Pearl Restaurant and Bar

Pearl Restaurant and Bar
252 High Holborn
London
WC1V 7EN
http://www.pearl-restaurant.com
Date visited: Wednesday 15^th August 2012
Attendees: Myself and The Cyclist
Price: about £75 per person for 3 courses

I have wanted to go to Pearl for so long – ever since I saw Jun Tanaka on TV being talked about as an amazing and inventive chef.The website makes it look like THE place to be and so lovely and lush. So I was really chuffed when I was told I was being taken here for dinner especially as the Cyclist has always said he didn’t like fine dinning – “the portions seem so small. I like to have a  lot of food in front of me.”

We went after work and arrived early. The lady at the front greeted us and took our coats and bags – you don’t get a cloakroom ticket, when I asked for one she just said there was no need. Hmmm not much business so an empty cloakroom OR she has a memory to rival Dominic O’Brien? We didn’t really question it and went to have drinks in the bar before dinner.

Shot of the bar area

The bar is a long strip where the windows face the roadside. It wasn’t very busy, just a scattering of people having drinks after work it seemed and it was easy for us to a compartment to ourselves. We were given the drinks menu and as I was being treated I thought I would get a non-alcoholic cocktail (check me out!). There were none on the menu so I asked the bar man if they did non-alcoholic cocktails and he replied they do. What do they do? He suggested a raspberry elderflower mix. Sounded nice to I went for it.

 

The cocktail was lovely, really nice and refreshing and I really appreciated the fact that it was something different from the usual apple mojito that is on every non-alcoholic cocktail menu. The Cyclist got a coke and the drinks came with a nice rectangular plate-tray glass thing filled with assorted nuts, which The Cyclist munched on. The one nut I had was a spicy one and hit me at the back of the throat, spooshed me into a coughing fit and I was put off the rest.

The drinks and the assorted mixed nuts

After enjoying the bar for a bit we decided to go to our table. I hailed a waiter and the Cyclist was shocked that the waiter took our drinks to our table rather than us carrying it. I think he was starting to enjoy fine dinning – free nuts with drink and someone to carry it to your table!

 

I thought the restaurant would be busier even though it was a Wednesday but it was fairly quiet. The menu looked good and we took a bit of time discussing it before we could pick our dishes. The staff were quite attentive and one of them offered us bread from the hollowed out polished log. I went for a wholemeal roll and the Cyclist went for a white flute. The rolls were warm but mine was definitely reheated and stale – disappointing and they didn’t pass the bread test. The bread was tiny and they didn’t offer more. The Cyclist’s flute was better but not great. The only thing I liked about the bread bit was the cute bell cover for the butter.

The stale bread …

… and the butter cover

 

 

 

 

 

Amuse Bouche:
Galia melon gazpacho with croutons honey drew melon ball, basil and olive oil

The amuse bouche helped the Cyclist to appreciate fine dinning

The little bowl of gazpacho was delicious. It was perfumed and sweet and more like a dessert. The tiny melon balls and croutons added a nice mix of texture and the olive oil and basil really lifted and added a different dimension to everything. An excellent recovery after the bread.

Starter:
Myself: poached lobster, scallop mousse, with black spaghetti, fennel puree and monk’s bread
The Cyclist: crisp pig’s trotter with pea shoot salad, apple remoulade and thinly sliced veal

Lovely lobster

The lobster looked amazing and was perfectly cooked – sweet, soft and succulent. The scallop mousse was very nice but a bit too creamy for me. The fennel puree was nice but I was surprise that the smell and the flavour of the fennel wasn’t stronger, the aniseed of the fennel barely came through. The black spaghetti was perfectly cooked and the monk’s bread (a spinach like leaf that tastes like samphire) I could just about taste and wish there was more so I could get a better idea of it.

Pig trotter patty

The Cyclist’s pig’s trotter like a little cake and had a fried egg and super crisp bacon on top, which we weren’t expecting. It tasted very nice but we couldn’t really taste the veal and forgot it was supposed to be there so I’m not sure if there was any. The Cyclist felt something was missing that would lift the dish and I agree.

