Last week was busy. Birmingham then Stratford with a trip to Henley in Arden in the middle. Train strikes did not make travelling any easier and the city centre was full of delegates to the Conservative Conference at the ICC and noisy, splendidly scruffy middle class Tarquins representing all sorts of causes protesting at the Conservatives’ presence in Birmingham. Dining out was easier than I expected since all the politicians were at evening meetings or noshing banquets in large groups.
Dinner at Qavali on Monday evening. It was very quiet. There were a few Conference delegates there who obviously hadn’t received invitations to any group meals. I went straight to a main course which was excellent - Kassori lamb karahi - delicious, the meat tender and tasty, the sauce hitting the target on spiciness and flavour and the peshwari naans possibly the best I have had for a long time. There were problems - bar service was slow and my drink arrived in a glass with a chipped rim which could have been nasty. That should never have happened. I had a pleasing light dessert of two ice creams - rose flavour with Turkish delight pieces in it and pistachio.
Rating - 0 (chipped glass indefensible).
The following evening, to Purnell’s. No surprise that there were no chipped glasses there. No surprise too that I was unable to resist the Tasting menu especially as there were a number of new dishes on it which had to be tried.
Firstly there was the sheer joy of Purnell’s Gifts from the kitchen. Sometimes I think that a restaurant that served nothing but fine canapés might be just what I’m looking for. Purnell’s chip - now well-established as a panisse had undergone a further evolution and was now made, deliciously, from sweet spiced carrot; this was served along with a little disc of rye bread on which was mounted by splended tomato and bacon meringue - unfortunately the rye did not present a very nice texture - if this was to achieve what Purnell’s should be achieving then the base would have been far better if it had been pastry. Then more ‘gifts’ - the hilarious little truffle pig sable with blobs of cheese custard and balsamic gel - delicious - served with truffle potatoes and herb emulsion. Very good though I had little flashbacks of the longtime favourite edible charcoal with its gorgeous chorizo dip. I suppose I will get over the loss eventually.
Then the old favourite of Emotions of soixante dix - Purnell’s ever-evolving play on the vintage cheese and pineapple and then Loch Duart salmon disastrously assaulted by excruciatingly sharp citrus - lime and ponzu - with undetectable ginger. This is a dish which needs a very rapid and drastic rethink.
I substituted the very familiar Haddock and eggs with a lovely heritage tomato dish served with a shiso leaf fritter. How could anyone not love a dish with a fritter as one of its ingredients. Then a fine piece of Cornish monkfish with tallegio and a delightful ragu of octopus and cuttlefish and squid.
Next, an irreproachable piece of roast sirloin cooked beautifully and presented in the company of equally nicely cooked salsify with the additional pleasures of hazelnut and leek. Then a startling intermediate dish made up of duck liver and sweet raisins and the pastry from which the tomato and bacon meringue amuse gueule may have benefitted. The meal drew to a close with the immortal 10 10 10 Burnt English egg surprise with the accompanying cherry lollipops as I had to recognise that I was replete and the mint choccy chip was a dessert too far.
The following day, the dog and I battled the travel impediments put in our way by striking train drivers, through a raging rainstorm to get to Stratford (by taxi as a last resort) so that I could see the present production of Richard III at the RSC for my third and final time. We stayed as usual at the Shakespeare Hotel, a minute or so from the theatre. Dating back to the early 17th century, it has seen better days and is always waiting for its long expected refurbishment but to my pleasure, the management reopened the atmospheric Quill Bar during this visit and I sipped Cotswold Gin, in the absence of Monkey 47, while the dog lounged around appealingly waiting for other guests to admire and stroke her.
I travelled to Henley in Arden the next day to renew my romance with Cheal’s of Henley which remains one of the West Midlands’ most outstanding restaurants. The place remains faultless starting with the excellent, informed service which is delivered supremely professionally. The food served remains exemplary. There was a lunch menu which was very appealing but Cheal’s is just too good to miss the remarkable gems which feature in its tasting menu. And so the tasting menu it was.
The first dish led the way in confirming that this meal was going to be another Cheal’s great success. No skimping on the luxuries either. Along came a very pretty little bowl containing pieces of lobster with delightful heritage tomato and tomato consommé. Who would have thought it? - a tomato dish raised to new heights by the pleasure of lobster. Well, obviously Matt Cheal thought of it.
And then one of my all-time favourite dishes sidled up to me and made me laugh out loud with pleasurable surprise and to purr with happiness. This was the Crispy Duck Yolk dish, previously wonderful, but now in a class of its home. The egg was certainly admirably cooked and nicely crispy and with it were little pieces of crispy bacon and tiny sweet tomatoes and perfectly cooked black pudding (so often cooked elsewhere to a dry mouth-clagging inedibility) but pushing all of it aside, underneath lurked cheeky, shocking, sweet baked beans completing this hilarious and delicious Full English breakfast pastiche. A great, delightful, witty, naughty dish for a fine dining restaurant - I loved it.
Conventionality was restored, probably wisely by another dish with a luxury ingredient - lovely turbot with baby artichoke and a delicious lobster sauce.
The main course was perfectly cooked new season venison with girolles, mischievous pieces of sweetcorn, nice potato gnocchi and an excellent Pedro Ximenez sauce. The excellence of this was matched by the excellence of the dessert - an irreproachable apple crumble soufflé with blackcurrant half plunged into it. For good measure, a selection of good English cheeses was served to complete the meal. The total price (excluding drinks and service) was £85. This is exceptionally good value in these present times particularly as the superlative meal included some fine luxury ingredients.
Rating:- 🌞🌞🌞.
With another day in Stratford, I was able to take myself to dinner at a restaurant I have been intending to visit for some time - Hussain’s, which held a Michelin recommendation for longer than anywhere else in Stratford upon Avon, from 1989 to 2001. Those days are long over, true, but I was curious to see how this place measured up in this era of South Asian food being served in restaurants such as Opheem.
This was good old fashioned ‘Indian’ food, barely any different from that being served in the 1970s. The restaurant was busy - it was a Friday evening - and the service was polite and brisk. The decor is very old fashioned, not necessarily a disadvantage, and very pink which it was, I remember distinctly, when I last visited there some years ago. Hussain’s clearly is not a slave to fashion; presumably it does not need to be.
Given the atmosphere of decades gone by, I thought I would order a meal of times gone by starting off with onion pakora (which I think could well have been the ‘onion bhajis’ of former times) served with a traditional but nicely fresh salad garnish. There were four little onion bhajis, distinctive by their intense redness but nice and crispy and generally quite enjoyable. Then I chose chicken tikka dhansak with Peshwari naan. The chicken was far too dry and gave little pleasure but the sauce was edible enough bringing the combination of heat and sweetness and dryness that makes dhansak my favourite curry shop dish. The naan was satisfactory though a little flabby particularly in comparison with the naan I had eaten at Qavali earlier in the week
I concluded with another ancient favourite - a mango khulfi, a flavourless and not very pleasant, highly phallic erection standing not very proud on the plate. To be avoided in the future.
Hussain’s seems to attract plenty of punters so for some the old ways are still acceptable. But not for me, though never say never.
Rating:- 0.
Recent developments -
It was announced on 7 October that 670 Grams will be enlarged after Chef patron Kray Tredwell acquired the shop next door to the present restaurant. It is planned that the kitchen will double in size and that the number of covers will increase from 16 to 26. There will also be a private dining room accommodating 10 to 12 guests. In pictures the decor looks more chic than the present very bohemian look which I think is something to be welcomed.
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