A la Colthard/ Wolseley , Hakkasan, Providores, Olivo
Most restaurant reviewers typically review new restaurants but I regard it as my function to keep regular updates on my faves. The reality is that most diners have 2/3 trusted places where they are known, like the cuisine , service and welcome and patronise these regularly. Over the past few days I revisited some of my faves.
HAKKASAN
For some reason this popular restaurant now a global brand was off my radar. However Bob Tickler’s p/a Polly, whose taste is as exquisite as it is reliable, advised me that it is her favourite restaurant in London. I first visited it with a South African visitor the summer before last and it met with our total approval. I went to their first venue in Hanway Place just behind Tottenham Court Road. It’s a combination of the old Traders Vic, fruity cocktails and winsome hostesses to take you to the table or bar and Asian fusion cuisine. The food is always reliable and to avoid complications we ordered the set menu of dim sun, fried squid, chicken, meat and fish dish and desert of two dishes. It’s dark and seductive and you sit comfortably at table a distance from your neighbour. It’s classy, fun, vibrant . Looking for negatives is hard. At £ 265 for two with cocktails and the old swizz of wine per glass (£11 for 175ml of rose) it’s expensive though this included 2 delicious trademark Hakka cocktails made with vodka and lychee juice. The dark staircase is not to be negotiated in Loubertin high heels if you have had a few already!!! We had an excellent start to the evening there so much so that next time my girlfriend and I will make it all the evening.
WOLSELEY
The Wolseley is the go-to place for breakfast for the movers and shakers and I caught up with an ex-politician whose company is always a delight and a power broker in the football field. My political friend believes that Labour will get 130 seats , more than 32% of the vote Miliband achieved and afterwards the Party will fragment with 100 Labour MPs breaking away to form her Majesty’s Opposition funded by Tony Blair. These insights are always valuable for silly old me as it makes me seem frightfully intelligent when Ollie (my husband) friends start holding forth on politics and means I don’t have to read the The Week from cover to cover!! Two problems with the Wolseley. The acoustics are poor and it’s not offering enough healthy option breakfast dishes. Not like the Providores …
PROVIDORES
This restaurant in Marylebone High Street is a tapas/Spanish restaurant run by New Zealanders that serves divine breakfast.
They queue round the block for the weekend brunch. I always have the fruit salad which is full of more exotic fruits, the scrambled eggs with chives on granary toast and the best Latte in London.
The negative here is it is a tiny space and you do feel crowded. I usually opt for a window seat and get there early. My breakfast came to £28 which is what you would expect to pay.
OLIVO
I always opt for the spaghetti alla bottaga (red mullet) and could not resist a more traditional dish of veal escalope Milanese.
We had a bottle and few glasses more of Gavi for a final bill of £135. It’s had a makeover replacing the yellow and blue walls with a darker grey but it’s core values of regional Sard cuisine at a sensible price have not changed.