Main Course:
Myself: Herb crusted limousine veal rump with lasagne of veal cheek, girolles and pickled baby artichokes
The Cyclist: Lemon sole meuniere with fennel confit, gratin mussels, asparagus and razor clams

Super rich astroturf covered veal

I have never had veal before and wanted to try it so thought here would be a good place. I have to say it was nice but I was disappointed with it. I don’t know if this is just how veal taste or if it was the restaurant’s way of cooking it but I found the meat (wonderfully lean and a very god cut) to be very very rich and almost creamy. The herb crust had absolutely no flavour and fell off in chunky, it was like eating astroturf. The lasagne of veal cheek was very tasty but again super rich and creamy and I couldn’t eat more than 2 chunks of it. It probably didn’t help that I was getting full but the richness to the point of cream of everything was too much for me. The picked artichokes really helped to balance the richness of the meat and I really needed more of it.

Thick sole and razor clam gratin

The Cyclist’s lemon sole was a surprisingly thick filet which tasted good but the Cyclist felt was a little over cooked. He was much impressed and liked the fact that the gratin was served in the razor clam shell but it would have been nice to have more of it. I quite agree.

I felt that the kitchen did a good job of trying to balance each dish e.g. the richness of the veal with the picked artichokes, but there wasn’t enough of the counter-part.

We were stuffed but dessert had to be done as well as an inspection of the toilets. They are located out of the restaurant and in the hotel opposite the hotel’s spa. It seemed they were little used at this time of the evening and so they were clean. All the spaces were narrow and it was freaky how the air conditioning would blow into the cubicles from the gap at the bottom of the door creating a breeze around your ankles and when a sheet of toilet paper fell on the floor it flapped and danced around the perfectly clean marble floor – creepy… Especially as that entire part of the hotel was completely deserted!

Pre dessert:
Home-made natural yogurt with berry compote

A shot of refreshing sweet yogurt to help balance the richness – and help hook the Cyclist on to find dinning

This came in a shot glass and was really lovely and refreshing. It felt like something clean to cut through the richness of main course. We would have been happy with this for dessert but we were greedy and dessert had to be done (and it was already ordered!).

Dessert:
Myself: chocolate layered mousse cake with brittle
The Cyclist: chocolate and raspberry torte with yogurt sorbet

Chocolate with chocolate with extra chocolate on top

I thought my chocolate dessert would be quite light as it was a mousse thing – it wasn’t light but it did taste great. The chocolate layers were of different densities and textures. The bottom layer was sponge, followed by a crunchy thick ganache like layer, followed by mousse followed by the extremely wafer thin chocolate crisp followed by a thick dusting to cocoa powder. Very very rich again and super chocolatey. Luckily there was a quinnel of yogurt cream to balance it but much more of the yogurt was needed. The brittle shards were nice but had a bitter after taste to them. Very good but just too much richness on top of the first 2 courses I had already.

The Cyclist loved his torte. It was heavy and rich – a chocolate brick I think is how he described it. There was not much he didn’t like about it – the pastry base was buttery and not too thick, the raspberries were a nice balance as was the yogurt sorbet. And he loves macaroons so the dish was a winner!

The chocolate brick with red-pink accompaniments

We didn’t have tea/ coffee afterwards and after sitting a while to digest we got the bill.

Summary:
Very good but very rich – the food matched the heavy marble and oak interior of the restaurant. The restaurant (and indeed the hotel) kept many of its original features and worked the modernity around it and that is how I felt it was with the food. Too rich for my stomach to handle but very good and high quality cooking indeed.  The best dishes were my lobster (which was rich but we may have got away with it as it was the first course), the amuse bouche, though it would have worked as the pre dessert, which was also one of the better dishes of the night. The restaurant wasn’t very busy and all customers were in the same corner which meant the staff could be be attentive and swift. All in all very good though I could only go again if the menu was less rich. I would certainly go to the bar again – it was lovely and comfortable.