20 seater living room sized restaurant.

In a lovely location just beneath the Forth rail bridge close to the banks of the Firth.

The friendly and efficient service was very good, as was the food. I started with a French onion soup, which was very tasty but the crouton and cheese being on the side was a little odd. The mains were a smoked haddock on garlic mash with spaghetti leeks and a poached egg on top, which was very good and tasty, as was the rib eye angus, great taste and well cooked. To finish we had chocolate fondant and a white mouse, both deliciously decadent, although the fondant was a touch over cooked.

Admittedly I was driving so we only had 3 glasses of wine between us, but at around £85 including tip and coffes, it was very good value.

For a local restaurant it is certainly worth the visit if you are in the Edinburgh/ Fife area. I’ll be going back next time I am up that way.

Having booked short notice the day before I was a little wary on how good Theo Randal’s could be, so went with managed expectations and good job I did!

The food on the whole was more hearty Italian than top end dining. For antipasti I had smoked eel salad, which was a nice meat flavour with subtle hints of smoke, very good. Then for Primi, I had slow cook Veal tagliatelle with summer truffle; the truffle a tasteless waste of time and the pasta was a little too dry and could of benefited with some sauce. Then for main I had the Monk fish and prosciutto, which was good especially the ham.

Where the wheels came off however was the service, it was a good half an hour before we were asked for our orders, and it didn’t occur to them to offer aperitifs, despite having some Archers and Prosecco thing on the top of their menu. Anyway, we ordered our food and aperitifs. A good half hour went by, and we asked again for aperitifs. About forty minutes after ordering the antipasti arrived, and about half way though that the aperitifs arrived. Once the plates were cleared we waited about another forty minuets for the Primi course to arrive, similarly about another forty minutes from those plates being cleared we finally got our mains.

By this point they picked up on our disgruntled body language and various people started to appear to apologise for the poor service. One told us that they were very busy that night, as they had a private function on too; but I am sorry get more staff, we are all paying for an evening out and why should my evening suffer?

They did however offer free pudding to make up for the lax service and long waits, but as we were keen to get off as it was quite late we politely declined. Only to be presented on our exit with a take out box with a couple of deserts in there! (Chocolate mouse cake, very moist and very yum, and a sharp lemon tart which was also yum and in fact these were the best food of the whole evening).

So whilst the food on the whole was good, it wasn’t really up to the standard I’d of thought a restaurant of this class could or would produce, but the wholly inexcusable service means if I want posh Italian food, I’ll go back to L’Anima!

After delighting in watching Tristan Welch beat his former teacher/ mentor Mark Sergeant on Great British Menu I knew that this was for sure a place to try, and was by no means disappointed that I did.

We opted for the tasting menu, which started extremely well, a cauliflower foam with a truffle oil drizzled on top. The menu also featured the devilled crab, potted shrimp with wild herbs alla the TV show; what were the judges thinking not voting for that one, the sea side on a plate for sure. Not normally a salmon fan, but the champagne poached salmon was cooked perfectly and the infused champagne taste made for another perfect dish. Opting for the suckling pig for the main course, whilst on the whole excellent, it was a bit of a let down that crackling of the belly pork wasn’t crisp. My other gripes would be a couple of occasional blips in service where we had to wait a little too long and the hot chocolate drink that was served with coffee instead of petit fours, which didn’t sit right, as in a hot drink to compliment another hot drink.

The sommelier is worth a mention, as he was quite entertaining as he enthused and described each wine that accompanied each dish,

At £52 per head for the tasting menu the place is remarkably cheap, even with aperitifs, prestige tasting menu wine match, coffees and service added on, it came to less than £700 for four of us. Whilst obviously expensive it was defiantly very good value for money for the quality of food, wine and service.

I certainly recommend this place and no doubt Tristan’s Michelin Star is already in the post.

I normally shy away from Conran restaurants viewing them more as more Mac-fine dining, never particularly good, but equally never particularly bad. So right on expectations, Sautrrelle came in decidedly average.

I had a quail starter which was pieces of quail on a salad of leaves and beans. For main I had pigeon which was pieces pigeon on a salad of leaves and beans. So similar that it was only portion size giving away which was which! Although the main did have peas added to the mix, but they looked like they were out of a can that had been open for a good week.

Nice view looking over the hubbub of the bar below though.

Great tasting menu, and quite unusually it has some options to choose from in terms of main and desert courses; they were even happy for you to switch the odd course with something, albeit a scaled down version, from the a la carte menu.

That said, although the food was very good, it wasn’t amazing; it is either restaurant fatigue on my part or the dishes were lacking a little imagination and flair. Perhaps even it was my expectations badly managed as I’d repeatedly seen ‘better that Ramsey’ on various reviews.

The other problem, and some of this will sound like nit picking but the devil is in the detail as they say, and especially so for a 2 star restaurant with apparent sights on a 3rd. We were left on the table for far too long before the arrival of the champagne cart arrived, no one unfolded our napkins for us, on toilet visits we were left to find and ask ourselves on their location instead of been escorted, doors weren’t held open when going in and out of the restaurant, as the meal progressed and they got busier the wine for each course arrived later and later and after the food arrived but the real sin in my mind is that no one could be bothered to ask if we wanted a desert wine to go with our puddings.

When spending £400+ on dinner for two, I really expect to be pampered and spoilt in terms of ingredients, cooking and service. Whilst the food scored well the service really was a disgrace.

(as a side note and I’m not sure if this makes a difference, but Marcus works Mon-Fri and we went on a Saturday?!)

Lot of talk about how expensive this place was, but we had 3 courses and a bottle of wine and a couple of glasses of dessert wine and were only £153. For a restaurant in this class I though fairly reasonable. My scallop starters were cooked to perfection and the belly pork main, not too fatty, well cooked again and great crispy skin (although struggling on the Italian-ness of that one ).
My only gripe would be the service was a little lacking, not offered aperitifs when we arrived, having to flag waiters down to get attention, desert wines not arriving with desert.
On the whole though a good experience.

I went to the one in Wimbledon. Waited an hour for the starters, had to practically mug the waiter to get a 2nd bottle of wine. The lamb rack was on then off and then on again, I was finally served two small cutlets that went straight back. Meat done well, experience as a whole a total shocker.