Three days to go! Eeeee!
This year for my birthday, I wanted to do something a bit special. It seemed like it would be the first and last birthday I would celebrate in London, so I wanted to go out somewhere that I normally wouldn't go. (For the record, this wasn't the only thing I did on my birthday. The morning after was an interesting experience). When I went to Florence for New Years, a friend of mine that I travelled with told me to visit The Fat Duck. Yeah, that was never going to happen. Therefore I had two options: Dans le Noir – a dining experience consisting of eating in pitch darkness – or Dinner by Heston Blumenthal.
I asked my lovely friend (Birthday Girl from the previous posts) to join me for my birthday lunch, and since she was freaked out about the idea of eating in the dark with her never-ending list of allergies and whatnot, I decided to go ahead with Dinner. I was excited – I'm a major fan of Heston Blumenthal and it was my first experience of eating at a Michelin-star restaurant. I booked three weeks in advance and was surprised at how much ease there was in booking my reservation after reading so many stories about how long it took people to book a table in advance.
Dinner by Heston Blumenthal
@ Mandarin Oriental Hyde Park, 66 Knightsbridge, London SW1X 7LA (Closest tube: Knightsbridge)
I decided to go for lunch instead of dinner for two reasons. One of those reasons being – and the only one pertinent to this post – was that they offered a three-course set lunch menu for £32 (now £36). That's a pretty good deal in the context of a fine-dining restaurant (let alone it being a Heston Blumenthal restaurant). As soon as I entered the hotel entrance, I knew this would be a lavish affair. From its bar and open kitchen to its dining area, the decor is amazing. Dinner by Heston Blumenthal focuses on adapting historical British dishes for the modern palate that date as far back as the 16th century.
One thing I knew about Heston is that his creativity levels are up to friggen roof. I remember the time he came to present a pressure test on Masterchef Australia for the contestants to recreate his overly elaborate burger and chips (only Heston can make a simple burger seem so friggen complicated). I also remember watching a Masterchef Australia episode a few years back, where the contestants went to the UK and were given the opportunity to recreate some of Heston's signature dishes. One of them was meat fruit. Sounds disgusting right? I just had to order it. It was either that or the tipsy cake, but I immensely dislike pineapple so the latter was a no go. Sorry in advance to all of you pineapple lovers.
It wasn't on the set menu but I had to try it. So after our complimentary sourdough bread with butter, we ordered the meat fruit starter (£15) consisting of mandarin jelly encasing chicken liver parfait, alongside grilled bread. Let me just say that I'm a rather skeptical person by nature. Most likely I would be the first person to say that it is rather easy to be fooled by photos, but it really does look like fruit in person (until you cut into it obviously). Both of us wasn't sure what to expect but it was brilliant. The parfait to bread ratio was a bit flawed though. Because it was so rich, we had to order more bread to eat the remaining parfait. For our palates, it was hard to imagine eating all of that parfait with that two pieces of bread. Now that I think about it, we also ate the parfait with the sourdough that we served beforehand.
I wanted to try all of the set menu options, so I decided to order whatever my friend decided not to order. For the first course, my friend ordered the Lemon Salad with Goats Curd, Buckler Sorrel, and Raisins, and I ordered the Dressed Snails with Artichokes, Beetroot and other veg. I think the starter courses were the most disappointing out of all of the dishes we ate for lunch. My friend found the salad way too lemon-y (appropriately named I guess, but I think she was hoping that the lemon wouldn't completely overpower everything else) and wished for there to be more goats curd in proportion to everything else on the plate. Mine was okay except for the fact that I'm not a huge fan of beetroot. Actually the actual veg part of the dish I wasn't entirely fond of. But the snails were delicious and wished there were more on the plate as well.
For the main/second course, I ordered the Bath Chaps with Savoy Cabbage, Lardo, Ham Hock & Robert Broth. My friend ordered the Salted Ling with Parsnips (both Confit and Pureed) and Monks Beard (that green thing on top). The waiter clarified that bath chaps were pigs cheeks so my friend opted for the fish instead. I really enjoyed the bath chaps. They were extremely tender and everything that accompanied the dish worked really well, especially the broth. My favourite part of the dish were those bits of crackling on top – they were unlike any other crackling I've ever eaten. They just popped in your mouth. My friend also really enjoyed her dish. She said that every component had to be eaten together, because if you ate the fish on its own it would have been way too salty. But if you ate everything together, the combination of flavours were just right with the salted ling.
As for dessert, I ordered the Prune & Tamarind Tart, and my friend ordered the Orange Buttered Loaf with Mandarin and Thyme Sorbet. Yum. The tart was the dish of the day for us. My friend is not normally a dessert person, but she was in love with the tart, just like I was. It wasn't too sweet and the added creme brulee-like texture on top was a bonus. Can I have another slice? Seriously. Personally, the loaf was never going to top the tart since I'm not a huge fan of oranges in desserts – I just like eating them as they are usually– but the loaf was surprisingly good and the sorbet alongside was delish.
To end our meal, we were given a complementary shot glass of earl gray infused chocolate ganache. I normally don't like earl gray, but it was delicious with the biscuit. I should mention that when I arrived at the Mandarin Oriental, my friend gave me her birthday present in a bag with a huge balloon attached to it which said HAPPY BIRTHDAY. I don't think it's hard to imagine how quite obvious it was from the balloon floating around our table that it was my birthday. Therefore it was such a nice touch for them to write a happy birthday message on my plate, since they didn't need to do that at all.
I was in the mood for drinking tea at the end of our experience so I ordered a pot of green tea (£5.50) with unlimited refills. The whole concept of what they brought to the table was pretty cool. The pot effectively fills up one cup exactly and the cup can be held no matter how hot the tea is. No need to wait for the tea to cool down since you don't actually feel how hot the tea. The tea wasn't groundbreaking stuff but it did its job.
One of the things that I was highly impressed of in particular was the service. All the waiters were extremely attentive, friendly and polite; engaging in conversation with the two of us when appropriate. Food arrived at a reasonable time which came as no surprise to me. Dinner by Heston Blumenthal is definitely a special-occasion type of restaurant, but it was worth the visit (even in spite of the mixed reactions to the first course). Would I go again? It's hard to say. That sounds like a strange answer considering what I've said in this post. If I had another special occasion, I would try another fine-dining restaurant. Who knows....maybe I'll make my way to The Fat Duck one day in the future. One can only hope, right?
Next post: The Jamie Oliver Experience (Union Jacks/Jamie's Italian). One more post before I leave for my two month holiday! Also, be on the lookout for a simple carrot cake recipe sometime soon on this blog! It's idiot proof.
