Posh nosh at Bronte – Trafalgar Square, WC2N

Posh nosh at large brasserie near Trafalgar Square

What’s this restaurant like? Well, the first clue is in the address – The Grand Building, The Strand. I’m guessing you’re with me so far.

Bronte restaurant on The Strand

Our party of eight visited on Tuesday evening, a cold autumnal evening. Entering the brightly lit, brasserie-style rooms at ground level, we were taken down to the equally large and elegant basement restaurant and bar area where our booked table was waiting.

Get a load of this edamame + kale pancake: aerial, sideview, cut open 

We each selected a main course and dessert from a set menu – three courses at £35 per head while starters and sides were served for the table to share. From the wine list, we chose a Le Paradou Viognier (dry white wine with subtle fruit and floral flavours) @ £27.00 a bottle.

Our shared starters included:

Roast beetroot + root vegetables

Octopus + charred pineapple with kalamansi (hybrid citrus fruit), chilli, Thai shallots and mint (Ceviche style with slightly pickled flavours)

Chilli + honey chicken skewers with baby leek, pickled cucumber, spring onion + sesame – so, so good

For main course, some in our party chose the fillet steak at a supplement of £10 (10 oz grass-fed rare-breed Black Angus with miso slaw and roast garlic) which looked great and was met with approval. But the exciting option had to be the edamame and kale pancake, it’s not something I’ve seen on a menu before. The smoked avocado and aubergine ratatouille had the lovely smoky flavours of baba ghanoush, and the pancake – despite sounding like a relatively healthy option – was spongy and dense, and really filling (which seemed appropriate on a cold, autumnal night).

Edamame + kale pancake with smoked avocado + aubergine ratatouille, sheep’s milk yogurt + harissa:

Spongy pancake texture – dense and filling, befitting a cold autumnal evening

Our shared sides included:

• Skinny fries with nori + rosemary salt
• Tenderstem broccoli
• Black sesame tahini + truffle
• Miso slaw
• Shiso, spring onion, red onion + sweetheart cabbage

Dessert choices included:

• Limoncello cheesecake with pomelo grapefruit salad + yuzu sorbet
• Summer berry pavlova – strawberry coulis
• Sorbet / ice cream – three scoops of your choice

Limoncello cheesecake + yuzu sorbet

Three scoops of ice cream including green tea

Summer berry pavlova – strawberry coulis – slightly sickly but it didn’t go to waste…

The verdict: If you’re not counting the pennies and want something that’s not mainstream, this is reasonably priced given the interesting, unusual menu items and quality food. Nice and spacious, it’s an easy space in which to feel comfortable and relax.

Restaurant info:
– Lardbutty rating: 3.5 / 5
– Type: International
– Address: Grand Buildings, 1-3 The Strand, London
– Postcode: WC2N 5EJ
– Nearest station: Charing Cross
– Website + menus: Bronte website
– Photos on flickr: Bronte photos
– Location: Bronte map

Babur – Indian fine dining in SE London

Babur offers creative, stylish and thoroughly mouth-watering Indian food that’s a cut above the rest

While you can dine in the restaurant near Forest Hill, we wanted to stay at home and be pampered. For us, this was a whole new, fine-dining-at-home experience.

There are two delivery menus to choose from – traditional or premium. The premium menu offers dishes from the restaurant menu and – unless you’re on a budget – is excitingly enticing and irresistible. Take a look, you’ll see what I mean.

For starters we shared:
~ Punjabi paneer sandwich: char-grilled cottage cheese sandwiched with mint chutney @ £5.75
~ Goat patties: Shredded, warmly spiced patties dry-fried on a tawa (flat cooking-plate) served with tamarind and raisin chutney @ £6.75
~ Monkfish tikka: char-grilled monkfish flavoured with fennel seed + mustard, with spiced coconut broth @ £7.50

 

Stylishly different

Starters: goat patties + Punjabi paneer

 

Punjabi paneer sandwich with mint + mango ‘traffic-light’ sauce @ £5.75

 

Goat patties with tamarind + raisin chutney @ £6.75

 

Starters: Monkfish tikka – char-grilled monkfish with fennel seed + mustard, and a spiced coconut broth @ £7.50. Divine.

 

For main course, I had stone bass fish with interesting fennel flavours, and K had a chicken chettinad (lovely peppery, sloppy sauce – really good).

 

Mains: pan-seared stone bass with a South Indian fennel chutney, green beans, channa dal and fennel pollen @ £13.95 (absolutely gorgeous even if the photo looks a bit messy!)

 

Mains: chicken chettinad – peppery Chettiyar masala from South India in a rice dosa fool’s cap @ £10.85

 

Baghare baigan – aubergine with peanut sauce side dish @ £5.35

 

Crispy fried potatoes – seasoned with dried mango powder, side dish @ £3.95

 

I’m carrying delicious food from Babur

True

Our fine-dining-at-home experience totalled £98.25 (a very generous banquet with enough leftovers for a second meal, that included a few beers too).

