I was going to dinner at Adam’s a short walk, as anyone would know, from The Grand Hotel where Lucy The Labrador and I were staying. It was too good an opportunity not to have a Harvey Wallbanger in Madeleine bar before heading off to Waterloo Street and Rich the barman there does a very good HW. He was telling me he previously worked at Fazenda and mentioned what he judged to be his own favourite classic cocktail, the Sazerac, of which I was previously ignorant which was a gap in my knowledge which should not have existed. The sazerac, said to have originated in antebellum New Orleans (pre-Civil War) though possibly more fin de siècle, is claimed to be the oldest known American cocktail. It is named from the Sazerac de Forge et Fils brand of cognac which was combined with absinthe, Peychaud’s Bitters and sugar. There was nothing to do but try one of Rich’s sazeracs. Golden amber, clear, stately, adorned with an appropriately restrained tiny slice of orange peel - as refined and mature a drink as can be found on this earth and crafted by a master of his trade - the antithesis of the drink - the negroni - of vulgar, self-regarding hipsters. The negroni is fine but in the hands of Rich at least, perfected I should think by much practising and experimenting, the sazerac is the final word in cocktails for people of style and good taste. Will there be a sazerac revolution? Time will tell though perhaps it’s something that would lose its position at the head of the elite cocktails if the secret gets out.. And so to Adam’s.
Adam’s. As serene as a sazerac. Calm, precise, formal but comfortable. I was planning to choose to eat from the tasting menu but was lured away by the à la carte with the thought that I might add the extra dish - crab with yuzu - to what looked like excellent dishes.
First an array of fine appetisers including the tiny but memorable beetroot meringue and a speck of mackeral tartare. Next excellent sourdough with two types of butter and then take off with an excellent starter of scallop with grilled pea purée plus other pea variants, cuttle fish and chamomile. Fine food.
Next came the extra dish of crab with yuzu. It looked very pretty but for me, the yuzu was far too powerful and the flavour of crab was all but lost. For me a disappointment and a dish that the chef really needs to reflect on.
But rough seas were soon calm again with a main course of stupendously delicious aged beef served with smoked curds, bone marrow sauce and somewhere marigold though I am not sure I would recognise its flavour as marigold is not exactly a regular ingredient I have with my beef. The meat was, as it should be, the star of the course, tender, full of flavour, nicely seasoned.
There followed a delightful predessert of blood orange granita with frozen yogurt and olive oil and then a very fine raspberry soufflé as dessert. This was a soufflé about which no complaints could be raised, light and tasty, pleasingly memorable. The petit fours included a charming miniature Paris Brest to lift the soul.
This was a Wednesday evening, for restaurants now the start of the working week. That day the country was being tortured by having its public transport assaulted by a rail strike courtesy of an unpleasant trade union leader who sees himself as a new Arthur Scargill and inflation is roaring away shooting up the price of food, basic commodities and one expects, soon, demands for big wage increases. The hospitality business has had a nightmare two half years - floods in some parts of the West Midlands, then repeated lockdowns and restrictions necessitated by the COVID-19 pandemic and now the fragile economic situation and all this seems to be having an effect endangering our recently burgeoning restaurant industry. There were only ten people dining at Adam’s the evening I ate there - only about half the tables were in use in the main dining area. I suspect that that did not reflect the usual state of affairs even on Wednesday evenings. On social media various restaurants are having to publicise last minute availability where cancellations have occurred in an effort to fill their restaurants - even Adam’s see below).
One hopes that our excellent restaurants are not going to go under now having survived the protracted period of the pandemic. Still there is some good news - indeed a historic moment - the Michelin Guide has finally included a West Midlands restaurant in one of its monthly listings - in the most recent it has featured Solihull’s Toffs by Rob Palmer (see Blog 231). A well-deserved recognition.
Meanwhile The Good Food Guide has now gone live on the internet charging almost £30 for access to it and its recommendations. This is quite a lot more than the price of the last printed edition (it is no longer sponsored by Waitrose) and presently there are only about 300 recommended restaurants featured on it with many notable restaurants to be added. However in many ways it is much improved and now has an excellent rating system. So I have paid my fee and have the access to the Guide which I want but to give value for money the editor really needs to get moving with adding many more restaurants.
The West Midlands restaurants listed so far are:-
Tropea (Harborne Birmingham) Good
Dishoom (Birmingham) Good
Tierra (Birmingham) Good
Oyster Club by Adam Stokes (Birmingham ) Good
Land (Birmingham) Good
Cheal’s of Henley (Henley-in-Arden, Warwickshire) Very Good
Tailor’s (Warwick, Warwickshire) Good
The Royal Oak (Whatcote, Warwickshire) Good
Russell’s of Broadway (Broadway, Worcestershire) Good
The Homend Ledbury (Ledbury Herefordshire) Good
The Cider Barn (Penbridge Herefordshire) Good
The Kilpeck Inn (Kilpeck Herefordshire) Good
The Bell at Selsley (Selsley Gloucestershire) Good
The Woolpack Inn (Stroud Gloucestershire) Good
Forelles at Fishmore Hall (Ludlow Shropshire) Good
Old Downton Lodge (Ludlow Shropshire) Good
Charlton Arms (Ludlow Shropshire) Good
There does indeed seem a long way to go with this project at present.
The scores so far are:-
Gloucestershire - 2 Good
Herefordshire- 3 Good
Shropshire - 3 Good
Staffordshire - nil
Warwickshire - 1 Very Good
2 Good
West Midlands - 5 Good (all Birmingham)
Worcestershire - 1 Good.
The problem currently is that with only 17 restaurants listed so far in The West Midlands the reader is paying for a completely useless list (unless the visitor is planning to dine in Ludlow and even there omissions are obvious). The list will need to be expanded almost exponentially to make it of any real use to the diner who has paid a lot of money to have access to it.
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