Silverbrow on Food

Wild Honey

I had lunch today at Anthony Arbutus Demetre's new place, Wild Honey. It's on the site of a former Mayfair members club and gents barber (not at the same time) and looks like it: a long wood pannelled dining room with sweeping ceilings. The room is beautiful, much less austere than its Soho sister operation. They're still in their first week of operation, their soft opening, so all food was 50% off - which is nice. Despite it being a low-key week for them, they were virtually full at lunch today, the dining room having a nice hum. There is also a bar where you can eat. The sole diner today, was, as far as I could tell, the restaurant's PR woman, who I'm pretty sure had no idea who I was.

The food was very good although not vastly different in composition or quality from Arbutus. In itself that is no bad thing. On the occasions I have been, I've had very good meals at Arbutus, although I have recently read (registration req'd) things have got a bit sloppy, especially service. But my experiences have only been positive so if they can replicate Arbutus then that's great. But then again why bother? And why open somewhere so close to Arbutus? I think the owners reckon there won't be much cannibalisation between the two. The media types will stick to Soho, whilst the private equity partners will not need to venture out of Mayfair. They're probably right. But, if this is the case I find it a bit of a shame, it would be nice to see something slightly different, maybe a bit of progression in the kitchen. Given the similarities of the menu, I ended up feeling that it was one kitchen for both restaurants.

My food today was very good. My mackerel tartare to start was spot on, with beautiful, oily fish, cut by the sweet baby beetroot and a horseradish cream. There was some pointless greenery on the plate as well, an affliction I now remember from Arbutus, but overall a lovely dish. For main I opted for baked haddock, which was a great hunk of fish. I think it was a tad undercooked, but nonetheless it was a beautiful fish, belying the excellent provenance of their food. Dessert - well it was 50% off - was the eponymous ice-cream with honeycomb shavings. I preferred the honeycomb to the ice-cream which although had a beautiful consistency, didn't have much of a punch when it came to taste. Unlike my cioccolato from Scoop yesterday.

So the food was generally very good with beautifully sourced produce and I'm sure I'll be back, but I'm finding it hard to get too overexcited by the restaurant. In part it is because of similarities with Arbutus, it is also because I'm getting a bit jaded by this school of very good simple cooking. Whoah there a minute, what was that? Jaded by good food. Well sort of, yes. But, I have to caveat that by saying I'm jaded in a wholly good way. There are now lots of restaurants in London that serve very very good food, at reasonable prices. So when yet another good restaurant opens up I don't feel the need to jump up and down in ecstasy.

I think that at long last, we're getting the food we deserve both in restaurants and if we want it, at home as well. For example, I was particularly impressed to get a text from a close friend today to hear that her eldest child, all of 2 and a bit, had her first taste of sushi today. I was twenty when I had mine. I should add, this child is clearly wise beyond her years, she refers to me as "The Giant" both behind my back and to my face.

Finally, can someone tell me what wild honey actually is, how it differs from normal honey? Is it simply made by a hive of livid bees?

Google Maps
Google Earth (download)

Wild Honey, 12 St George Street, London, W1S 2FB, UK
Tel: +44 (0)20 7758 9160

What others think

As far as I can tell, it's too early days for much coverage. I'll update here if that changes.

Blooms again, but never again

I have had bad meals in the past, we all have. However, a recent dinner at Blooms was the first time I have had a truly awful meal whilst accompanied by a restaurant critic from a national newspaper.

What made this particular meal worse - and genuinely it was so awful it is hard to believe anything could have been worse than what we ate - was that I had cheerily invited Jay Rayner, the Observer's food critic, citing my two previously good experiences. In my invitation I did mention a third, more recent meal, when my grilled liver resembled a particularly tasteless, tough piece of shoe leather, but I dismissed that as an aberration. I was wrong. It seems to be the norm.

You might argue, "you had two good meals, now you have had two bad meals, maybe they're just inconsistent." They are certainly that. But any restaurant that dares serve the quality of food we ate and has the chutzpah to charge people for it, is a truly awful establishment.

Read Jay's eloquent review for an insight into what we had to put up with. It was a trip down memory lane we would both rather forget.

Before I go, I have to praise Jay and his kind. I thought being a restaurant critic was all about eating at the world's greatest restaurants, or gorging yourself in a dining marathon. I now know that it is much harder than that. Especially when you have to order ersatz custard, made from heaven knows what, but almost certainly not egg and definitely not milk, all in the name of journalistic thoroughness. I pleaded, begging him, feeling like Zammo, to just say no to the waitress offering him this curdled mess atop the apple pie. In spite of my wailing, he perservered. Mr Rayner you're a mensch and a martyr to your profession, I salute you. I also profoundly and grovellingly apologise for dragging you along to Blooms.