The verdict: On the plus side, there’s the ‘fine dining at home’ experience. But on the downside, delivery times can be long. We’ve ordered from Babur a few times and our most recent experience was a let-down. We placed the order at 5 to 7 on a Saturday evening. After 90 minutes we called them to check the status of our order and were told that deliveries usually take two hours and to wait a while longer (they didn’t check our name or order details). Shortly after 9pm (just over two hours later) the delivery arrived. It was a cold November evening and the food was cold too. While I enjoyed the cold monkfish tikka in a cold broth, K would have preferred it hot as intended. Be prepared – order early!

On this occasion, our order included a bottle of prosecco. On arrival it was very cloudy and tasted of bitter apples (overly dry and unpleasant). On discovering there was a sediment at the bottom of the bottle, I looked up this particular variety of prosecco and found that it’s a natural, unfiltered prosecco with plenty of sediment (perhaps not ideal for deliveries as it benefits from leaving the sediment to settle, rather than serving cloudy).

The LardButty rating for Babur has been lowered to 3.5/5.

 

Cloudy, bitter prosecco with plenty of sediment

 

Restaurant info:
~ Lardbutty rating: 3.5 / 5
~ Type: Indian
~ Address: 119 Brockley Rise, London
~ Postcode: SE23 1JP
~ Nearest stations: Honor Oak Park, Forest Hill, Catford
~ Website + menus: Babur website + Premium delivery menu
~ Photos on flickr: images of Babur food
~ Location: Babur map

 

Cinnamon Club – Old Westminster Library

Being an information professional, it’s not surprising that what appeals most on my first visit to Cinnamon Club (Whitehall branch) is its location: the Old Westminster Library.

Cinnamon Club restaurant in the Old Westminster Library

We are encouraged to relax and have a drink in one of the bars before being seated at our reserved table (which isn’t quite ready for our party of five, yet), and are led down to a neon-lit cocktail bar in the basement. There’s another library bar adjacent to the main restaurant.

Library bar

The menu is haute cuisine Indian (posh nosh), with starters averaging at £10.00 and main courses at £25.00.

Starters
For starters, I have a vegetable kebab with mint and yoghurt @ £8.50 (a bhaji on a kebab skewer, which reminds me of falafel as much as it does a bhaji, as it’s bursting with fennel aniseed flavours and is absolutely delicious). A has a crisp zucchini flower with spiced vegetables, slow cooked marrow @ £8.50; M has a black leg chicken breast with dried mango and peanut, and chicken tikka rillette @ £9.50 and D has char-grilled Welsh lamb fillet with nutmeg, and sweetbread bhaji @ £9.50.

Vegetable ‘kebab’ starter (bhaji on a skewer)

Courgette (zucchini) flower with spiced vegetables starter

Black leg chicken breast starter

Char-grilled Welsh lamb fillet starter

Main course
For main course, I have Tandoori Portobello mushroom with root vegetable curry and saffron bread @ £16.00. Mushrooms are one of my favourite foods and this does not disappoint (even if portions are small). Three of those Portabello mushrooms and I’d have been in heaven.

Tandoori Portabello mushroom main course

Wine list
While you can get a 750ml bottle of wine for £22 here (eg. red: a Sicilian Nero d’Avola/Nerello Mascalese, or white: a French Grenache Blanc – Bergerie de la Bastide, Terre du Sud, Vin de Pays D’Oc) the cheapest are mostly priced from the mid £30s. It’s an extensive list with the price of a bottle of white wine reaching up to £260 for a Chambertin Grand Cru, Clos de Beze, Pierre Damcy (2007 vintage) although there are many at around the £100 mark. Vintage reds reach up to £3,000.00+ a bottle.

Beers
I stuck to beer: it’s £4.00 for a 330ml bottle of Cobra or Kingfisher, £6.00 for a 350ml bottle of Sierra Nevada pale ale or £15.00 for a 750ml bottle of King Cobra (double fermented strong lager).

All in all, it’s a great restaurant if you’ve got something to celebrate. And you can keep costs down by going at off-peak hours and ordering from a set menu (currently £22.00 for two courses) so do keep an eye out for special offers/ discounts.

Restaurant info:
~ Lardbutty rating: 4 / 5
~ Type: Indian
~ Address: The Old Westminster Library, 30-32 Great Smith Street, London
~ Postcode: SW1P 3BU
~ Tel: 020 7222 2555
~ Nearest tube station: St James’ Park, Westminster
~ Website: Cinnamon Club website
~ Photos on flickr: images of Cinnamon Club food
~ Location: Cinnamon Club map